As states put their plans into place for Common Core State Standard implementation, many are realizing how Open Educational Resources (OER) and open practices play an essential role in accessing the true power of the Common Core. The opportunity for sharing and collaboration in education has been amplified, because for the first time, 47 states share the same Mathematics and English Language Arts learning standards.
Last Monday, during her final week as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton commanded the attention of a global education force field from the State Department, the Arab League, the Department of Education, and a group of representatives from other national and international education organizations and institutions with a simple, but radical idea–education diplomacy–and a road map of how to achieve it.
By Clare Middleton-Detzner and Erin Knepler
We’ve seen how hot news stories and video links can go viral through social media channels. Imagine if that same fast pace could propel ideas through higher education to benefit productivity and efficiency in those systems. After returning home to Maryland from Big Ideas Fest—an annual nexus for some of the top innovators in education—Erin Knepler, P-20 Program Director at the University System of Maryland, began to imagine education innovation gone viral.
As a research assistant at ISKME, I have opportunities to investigate cutting-edge innovations in education everyday. This past year I was tasked with a project to investigate alternative pathways in education, such as MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses), personalized online classrooms, and free, university-level courses. Developments in this space have accelerated over the past year and disrupted how we view education.
Eagerly awaited at Big Ideas Fest 2012 was an update from our three Big Ideas in Beta 2012 teams, whose projects originated at Big Ideas Fest 2011, and who had spent the year meeting regularly to develop their kernel of an idea to the next stages. The three teams below received financial support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, facilitation from ISKME, and advice from experts in education, technology, and business development:
