• Tips for Business School Personal Statement Your personal statement for business school is one of the most important components of your application portfolio. The essay is kind of like a presidential candidate?s speech at a convention; the audience may have learned a lot about you from second-hand sources, but this is the only shot to sell yourself in your own words. Accordingly, you should bring your A-game. The most essential aspect of a strong essay is a compelling narrative. Tell your story and give it an ambitious ending. Place yourself within a chronology, and explain why it?s now time to get an MBA. You may have been a Philosophy major who entered the workforce as an Editor but ended up really interested in Marketing and Business Development. Or you may be looking ... | Read the rest of this entry »
• Careers in Augmented Reality ‘Augmented reality’ has become a hot term in new media since the MIT Media Lab unveiled SixthSense, an interactive data projection device, at the 2009 TED conference. The projection of virtual information onto the physical environment is already revolutionizing video games and mobile phone apps. Next up: healthcare, military training, and product marketing innovations. To take part in the new and improved digital future, train for careers in augmented reality. What is Augmented Reality? Augmented reality leverages existing technologies to create a single, powerful innovation: a digital overlay for the real world. As Greg Davis, manager of AR software company Total Immersion, explains it, “Augmented reality is a composite experience — a video stream merged with a synthetic component and manipulated in real time. We are taking ... | Read the rest of this entry »
• Top 5 Reasons for a Health Degree Online Health Affairs recently reported that the U.S. will have 260,000 fewer nurses that it needs by 2025. Online career training can help you train for a job that’s expected to be in high demand in the coming years. Check out the top reasons to get an online degree in health care. 1. Online Education Fills Training Shortages The American Association of Colleges of Nursing reports that U.S. nursing schools turned away 49,948 qualified applicants from baccalaureate and graduate nursing programs in 2008 due to insufficient number of faculty, clinical sites, classroom space, clinical preceptors, and budget constraints. With campus-based schools scrambling to fill the training need, online nursing programs offer an alternative to the crowded classroom. 2. Get a Primer on Health Care Technology Whether you’re looking for a ... | Read the rest of this entry »

• Ethiopia Gets It Wrong, Oh So Wrong

  “When brains are outlawed, only outlaws will have brains.” — Kevin Hawkinson

  Having grown up in the Washington, D.C. area means that I've heard some pretty bone-headed public policy decisions in my time. And long time readers and others who know me well will remember that usually I'm biased toward developing countries, not against them. But the Ministry of Education of Ethiopia has done something so incredibly short-sighted that they deserve to be ridiculed: As reported by Addis Fortune newspaper, they have decided, without warning, to ban Ethiopian universities from providing distance learning.

  The purpose for this surprise decision is ostensibly the lack of need in Ethiopia for distance learning. According to the article, "Distance learning education is unnecessary at this stage in the development of the education sector, the directive claimed in banning it. This logic was hard to grasp by a lot of people at the helm of private institutions of higher learning." I'll bet it was! But industry groups there were quick to protest this explanation, pointing out that Ethiopian students are already proving those in government wrong by earning degrees through foreign-based providers like the University of South Africa and the UK's Open University. After all, if it's so unnecessary, then why would they have to ban it?

  What those in governments around the world should have figured out by now is that on a planet with an Internet, only two choices are possible. One is to disconnect your country from the Internet (a lesser version of which is to make futile attempts to censor it). The other is to accept that those living in your country will have access to information and services that originate from outside your borders of control. In the case of this ban on distance learning, the only thing that will happen is that Ethiopians who need or want this demonstrably desirable service will seek out foreign universities — meaning that money that could have remained in the Ethiopian economy will instead disappear abroad. This is so foolish that it's difficult to believe that decision makers there don't realize it.

  But if that's so, if they are consciously sabotaging their own university sector, it raises the question why. Could it be that private universities are doing such a better job accommodating students that public ones are being put to shame, prompting this ham-fisted response to subvert them? Perhaps that or something like it can serve as an explanation. But even then, one recalls that it was private, for-profit universities that first focused on meeting the needs of working adults in the U.S., and which first concentrated on offering programs online. Eventually, public and non-profit institutions began to learn from those early adopters and catch up. This sequence benefited both students and universities in the U.S. The Ethiopian Ministry of Education would have done well to consider this example before smothering their country's ability to fully train its own workforce.

  

• Golden Swamp goes big picture with Handschooling.com A new website Handschooling.com has been spun off of GoldenSwamp.com. Click this line to go there to see what is a big picture of exciting new serendipitously, wonderful brand new way to learn in the 21st century. Here is why I created Handschooling.com, from the About section of the new website: Handschooling will ? at last ? [...]

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• Using Media to Pace Your Class When teachers do anything for more than 20 minutes, students get restless. One way to deal with this is to keep a collection of relevant film clips on hand to break up the monotony of discussion, to reenergize a class grown bored. A well-paced, technology-enhanced class feels like it's going by faster and is more enjoyable for students. And when students are enjoying themselves, it's a lot easier to teach them. This article explains the tools you will need to create video clips for class, as well as an explanation for why and how to use them.
• The Human Systems Director For many years, e-learning suppliers (at least, those in the U.K.) have been frustrated by having to sell their products twice to the same potential buyer. That's because they need to convince not only a potential customer's HR specialists, but also their IT specialists that they should buy what the supplier is offering. Now comes news that that sort of frustration could soon become a thing of the past. Newly published research suggests that a new job title is coming to the business world: the human systems director. According to a study conducted by the Future Foundation on behalf of Google, the workplace will be transformed by the sharing and development of ideas by 2020.
• Can Social Media Help School Phobia? Didaskaleinophobia, more commonly referred to as school phobia, is a panic disorder affecting roughly 1.4 million American adolescents. For these children and young adults, e-learning and other learning grounded in social media tools may provide some of the best opportunities for them to succeed in their education.

• Find the Best Online University for You Search our online university rankings and ratings below in order to select the best online university for your needs, then use the links to request a free information packet from that school: Kaplan University ? Kaplan University online is the...
• Online University Ranking - 2008 Below you will find the top 10 online universities for 2008. Students interested in a particular school can request free information directly from the university by clicking on the 'More Info' buttons: Kaplan University ? Kaplan University online is the...

• How to Interview with Confidence Since just getting an interview can often seem like a job in itself, you can go ahead and give yourself a big pat on the back if you’ve landed one? However, now the hard work really starts? Now it’s time to actually land the job! The interview itself is the most difficult part of securing job. Not only [...]
• The 3 Step Job Interview Process Getting a job these days can be quite difficult. In fact, just getting a job interview can be quite a challenge. You need to make sure you do everything you can to make your cover letter and resume stand out amongst all the competition.Unfortunately, even if you do that it still might not be [...]