Sarah Battersby

Communications Consultant, National Scholarship Providers Association

Scholarships are an important part of any college journey, and a few key steps can help students access this source of higher education funding.

FAFSA

First, complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), if eligible. The application opens in October each year and it should be completed as soon as possible. Colleges use this to calculate their financial aid awards (scholarship providers often use it, too). The FAFSA uses information from two years ago, so if there have been big changes in employment or income for anyone in the family, a good next step is speaking to financial aid staff to make sure those are updated.

Look for scholarships

Second, look for scholarships. The best place to start will be on their college’s financial aid website and department(s) where they’re hoping to study. Next, search for private scholarships; these can be national, statewide, and local.

Check out sites like College Board and Fastweb, but also be sure to speak with guidance counselors and look at local organizations like foundations, nonprofits, civic groups, and employers. Often, the narrower the criteria, the higher chance students may have of receiving an award as the scholarship will receive fewer applications.

Students should apply for all scholarships where they meet the eligibility criteria. To get started, make a list of accomplishments, extracurriculars (including awards, clubs, sports, work, and (for some scholarships) even child and elder care), passions, interests, and college goals. This information can be used over and over when filling out applications. Many scholarships might use similar essay prompts or short answer questions.

Make sure to keep track of deadlines, spell-check essays, and have at least one trusted non-family member in mind that can write a recommendation letter. 

Follow up

Finally, scholarship recipients shouldn’t forget to thank their donor and make sure they are aware of any requirements, like providing student information, maintaining a certain GPA, or completing a report every semester. Students can also share with their scholarship provider how the award helped them! 

For more information on finding and applying for scholarships, head to this helpful guide for scholarship seekers created by the National Scholarship Providers Association (NSPA).

The post Key Tips for Accessing Scholarships for Higher Education appeared first on Education and Career News.

As these technologies began to mature and the human population became ever-connected with smartphones, smart infrastructure started to move into more defined spaces, like airports, hotels, amusement parks, and now, higher education campuses. 

Smart higher education

The advent of these technologies within higher education campuses is particularly important to note. Not only are these making everyday lives of students safer, more productive, more predictable, and less wasteful of time and resources, but they are also making it easier for campus administrations to manage these growing campuses with a clear line of sight to returns on their investments.

Let’s look at this a bit more closely.

Several higher education campuses have already deployed the infrastructure that generates context-sensitive, real-time data that allows for a wide range of services for the students (e.g., smart scheduling, health and safety, curated local events, booking available space at the gym or meeting rooms, etc.) as well as for administrators (e.g., utilization rate of gym infrastructure, safety hot spots, etc.).  All such use cases directly tie back to student well-being, student performance, and increased capital returns. And in the end, they start bending even more important metrics like student dropout rates.

Transforming campuses

The momentum around smart higher education campuses is clearly picking up. At a recent congressional caucus that included Arizona State University, Rice University, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, and others, the discussion highlighted the benefits of smart campuses tied to “enhancing student learning and quality of life, lowering operation costs, greater security and safety, and environmental sustainability. These digitally connected campuses are benefiting not only the students and faculty but also their surrounding community.” This is no small recognition.

“Transforming the campus to leverage these smart technologies to improve everyday life on campus is a journey,” says Sabina Saksena, founder and CEO of Cytilife, the leading smart campus platform deployed at several prestigious higher education campuses. “It is about connecting individuals (students, administrators) to physical and informational infrastructure (gym machines, campus shuttles) on a real time basis to offer services that are transformative, almost magical. The data allows us to offer predictive services where the user gets to know even before asking.”

Adaptive

This is the new world of living within an environment that learns about you, adapts to your needs, and helps you stay one step ahead of yourself. It sees around the corners to keep you safe. It serves you with insights that make the moment better and the waste of time steadily disappear. And all that while ensuring you remain in control of your identity and data, and how you wish to be served. 

The benefits are significant and far-reaching, from improved mental health to reduced dropout rates, from higher return on investment to better all-around performance. Students have already tasted the power of this movement, from visiting Disney parks to studying at early adopter higher education schools, and that grassroots movement is propelling the growing interest among institutions.

Smart campuses are here.  Are you there too?

The post Smart Campus: The Environment That Adapts appeared first on Education and Career News.

Campus safety has never been more important. In a survey conducted by education resource company Noodle, 75 percent of respondents listed a “safe environment” as a priority when it came to choosing a school. But the definition of a safe environment has gone far beyond a few security officers and some cameras — modern-day security is determined by an institution’s handling of critical events.

“What it comes down to is there are things you care about, and there are things that you worry about,” says Imad Mouline, chief technology officer at Everbridge, an emergency communications company. “If the things that you worry about impact the things that you care about, that’s a critical event.”

Managing critical events

Whether the campus in question is a small college, a large teaching hospital, or another type of institution, the definition of what constitutes a critical event has broadened to include natural disasters like earthquakes or hurricanes, active-assailant scenarios, or even terrorist threats far away from the physical campus.  

“The scope has changed,” notes Mouline. “The duty of care has expanded to cover anybody who happens to be on campus and to cover people affiliated with the school, regardless of where they are.”

This expanding scope has made it an absolute necessity that every campus has a Critical Event Management System (CEM) in place. A software platform can analyze the huge volume of information generated by both campus communications and security systems as well as global events that can potentially impact students, faculty or staff associated with the institution.

Critical events can also be more routine and smaller in scale — such as managing annual commencement or a sporting event. Processes and management can often require the same diligence and coordination as with larger disasters.

Another reason an integrated software platform for managing critical events is essential is speed — when critical events occur, the speed of response is critical. “That’s what a CEM allows you to do,” says Mouline, “notice something has happened as quickly as possible, letting you know that you need to care about it, tell you what the scope is, and trigger the appropriate protocols to help you minimize or eliminate the impact.”

Consolidation

CEM offers one other huge benefit: consolidation of emergency response resources. Managing critical events requires security and emergency management personnel to continuously know where their student, faculty, or staff populations are, what’s happening in those locations, and how those events might impact those specific people. It’s almost impossible to manage this level of real-time data without a CEM software solution.

“Chances are, you will miss somebody, you will miss something,” warns Mouline. “It’ll take you longer, and you’ll end up being reactive. In many cases, the response to one of these critical events can have more of an impact than the critical event itself.” It would be easy, for example, to overlook populations with special needs, such as students who cannot self-evacuate.

Everbridge’s CEM platform (which is delivered as customizable software-as-a-service through any web browser, requiring no local installation) closes the loop on the critical event cycle with a four-step process:

1. Assess events culled from data sources including local security systems and world news
2. Locate students or other groups impacted by these events
3. Act by initiating response protocols and alerting emergency response teams
4. Analyze the event and the response to determine how plans can be improved

Modern campus security needs to be proactive, wide in scope, and consolidated to keep students, faculty, staff, patients, or visitors on campus safe. A robust critical event management platform can augment existing data and security systems to ensure that the campus — both locally and globally, wherever students or faculty happen to be — is safe. With increasing competition to attract the best and brightest students, faculty, and staff, a CEM platform is no longer a nicety; it is a requirement that can directly impact an institution’s bottom line.

The post Keeping Your Campus Safe During Critical Events appeared first on Education and Career News.

The rise of CTE

“There is a huge need for workers in entry-level jobs in fast-growing industries like healthcare,” says Dr. Fardad Fateri, president and CEO of International Education Corporation (IEC), a national provider of career education programs.

The growing divide between the skills acquired in the traditional higher education experience and the skills that are needed in the available careers has driven a renewed interest in, and support for, CTE programs. These programs offer shorter routes to a degree (often in less than 10 months), lower costs, and a tighter focus on landing a job right out of school. These factors have driven public interest in the CTE sphere; in 2018 alone, state legislatures passed 85 CTE bills, and, at the federal level, congress reauthorized the 2006 Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, which gives the states more control over more than a billion dollars in grants aimed at CTE programs. This benefits people who never considered a four-year college an affordable option — in terms of time or money — but who nevertheless want to pursue a degree that grants them access to a rewarding and lucrative career.

More than just a degree

To fulfill these potential benefits, Dr. Fateri believes short-term career training programs must offer a few key aspects: career advising, and hands-on experience through externships or apprenticeships and faculty active in their field.

“At IEC, we consider externships to be an important part of the curriculum,” Fateri says. “The students get to apply what they’ve learned in a real work environment with an employer who may ultimately hire them.” These types of programs offer a huge advantage; the U.S. Department of Commerce reports that a staggering 91 percent of apprentices find employment after they complete their program, with an average starting salary of $60,000.

Fateri stresses that students considering a CTE program should look for schools that offer career counseling “from the beginning,” but also notes that they should choose programs that employ instructors who are also practitioners in their field with significant experience, as this allows them to acquire real-world, relevant skills in their chosen field.

These real-world elements are important to the new generation of students, says Dina H., a student in the Pharmacy Technician program at IEC’s UEI College. “We get time in the lab to work on our skills every day. The classes are small enough to allow for one-on-one time with the instructors and the instructors are professionals in the fields they teach.” Kaitlyn L, studying to be a Pharmacy Technician at IEC’s Florida Career College shares, “The part about the program I love is the hands-on learning aspect — the simple fact that I can get a first-hand real-life example and experience of what is to come.”

In an educational climate shadowed by debt and a job market undergoing a fundamental transformation towards middle-skill positions, CTE programs offer clear rewards with lower costs. “Our students want to build a future they can be proud of,” Dr. Fateri says. “We take that responsibility very seriously.”For more information about these programs visit www.ieccolleges.com.

The post The Future of Higher Education Includes Career and Technical Training appeared first on Education and Career News.

Leveraging artificial intelligence and machine learning, SailPoint provides a cloud-based predictive identity governance platform specifically curated to your university’s needs. “You’re going to be able to be more autonomous,” said Cullen Landrum, a sales engineer at SailPoint, “while your users will have rights and entitlements added or removed based on the user population.”

Access authentication

Because of the transient nature of a university’s user population, one of the risks institutions face is giving a user too much digital access. “Most cybersecurity attacks have some element of a user’s identity having access to too much information,” Landrum said. “SailPoint limits that attack vector by managing the correct entitlements for each user.”

SailPoint not only governs all users and their access to sensitive applications and data, but they have also taken that to the next level with SailPoint Predictive Identity , which leverages machine learning and AI technologies to predict whether a user has the correct access (as one example). “It’s really the future of where we’re going with identity governance,” Landrum said. “A cloud infrastructure that’s going to put security first — that’s where SailPoint shines.”

SailPoint has already helped many universities. According to their success story, Norwich University implemented SailPoint’s IdentityNow to advance their identity management program. Norwich understood the importance of digital security, as their graduate program was entirely online. The IT Systems team at Norwich University began by implementing a password management solution, giving remote students a more efficient and safe introductory onboarding experience. Before using IdentityNow, Norwich University was manually managing incoming digital users, but now all of that password and access management is automated. University officials reported that integrating IdentityNow fixed 90 percent of their provisioning issues and saved two full days per month in administrative time creating accounts. 

For universities looking to increase digital security, SailPoint’s identity management platform lowers the resource costs of identity management, as their machine learning and automation take those tasks out of the hands of digital administrators. The long-term financial benefits of an automated identity management system are evident, yet universities are not directing adequate resources for digital security. Almost 70 percent of universities are spending only 1-10 percent of their IT budget on cybersecurity, according to research from the Tambellini Group in 2018.

SailPoint has partnered with other complementary identity management providers, including Identity Works. “Within the past decade SailPoint has really taken on a leadership role in the field of identity governance,” said Patrick Dooley, president and founder of Identity Works. “They have a comprehensive solution to identity governance and administration tools as both an on-premises offering as well as the cloud-based side solution for the institutions that are opting for a cloud-first strategy.”

Tailored solutions

SailPoint offers a curated approach to each university’s needs. “Out of the box, SailPoint provides over a hundred connectors which can get them managing accounts in mainstream products, whether they’re on-premises or whether they’re cloud-based,” Dooley said. “In addition to that, SailPoint provides a plug-in interface, which we’ve found to be very flexible.”

Dooley is particularly excited about SailPoint Predictive Identity. “SailPoint’s most recent innovation in artificial intelligence and machine learning is extremely promising from our perspective,” he said. “This will change the future of how identity management is done.”

What sets SailPoint apart from all of their competitors, Dooley said, is that they are dedicated to their customer’s success. “When we first made a decision to partner with SailPoint years ago, that was the No. 1 driver,” Dooley said. “They’re innovating the marketplace and they’re really driving identity management vendors to follow in their footsteps.”

The post How One Company Has Changed the Game for Identity Management appeared first on Education and Career News.

Sue Diseker Sabat

CEO, BocaVox

How important is it to consider each student’s unique needs in optimizing their higher education experience? 

Students have different learning styles and goals for why they attend college. If their adviser utilizes an individualized learning plan and uploads it to the student’s file in the institution’s management system so both can refer back to it and update it throughout the student’s academic life, it can provide a roadmap to help them reach their goals. Documenting goals helps students commit to them.

What challenges do colleges and universities have when changing their infrastructure to ensure student and institutional success? 

Because each institution has different ways of operating, an infrastructure change is always challenging. The key to a successful system transition is to have at least one fully dedicated resource who is familiar with the institution’s processes. A project manager must have excellent communication and organizational skills with the ability to prioritize needs.

How does data inform strategic decision-making for college and university leaders? 

Admission, attendance, grades, and data from satisfaction surveys all help predict drop-out or graduation rates; disciplinary actions, data from media and student/faculty communications can inform decisions to avoid potential acts of violence; and course request data can inform hiring decisions and the need for an increase/decrease in courses to offer. 

What areas should institutions prioritize in 2020 and how important is it to consider each student’s unique needs in optimizing the higher education experience?

Key focus of institutions for 2020 are maintaining or increasing enrollment numbers with clever recruitment efforts: offering up-to-date courses based on career trends, staying current on social media, offering social events and presentations that cater to the preferences of targeted student populations, and continuing to do research that will contribute to a kinder, healthier world.

Charlie Moran

Sr. Partner and CEO, Moran Technology Consulting

How important is it to consider each student’s unique needs in optimizing their higher education experience? 

Each student arrives with different background, goals, resources, and challenges. If we really want to help our students, we have to holistically consider these differences to provide personalized help that really helps. Bulk solutions that assume they help everyone often help no one. 

What challenges do colleges and universities have when changing their infrastructure to ensure student and institutional success? 

The major challenges are money and culture. Investment dollars are disappearing, but major people and technology investments are needed. A culture that doesn’t primarily focus on student success will be hard-pressed to survive. Cultural change has to start at the top and be reinforced regularly.

How does data inform strategic decision making for college and university leaders? 

It is countercultural, but institutions must learn to use data to analyze and stop spending on low-return programs and activities, and to focus spending on areas that deliver student-recognized benefits. Schools have the data they need – they just haven’t invested to strategically use it.

What areas should institutions prioritize in 2020 and how important is it to consider each student’s unique needs in optimizing the higher education experience?

Find and stop low benefit activities, and redirect their funding to invest in student and institutional success. Use your data to identify and recruit the types of students who will be successful at your institution. Be transparent, and show faculty and staff where you get and spend your funds. 

Dr. Michael Berger

Dean, College of Doctoral Studies, Grand Canyon University

How does higher education benefit career paths or create value and new opportunities?

College degrees are more imperative today than ever before. As our workforce grows increasingly competitive, it becomes clear that higher education is a necessary pursuit for those with goals of becoming a leader in their field. 

In many industries, it’s not only that a person’s salary steadily increases along with their level of college education, it’s that a college degree is the key you need to unlock the door into the field at all. Many employers won’t even consider employees without a bachelor’s degree. 

Employees with graduate-level degrees stand out from their peers and are better positioned for advanced opportunities and leadership positions. Doctoral programs teach not only advanced skills and knowledge, but also high-level critical thinking and analysis skills that are increasingly in demand in today’s information-saturated world. 

What resources are necessary to help students thrive in higher education programs?

Higher education programs are challenging by nature but earning a high-level degree is more than achievable when academic institutions offer students proper resources. Academic support in higher education includes traditional tutoring programs outside the classroom, but inside the classroom, it is essential to have faculty who are accessible to students, who are invested in their students’ success, and who care about them as human beings. 

In addition to academic resources, institutions who intend for students to thrive should provide resources that support students’ physical and mental health. These include counseling services and addressing problems within the institution that may cause students to experience stress or setbacks. 

One of the most impactful resources in higher education is the support of peers. Higher education institutions can assist students by fostering an environment where learners can benefit and learn from one another.

What changes are universities making to adapt to the increase of online students in higher education programs?

The increase in demand for online education programs has resulted in a greater number of higher education institutions entering into the online education space. This competitive landscape has made it necessary for universities to invest into their online education platforms, utilizing software and hardware to enhance the connection between remote students and faculty. 

In order to provide higher quality in their online courses, universities are hiring faculty who specialize in online education rather than traditional in-person instruction. Prioritizing research into effective pedagogies for online learning is allowing institutions to administer superior education to a rapidly increasing population of online learners. 

Online students can have different needs than their on-campus counterparts, and a university has to be ready to address and manage those differences. 

What are your thoughts on the future of higher education?

Expectations of employees are increasing throughout our workforce and the responsibility of preparing graduates to meet these expectations is falling on higher education institutions. 

Moving forward, higher education programs will need to provide students with opportunities to practice skills learned within the classroom. Higher education needs to harness the theoretical toward the development of concrete, actionable skillsets that allow students to thrive when they enter their careers. It needs to accommodate the students with differing schedules who are likely working one or even two jobs while in school. It needs to focus first and foremost on student outcomes — higher graduation rates, lower student debt, and higher employment placement rates. 

Fardad Fateri

President and CEO, International Educational Corporation

How important is it to consider each student’s unique needs in optimizing the higher education experience?

Students come to college with unique backgrounds and experiences to be able to assess and address each student’s style in an accommodating and warm learning community is an essential part of ensuring student success.

How are non-traditional higher education programs improving the student experience?

I wouldn’t say non-traditional higher education necessarily improves a student’s experience; I would say non-traditional higher education serves a student population that would otherwise not have the opportunity to experience a college experience that is short-term, practitioner-oriented, hands-on and career-focused.

What key focus areas should institutions be prioritizing in 2020?

The postsecondary institution of the future needs to align itself with societal and marketplace demands as well as the needs of the new generation of students who don’t always seek degrees but want competency-based education that prepares them for the real world.

How does including educators in a university’s decision-making leadership improve outcomes for students and faculty?

Asking for student, staff, and faculty feedback should not be a novel concept but as an integral part of designing organizations that is inclusive, collaborative, thoughtful and strategic.

The post The Key to a Student-Focused Future for Higher Education appeared first on Education and Career News.

Do you know your agilities? 

At The DeBruce Foundation, our theory of change is that when one knows their “agilities” — or how strengths and interests connect to work activities — they begin to develop the “Agility Advantage.” This means they are prepared to see opportunity, overcome challenges and navigate the ever-changing workplace.

As the first step toward developing the Agility Advantage, we’ve created the Agile Work Profiler, an online career assessment that is free to the public and takes less than 10 minutes to complete. This tool helps individuals discover their agilities.

In our recent survey of 700 young people (ages 16-24) and 300 parents in the Midwest, we found: 

Youth are optimistic about their futures, but there’s a disconnect

Although 88 percent of young people are confident they will achieve their career goals, they do not know what those careers will be or which are best suited for them. Four out of 10 do not know what career they want to pursue, and 64 percent have only considered one or two careers in the last year (yet we know from the Bureau of Labor Statistics they will hold an average of 12 different jobs throughout their working life).

Too many youth are disengaged from the career preparation process

One in 5 youths say they have not really spent time thinking about their career at all and 1 in 3 youth have little to no idea what to do to prepare for a career. Also, only about half of youth (45%) have taken a career aptitude test.

Our research indicates there is a tremendous opportunity to help youth develop the Agility Advantage to expand their career pathways and make informed career decisions. To learn more about our research, visit DeBruce.org. To access the Agile Work Profiler, visit agilities.org.

The post How Identifying Strengths and Interests Can Set Kids up For Success appeared first on Education and Career News.

SCUP Planning Institute 

January 13-16 | Ann Arbor, MI

Join us for two workshops focused on designing, implementing, and sustaining integrated planning at institutions of higher education.

Attendees: Staff members from institutions of higher education

AASCU 2020 Academic Affairs Winter Meeting

February 8-6 | New Orleans, LA

The 2020 Academic Affairs Winter Meeting will give chief academic officers and other higher education leaders the opportunity to connect and learn from one another about a broad range of topics, including student success, civic and community engagement, international education, teacher education, learning innovation, learning spaces, curricular transformation, and enrollment management.

Attendees: Chief Academic Affairs Officers/Administrators/Faculty/Staff

SCUP North Atlantic Regional Conference

March 8-10 | New Haven, CT

The SCUP 2020 North Atlantic Regional Conference is coming to New Haven, CT, to celebrate and showcase the region’s fine institutions while hosting a conference devoted to the following topic:

Finding Your Niche: Institutional Strategies to Survive and Thrive.

Topics Include: Strategies and solutions to address enrollment retention and financial challenges

Attendees: College and university faculty, staff, and senior leaders/Corporate entities that support higher education

SXSW EDU

March 9-12 | Austin, TX

The SXSW EDU Conference & Festival cultivates and empowers a community of engaged stakeholders to advance teaching and learning.

