Media Copywright Law Clashing with the Classroom

In the latest clash of copyright law and instructional technology, the University of California at Los Angeles has stopping allowing faculty members to post copyrighted videos on their course Web sites after coming under fire from an educational media trade group.

The policy, enacted earlier this month, has been planned since last fall, when the Association for Information and Media Equipment — a group that protects the copyrights of education media companies — charged the university with violating copyright laws by posting the videos to the password-protected course Web pages without the proper permissions.

Read the full articleon Inside Higher Ed.

IBN Forges Partnership in Science Education with Singapore

Science education in Singapore will receive a boost with new partnerships forged between the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (IBN), the world's first bioengineering and nanotechnology research institute, and four partner schools to develop future scientists and technopreneurs. IBN will formalize partnerships with the School of Science and Technology, Singapore (SST), NUS High School of Mathematics and Science (NUS High School), Singapore Polytechnic (SP), and National Junior College (NJC) through Memoranda of Understanding (MOU).* This major initiative will take place at the 7th IBN Young Researchers' Nite, which will be officiated by Guest-of-Honor, Mr Lim Chuan Poh, Chairman of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR).

NSF Awards SRI $2.4M to Study Science Programs

SRI International, an independent nonprofit research and development institute, has been awarded $2.4 million from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for a five-year research study focused on science in afterschool settings.

The study will examine publicly funded elementary and middle school grantees of California's Afterschool Education and Safety (ASES) program. SRI's research study will explore the social networks connecting afterschool programs with each other and with outside institutions such as science museums and technical assistance providers.

"We will examine the network links between afterschool providers and science institutions to understand how the network structure influences students' exposure to high-quality science learning materials," said principal investigator Barbara Means, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Technology in Learning, SRI International. "The larger goal of the study is to create new knowledge that helps afterschool and informal science stakeholders improve programs and broaden their impact."

Findings from the study will be available to practitioners, intermediaries, policymakers, funders and others with an interest in improving the quality of informal science and afterschool learning.

About SRI International

AAC&U Survey Shows Need for Improvement

The Association of American Colleges and Universities kicked off its annual meeting on January 20, with the release of the findings of a national survey of executives at 302 private sector and non-profit employers who, by and large, say their employees need a broader set of skills and higher levels of knowledge than they ever have before. But, most surveyed said, colleges and universities have room for improvement in preparing students to be workers.

To AAC&U, which has long advocated for liberal education – at once educating students in a certain field and giving them a broader foundation of knowledge and skills – the results are a sort of vindication and coincided with its board issuing a statement, “The Quality Imperative,” that calls for the quality of student learning to be at the core of the national debate over the place for colleges and universities in the United States.

“It is time for us to match our ambitious goals for college attainment with an equally ambitious – and well-informed – understanding of what it means to be well-prepared,” said Carol Geary Schneider, the association’s president. “Quality has to become the centerpiece of this nation’s postsecondary education.”

Survey Results

NCSE Addresses Science and Religion Compatibility

A recent blog from Discover Magazine outlines a way science education and religion can be compatible and how the National Center for Science Education has addressed this topic.

Read the blog.

MA Gov Approves School Reform Bill

Governor Deval Patrick has signed a bill to allow superintendents in poorly performing Massachusetts schools to impose major policy changes; charter school operators can double the number of seats in low-scoring districts; and the state may have drawn closer to $250 million in federal funding with yesterday's bill signing. The bill is aimed at reducing educational disparities along demographic fissures.

During a Martin Luther King, Jr. Day bill-signing, where several speakers invoked the civil rights icon's memory in praising the bill, Governor Deval Patrick said he was "most excited" with the innovation schools created under the bill, intending to allow administrative flexibility at traditional public schools.

Anti-evolution Legislation Announced in MS

It is actually hard to believe that in 2010 we are still discussing anti-evolution ideas in the public schools. Sad but true.

The National Center for Science Education announced a bill in Mississippi, House Bill 586, is the first legislation on antie-volution this year.

House Bill 586, introduced on January 12, 2010, and referred to the House Education Committee, would, if enacted, require local school boards to include a lesson on human evolution at the beginning of their high school biology classes. The catch: "The lesson provided to students ... shall have proportionately equal instruction from educational materials that present scientifically sound arguments by protagonists and antagonists of the theory of evolution."

Seems this is a back-ended way to have creationism discussed in public schools.


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