Invisible Learning in the Community Technology Centers in the Dominican Republic

11/29/2011

A case study about how increased access to information through modern information and communication technologies is impacting the informal and formal education of Dominicans.

Chapter 1

–        A growing number of individuals lack access to a higher education. There are unmet expectations. Discuss statistics which mention that despite a growing access to primary and secondary schools worldwide, there is a lack of human capital and other resources needed to meet the demand that is currently present and will continue to grow for access to higher education institutions.

–        Information access is growing because of the growing ubiquity of certain ICTs. Explain how ICTs are not only spreading quickly as few other technologies have before, but also, that since they carry information with and through them, therefore they have a broader educational impact than those the spread of a other types of technology such as new biotechnologies or energy technologies, etc.…

Wikieducator.org – OER[YUN1]  Online Community – An Online Community Ethnography

11/29/2011

Increasingly interacting with digital media, spending thousands of hours watching television, surfing the internet, or playing video games, an ever growing number of individuals can be considered digital natives or digital immigrants (Prensky, 2010; Tapscott, 2008). As a result of this recent change, it is important to understand how these interactions affect individuals living in our time and space, their cognitive abilities and what it all means for the youth of tomorrow. These are among some of the topics that have recently risen to challenge the modern ethnographer. The rapid technological change witnessed by societies in recent years has led to an increasing disconnection between generations. Phrases such as the Net Generation, Digital Natives, or Google Generation are surfacing regularly in popular news channels and have been the subject of recent publications (Tapscott, 2008; Prensky, 2010; Rowlands, et al.,…

Minnesota Principal Licensure Program – Cost / Benefit Analysis

11/30/2011

Advancing one’s education is correlated to an individual financial lifetime earnings, and increases the number of ways in which an individual can contribute to society. While going back to school is seen by some as a cost, it should more accurately be described as an investment. As this examples shows, were an elementary school teacher having a six of years of work experience and a MA degree to decide to go back to, even if this person were not to obtain the desired job, in this case, that of being a principal, the individual would still increase their earning by now qualifying to a different scale in the Wayzata teacher salary scale. In this example, the teacher in question originally had an MA and 30 additional graduate credit units, if that teacher were to obtain an additional 30 credit units, that individual would then be moves to the MA+60 pay scale.…

Sophia.org – A Collaborative and Accessible Online Learning Community

Alfonso Sintjago – Intro to Evaluation – Project B: Evaluation Context

Oct 21/2011

Object Summary

            Sophia.org provides students with an online social learning environment, where students and instructors can develop relationships with one another, and contribute to a robust social network capable of rapid expansion and fueling innovation. The program, located physically in Minneapolis, is accessible from anywhere in the world where there is free access to the internet. Their community is everywhere. However, having primarily English resources, most of Sophia’s audience is in the United States, and more specifically, in the Midwest. Sophia has various programs including free access to community developed educational videos and resources that can be rated by anyone who is a part of the community, a learning management system which integrates social media, the use of groups, and forums to further explore concepts and ideas, and Sophia Pathways, a program with over 20,000 educational videos where an institution can purchase a computer enhanced math rapid assessment program.…

Last Question – Focus Group Web Test (Open Access Questions)

October 19, 2011

Thank you for your rich responses the last few days. They have been very insightful in increasing my understanding of the opinions of graduate students at the University of Minnesota. It seems that while many of you see some promise to Open Access Journals (OAJs), there seems to be a concern regarding their quality and their sustainability. Below I include three additional questions that would help me to better understand your attitudes and concerns. Once again, thank you for your time.

A – You have just written an article and you have three choices to where you are able to submit your article:
1) to an OAJ where the university would cover the writer’s fee (if there is a fee) to submit the article.

2) to an OAJ where the writer or the grant agency that is sponsoring him or her has to pay a processing fee to submit the article.…

First Online Focus Group Questions – Open Access (Krueger’s Course)

 October 19, 2011

Day 1 –

– What are your top three news websites and the top three websites where you access academic articles? (It could be from an academic journal directly [such as IRRODL] or  from an online system for archiving academic journals [such as JSTOR]?

– Are these sites open to the public? Can they only be accessed with a subscription or membership? Does the site being open play a role as to whether or not you access it? Can you think of one major information website that you currently do not use, that you would use if it was open? With this in mind, to what extent is the ability to access information freely on the internet influencing the type of information you consume? (not at all, some (little), a lot, a great deal)?

Day 2 –

For today, it would be helpful if you could share with us what you understand by a) open access journals, b) open content (on the internet), c) open courseware, d) open education resources, and e) open education?…

Second Online Focus Group Questions – Open Access – Krueger’s Course

October 19, 2011

Day 1

– What are your top three news websites (CNN, NYT, Fox, etc) and the top three websites where you access academic articles? (It could be from an academic journal [such as IRRODL] or from an online system for archiving academic journals [such as JSTOR], an online directory [such as DOAJ ] or an academic journal search engine [Such as Google Scholar]?

– Are the sites you mentioned open to the public? Can they only be accessed with a subscription or membership? Does the site being open play a role as to whether or not you access it? Can you think of one major information website that you currently do not use, that you would use if it was open? With this in mind, to what extent is the ability to access information freely on the internet influencing the type of information you consume?…

Vertical Discourse Analysis of ICT Policies: Policy Borrowing from the International to the Regional to the Local. A study of the policy recommendations from the World Summit on the Information Society (2003-2005), and their impact on Latin American regional ICT policy recommendations, the Dominican Republic, and Colombia’s national ICT plans.

10/19/2011

“Like the generations before us, we may be preoccupied with specific and possibly ephemeral events and trends, at the risk of overlooking what only many years from now will be seen as the fundamental dynamic of our age” (Beniger, 1986, p. 3)

Technologies have shaped the course of human kind throughout history (Adas, 1990)[1]. Faced with obstacles, “modern men [made] use of sophisticated technology to remake their environment and change their social systems in ways intended to advance… the development of society as a whole” (Adas, 1990, p. 413) After a technology is adopted, returning to a stage where this technology is no longer utilized is often a difficult, if not impossible, endeavor (McClellan & Dorn, 2006).…

Inviting Participants – Open Access Focus Groups!

October 17, 2011

Dear Fellow Students,

Open Access Week 2011 is just around the corner (z.umn.edu/openaccess2011). This year the University of Minnesota Libraries are planning a series of activities which we hope you are able to attend. Open Access Week promotes the increased publication in, and use of, open access journals, which allow anyone with an internet connection to access up to date research online, for free! This enables students, as well as researchers, doctors, patients, entrepreneurs, the public, and people in developing countries to be able to access the most updated research and, in doing so, make better decisions and time investments.  For more information visit about some student concerns regarding “Open Access” visit www.RighttoResearch.org.

To have a better idea of the concerns of graduate students at the University of Minnesota, I invite you to participate in a focus group on one of the following dates; October 20 and 21 (2 to 4 pm – East Bank – Room TBA), or October 24 (10 am to 12 pm – St.…