Attendees: From higher education leadership — directors, managers, administrators, deans, SVPs, VPs

SCUP Mid-Atlantic Regional Conference

March 15-17 | New Brunswick, NJ

SCUP is teaming up with Rutgers University for the SCUP 2020 Mid-Atlantic Regional Conference: Realizing the Vision. The conference will play host to a diverse array of sessions — from timely keynotes to presentations that focus on unique case studies — that will cover fascinating, critical issues facing higher education planning across the Mid–Atlantic region. You will enjoy opportunities for meaningful engagement with colleagues, as well as immerse yourself in a tour of the Rutgers campus where you will learn all about the university’s innovative planning efforts.

Topics Include: Higher education, campus planning, tech and data, sustainability, and risk management

Attendees: College and University faculty, staff, and senior leaders/Corporate entities that support higher education

CASE DRIVE

March 23-25 | New Orleans, LA

DRIVE is the only U.S. event that offers a focused learning experience for education institutions and other nonprofit organizations to explore all things data. Two full days of programming include sessions on data management, mining, analytics, visualization, governance, artificial intelligence, and more. Attendees will have an opportunity to learn from industry experts and peers, as well as explore technologies and solutions through interactive sessions, and in a dedicated exhibits area.

Attendees: Advancement services and data management professionals from the education and nonprofit sectors

SCUP Pacific Regional Conference 

April 1-3 | San Diego, CA

The SCUP 2020 Pacific Regional Conference will explore the continuum of personalized learning in higher education through the theme of “multiplicity,” offering a fresh take on diversity and inclusion, campus life, and student success. Embracing multiplicity is about acknowledging and supporting the diverse perspectives and contexts that inform how students learn and participate in their communities. Together we will investigate how higher education institutions are fostering multiplicity on their campuses and recognizing the potential for greater outcomes in personalized education delivery.

Topics Include: Personalized learning in higher education and improving society through education and innovative technology

Attendees: College and university faculty, staff, and senior leaders/Corporate entities that support higher education

EDUCAUSE Security Professionals Conference

April 21-23 | Bellevue, Washington

As the only conference in the nation created for the higher ed information security and privacy community, don’t miss this opportunity to connect and collaborate with colleagues around the latest information security, privacy, and risk management innovations and strategies in higher education.

Attendees: Higher education information security and privacy professionals

AIR 2020 Annual Forum

May 25-29 | New Orleans, LA

The AIR Forum, the Association for Institutional Research’s annual conference, is the largest global gathering of higher education professionals working in institutional research, assessment, planning, and related postsecondary education fields. This five-day conference includes more than 250 presentations by colleagues and thought leaders representing all sectors of higher education, and an Exhibit Hall that features the latest tools and resources to support data use for decision-making.

Attendees: Higher education professionals

SCUP’s Annual Conference 

July 19-21 | Cleveland, OH

SCUP 2020 brings together higher education leaders and corporate partners for a one-of-a-kind professional learning experience. Join us for thought-provoking keynotes, powerful concurrent sessions, and casual conversations that represent our mission: a community coming together to help unleash the power and potential of higher education.

Attendees: Higher education leaders, corporate organizations that support higher education (architects, construction, planning consultants)

EDUCAUSE ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2020

October 26-29 | Boston, MA

The EDUCAUSE Annual Conference is the premier higher ed IT event, and brings together professionals and technology providers from around the world to share ideas, grow professionally, and discover solutions to today’s challenges.

Attendees: Higher education leaders, IT professionals, technology providers, CIO’s

The post Upcoming Events in Higher Education 2020 appeared first on Education and Career News.

Innovation in education technology has been an important means to enable the shift toward a more personalized approach to teaching and learning. Personalized education addresses the increasing number of challenges institutions face while trying to operate a traditional educational model for a tech-savvy generation, such as disengagement, achievement gaps, and frequent drop outs. 

Individualized learning offers students optional learning styles with the choice to excel in areas they are most interested in, progressing at their own pace. Personalization allows all students to succeed without time constraints, with the goal of instilling a deeper, more meaningful grasp of subject matter.  

Having access to reliable, comprehensive data regarding each student’s prior and present academic performance, attendance, discipline reports, and personal interests provides educators and academic advisors the information they need to guide students to choose goals that interest them and are realistic for them to achieve.  

