OLDaily

Younger Americans are better than older Americans at telling factual news statements from opinions
Jeffrey Gottfried, Pew Research Center, 2018/10/25

I've heard it said only half-jokingly that people are worried about social media being as bad for today's generation as television was for their parents. Television was - and continues to be - a disaster for public knowledge, in my view. According to this report, we might be better off with the internet (even with cesspools like 4chan and Facebook). "About a third of 18- to 49-year-olds (32%) correctly identified all five of the factual statements as factual, compared with two-in-ten among those ages 50 and older." I tried the test myself and scored 5 out of 5, of course.

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Media, Society, Culture and You
Mark Poepsel, Media, Society, Culture and You, 2018/10/25

This isn't a great book, and it isn't a terrible book - I think the advertising describes it best, as "an approachable introductory Mass Communication text that covers major mass communication terms and concepts including 'digital culture.'" It introduces readers to everything from Dewey to brocolage to Shirky to framing theory. At one point it invites readers to criticize the book itself - exactly the right approach. And it's free and open source, and would make a fine high school or first year text. Comes in a variety of open formats, or if you want, 116 page PDF.

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2018 Students and Technology Research Study
Dana C. Gierdowski, D. Christopher Brooks, Joseph Galanek, EDUCAUSE, 2018/10/25

 From this report (47 page PDF) some of the the key findings (quoted):

• Practically all college and university students (in the U.S.)  have access to the most important technologies for their academic success.
• While laptops, hybrids, desktops, and smartphones continue to be rated as very to extremely important to student success, the importance of these devices differs considerably by student demographics
• Students’ overall technology experiences continue to be correlated with their evaluation of campus Wi-Fi reliability and ease of login.
• The typical student is fairly serious about doing the work of being a student, spending 1 to 4 hours per day online doing homework and conducting research.

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EDEN RW Barcelona Declaration 2018
European Distance Education Network, 2018/10/25

I'm not sure when this will wrap up (perhaps even before you read this post) but it's worth forwarding: "#EDENRW10 organizing committee is working on a Declaration regarding the workshop theme. Here's the draft http://ow.ly/YPPi30mmYF6  Please we would love your contribution using the hashtag #BCNdeclaration18." The document addresses the need for personal learning, open learning, and teachers as facilitators using digital technologies. Your new jargon for the day is "ipsative approaches", which is defined in the document as "Assessment based on a comparison with a previous performance can offer to the students more information about their progress, in terms of how well they have implemented the recommendations from previous feedback." I've created my own version of the document in order to allow you to comment directly on the text rather than rely on Twitter.

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Social entrepreneurship gains ground on Canadian campuses
Anqi Shen, University Affairs, 2018/10/25

According to the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation’s RECODE initiative program director Chad Lubelsky, “A social entrepreneur, in the broadest sense, is someone who is starting things for the social good, and the container – be it a business, co-op, not-for-profit or charity – is secondary,” I'm not thrilled by the use of the term 'entrepreneur', which to me seems to import for-profit business concepts into the social and public spheres, but but I do support the idea of promoting projects that engage students in projects designed to increase the public good. This isn't a business concept; it's a concept rooted in progressive education. “Its role is to provide students with what’s sometimes called a 21st-century education, a real-world application to their learning on real issues, and building core skillsets. It also helps create a more permeable boundary between the campus and community.”

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VET Knowledge Bank
2018/10/25

The National Vocational Education and Training Research NCVER News has been running a series on the vocational education and training (VET) Knowledge Bank, including especially the History of VET and Landmark documents. From the website: "The VET Knowledge Bank contains a suite of products capturing Australia's diverse, complex and ever-changing vocational education and training (VET) system. It aims to provide a collected memory of VET reference information. The VET Knowledge Bank is a living, growing resource. More content will be added in the coming months." Also, "VOCEDplus is a free international research database for tertiary education relating to workforce needs, skills development, and social inclusion."

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Try to Lower the Stakes of the Job-Interview Dinner
Jonathan Malesic, Chronicle of Higher Education, 2018/10/25

I've never had a job-interview dinner, and never really thought of it, but I do recall meeting Gene Semchych at a restaurant prior to my employment at Assiniboine Community College (which would be my first real job in 15 years) and spilling food on my shirt. I'm not really a social eater to bgin with; I can't imagine eating when my future employment is on the line. This article gets to the point of job-interview dinners. " Dining is filled with unwritten social codes: signifiers of status, indexes of health, identity markers, taboos. When academic departments invite a job candidate out to eat, they’re putting all of that on the table. As a result, their choice of a restaurant can signal who belongs and who doesn’t belong at the university or in the wider community." And in a world where everybody should belong, that's not a good signal to send.

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