Hack Education

Below are the notes from my workshop at this weekend's THATCamp Hybrid Pedagogy, along with a Storify of notes and tweets from the entire unconference. Publishing Outside the Academy Created for: THATCamp Hybrid Pedagogy, October 2012Google Doc: http://bit.ly/publishingoutsideac Workshop Description: Although many traditional academic presses are struggling to stay afloat,...

Law and Politics British Columbia announced its support for open textbooks at the Open Education 2012 conference this week, becoming the first Canadian province to do so. BC will create openly licensed textbooks for the 40 most popular first- and second-year courses in its university system. Washington voters have rejected...

[View the story "Open Education Conference, 2012" on Storify]

I wish that I could have sat and listened to Gardner Campbell talk this morning and then spend the rest of the day thinking and talking with him and with others at #opened12 about his keynote. Well, I suppose I sort of did that. I think we have all been...

Late last week, Gawker’s Adrian Chen followed through on a promise to “out” a prominent, but anonymous member of the Reddit community — “Violentacrez,” the creator or moderator of many racist and misogynist subreddits including “Creepshots” and “Rapebait.” Chen’s article “Unmasking Reddit’s Violentacrez, The Biggest Troll on the Web” is...

Every week, Steve Hargadon and I sit down (virtually) to talk about the latest ed-tech news. I always find our conversation to be one of the most thought-provoking exchanges I have all week. And I have to admit, after writing three posts last week about the business and politics of...

Law and Politics The Pakistani Taliban has claimed responsibility for the shooting of 14-year-old Malala Yousafzai. Malala has been an outspoken advocate for girls’ rights to education, blogging for the BBC about the growing influence of the Taliban in her hometown of Mingora. Malala was shot in the head and...

“As long as I live under the capitalistic system I expect to have my life influenced by the demands of moneyed people. But I will be damned if I propose to be at the beck and call of every itinerant scoundrel who has two cents to invest in a postage...

(Another post in my series on what educators should know about the business of (ed-)tech.) I confess: before I became a technology journalist, I’d never thought twice about the funding process for startups. Sure, I’d heard plenty about investors in general — that Warren Buffett fellow, for example; but I...

(Part of my “What Educators Should Know About Tech” series) The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a powerful non-profit organization whose membership is comprised of corporations and conservative politicians. This isn’t merely a lobbying group, as corporate members craft legislation introduced at the state level that promotes free-market and...