Higher education has never been in greater need of innovation. So, why stop fostering it? Today, Inside Higher Ed published a chilling article:
[...] the U.S. Education Department quietly revealed this week that the Fund for the Improvement in Postsecondary Education will forgo its main open grant competition. The main reason: The program’s funds have been [...]

An innovative program offered in some Massachusetts elementary schools is giving kids a chance to become bilingual early—and learn from each other.

This story in the Boston Globe describes how the program, which begins in kindergarten, mixes native English speakers and native Spanish speakers and teaches all subjects in both languages. The article states:

According [...]

On her blog, Elena Benito-Ruiz shares a draft chapter on “‘Infoxication 2.0′ as one of the main downsides to Web 2.0 and its educational application.”  Infoxication is a state of intoxication of the mind, caused by an overload of information. Although centered around technology, this is thought to contribute to a decline in intellectual performance. [...]

…but, only if students know the math first.
Media guru Griffin Gardner forwarded this article from ScienceDaily, which suggests that calculators are useful tools in elementary-level mathematics classes.  Citing research by Bethany Rittle-Johnson and Alexander Oleksij Kmicikewycz at Vanderbilt, and recently published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, ScienceDaily writes:
“So much of how you teach [...]

The World Futures Society has published a special issue of Futures Research Quarterly, focused on the Leapfrog Principle.  These papers will serve as the knowledge base for the upcoming Leapfrog conference in Anqing, China this October.  Online copies should be available through EBSCOhost in the near future (check with your library for access).  Contents for [...]

David Brooks wrote an excellent op-ed piece in today’s New York Times. He states that individuals cannot be successful in a globalized world without building advanced capabilities to transform information into meaningful knowledge:
The globalization paradigm leads people to see economic development as a form of foreign policy, as a grand competition between nations and [...]

An editorial by Bill Gates appears in today’s Washington Post. He argues that if the U.S. continues to fail to produce the skilled talent it needs to succeed in an innovation economy, the country should import knowledge and innovation workers:
To remain competitive in the global economy, we must build on the success of such [...]

Danah Boyd joined the call for reforming how academics publish their work by calling for a boycott of non-open-access journals …and, provided a list of suggestions on what needs to be done now:

Tenured Faculty and Industry Scholars: Publish only in open-access journals.
Disciplinary associations: Help open-access journals gain traction.
Tenure committees: Recognize alternate venues and help the [...]

As a follow-up to last week’s posts by Ai Takeuchi with Japanese perspectives on global education, I wanted to comment on Steve Jobs’ claim that nobody reads books anymore –and counter his claim by pointing out that books are alive and well in Japan because the Japanese are embracing the distribution possibilities provided by new [...]

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports on a discussion paper, “British Universities in China: The Reality Beyond the Rhetoric,” published this month by Agora, a British organization focused on higher education. Paul Mooney writes in the Chronicle:
Ian Gow, an expert on Asia and former provost of the University of Nottingham at Ningbo, China, expresses [...]