OLDaily

FutureLearn team up with Microsoft for online AI course
Graham Attwell, Pontydysgu, 2020/11/18

I like the commentary more than the news. "Why would FutureLearn be giving away vouchers for sitting Microsoft exams?" asks Graham Attwell. "It could be because the 15 week course costs 584 Euros to enroll.  Much as I like microcredentially, this seems a long way from FutureLearn’s past MOOCs free for participation." No kidding. And as he says, " if as the course information claims, 'artificial intelligence skills are frequently listed among the most in-demand workplace skills in the current and future job market, as organisations seek to harness AI to revolutionise their operations' and 'employers are faced with a shortfall of qualified candidates' surely this is an area where public education and trainings services should be providing online course, rather than restricting access to those who can afford to pay for learning new skills." Maybe these employers who need these AI skills could pay for some of these education programs.

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Social Media Privacy in Canada 2020
Anatoliy Gruzd, Philip Mai, Social Media Lab, Ryerson University, 2020/11/18

This is an overview of privacy preferences on social media in Canada. The most telling finding is that "The majority (56%) of respondents (n=1500) were uncomfortable with marketers and political parties (52%) accessing information about them or posted by them publicly on social media." Only on LinkedIn did the majority of users prefer primarily public settings. There's no direct download on the website so I'm saved a copy of the CC-by document on my website you can access here. Here's the report press release.

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Privacy Pressure Points: A Closer Look at Ten Consumer Privacy Protection Act Concerns
Michael Geist, 2020/11/18

Michael Geist has analyzed the proposed Consumer Privacy Protection Act (or as he says, technically Bill C-11, the Digital Charter Implementation Act) and erases some of my original optimism. Some of the concerns: allowing data collection to support "an activity in the course of which obtaining the individual’s consent would be impracticable because the organization does not have a direct relationship with the individual (though the same language is found in the Panel on Research Ethics, 5.5A, so it may be too late to object); a concern that "that complainants may find themselves largely shut out of the process should the Privacy Commissioner decline to conduct an inquiry". The main criticism, I think, is that the bill is being approached as a commercial privacy law, while as Geist notes, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (and, I note, many others) have called on the government to take a human rights centered approach. Image: Innovation, Science and Industry Minister Navdeep Bains, CBC.

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Culturally Proficient Professional Learning: A new lens to look at professional learning and enhance learning transfer
eLearning Africa News, 2020/11/18

This article recommends specifically a "culturally grounded professional learning framework... that aims to enhance the implementation of newly acquired knowledge" and describes the Culturally Proficient Professional Learning (CPPL) framework, includes a Multidimensional Model of Learning Transfer (MMLT), where "culture incorporates the differential effects of age, gender, race, ethnicity, social class, religion, sexual orientation, and abilities." This article describes a very ordinary approach, though more information is available in these books by Delores Lindsey et.al. (I looked for open resources on this framework but couldn't find any, which doesn't seem very culturally proficient to me).

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Internet of Education
Learning Economy Foundation, 2020/11/18

The Learning Economy Foundation and its partners are launching the Internet of Education Guiding Principles today. The Internet of Education was promoted in Davos back in January and the first-interation website is available today. It is not an organization, according to its website, but is rather "a network of protocols and shared services that enable lifelong, personalized, competency-based learning at the scale of the Internet." Its vision is articulated in these principles (which have my broad support) and specific proposals include a focus on equity networks, skills libraries, digital wallets, data harmonization, and a skills GPS. I think they've built a nice online community to share resources and ideas, but I don't see that they're actually doing anything yet, though it may be too early for that. But I'd be looking for things like a distributed learning resource library, calendar of open educational events, personal learning environment specifications (and reference implementation), etc.

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