Keeping in touch

Frequent communication has been shown to be one of the top criteria for increased retention rates. Providing students with an academic advisor for one-on-one conferences is a practice that results in overall improvements in academic achievement, eventually raising graduation rates. This important practice is more likely to occur if the institution’s management system offers a tool for easy scheduling, both for faculty and students. 

During conferences, advisors can work with students to create an individualized learning plan or ILP to document their goals, with a plan of action for attaining them. The ILP can be uploaded to a platform where it will be accessible to the student throughout their academic career to update and use as a roadmap to to see how they are progressing toward meeting those goals. 

Learners of all ages can benefit from having a mentor with whom they can voice their interests and dreams, and to help them make strategic career decisions. College students in particular need someone, besides their parents, who has knowledge of their personal academic data, and who will listen to their personal goals and help them make important life decisions in which they are most likely to succeed.  

A personalized plan

Personalization requires educators to tailor their instruction and the learning experiences for each student. Faculty can evaluate metrics like pre-test scores from competency exams, persistent failure to log in or attend class, and low grades or poor completion rates to predict which of their students are most at risk of failure, and reach out to them before it’s too late. 

This data can be used in conjunction with alternative learning opportunities, such as projects or internships aimed at increasing engagement for students with different learning styles, while simultaneously providing more challenging stretch-assignments for those who consistently meet their goals.

Tailoring learning

Some other important tools that enable educators to juggle the challenge of allowing learners to progress on different learning tracks include management of anytime starts, academic pacing, access to test scores, and personalized learning plans, all in a single, comprehensive platform that is easily accessible to both students and advisers.   

Additionally, the ability to offer competency-based learning provides even more opportunities for personalization, with rapid achievement of subject mastery in areas where students excel, especially for returning students who may have some work experience. Competency based learning requires tools that can import standards or criteria for mastery, and associate outcomes and rubrics with assignments, as well as a gradebook, with the flexibility for mastery-based grading.  

A comprehensive management system that offers a complete set of tools will make the evolution back to a personalized setting akin the one-room schoolhouse (a class of diverse students all working at varying stages of learning) a workable reality in today’s fast-paced educational environment.  

The post These Technical Tools Can Support Personalized Learning appeared first on Education and Career News.

Directors and trustees at our nation’s universities and colleges face four seemingly impossible tasks:

1. Provide a world-class education that prepares the future leaders of America with a well-rounded foundation of knowledge, learning, and smarts
2. Resolve both short-term and long-term issues in a transparent, forward-looking manner
3. Work in a regulatory environment that is overly complex
4. Answer to multiple constituencies that are all passionate and focused (i.e., faculty, staff, students, alumni, community groups)

On top of these near-impossible tasks, boards and trustees are managing an ongoing state of digital transformation. As better connection, insights, and management in the boardroom evolve from “nice-to-have” to “must-have,” digital transformation is enabling boards and trustees to successfully carry out their mission cheaper, faster, and with more efficiency. 

The centerpiece of digital transformation is an underpromoted yet critical software platform: board management software (often called “a board portal”).

Staying organized

A board portal is a software platform used to assist all aspects of corporate board management. From preparing and distributing board books to providing a secure environment for sharing documents and communications, board portals are specifically designed to help board members and professionals stay organized, make timely decisions, and plan and conduct meetings effectively.

The benefits of a board portal are immediate and impactful. 

It allows for effortless collaboration, putting everything in one place without having to rely on back-and-forth emails, cumbersome attachments, or unsecured channels like SMS and social media. 

Board portals increase board engagement by evolving meetings from dry and slow operational presentations, into strategic working sessions focused on addressing the issues that matter most. They also allow boards to solve problems more quickly by allowing them to handle more issues between meetings, leaving facetime for “roll-up-the-sleeves” style work.

A board portal can help boards and trustees meet the standards for legal compliance. It also helps secure an institution of higher education’s treasure trove of personal information Security can often an afterthought, which is why a modern board portal has strong security built into the platform.

Changing the game

As reputational and regulatory issues continue consuming attention in this space, universities and colleges are faced with an ever-growing list of responsibilities. Getting everything done can seem impossible. That’s why board management software is a real game-changer.

Ultimately, the right software empowers leaders of higher education with the technology they need to make intelligent and informed decisions that help achieve their institution’s strategic goals.

The post The Benefits of Board Management Software for Higher Education Institutions appeared first on Education and Career News.