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by Rebecca Hellman

A FREE Opinion

A few weeks ago while channel surfing I stumbled across a 60 Minutes interview with Dr. Freeman Hrabowski, President of University of Maryland Baltimore County. A few months ago, this might not have caught my attention, but that was before – before I met Freeman Hrabrowski, before I visited UMBC and before Blackboard began the Solutions in Action series with NBC Learn. Last spring, I traveled to UMBC to assist with an interview between Freeman Hrabowski and NBC News Chief Education Correspondent, Rehema Ellis. When I learned Hrabowski would kick-off the Solutions in Action series, I quickly did my research. Named one of Time Magazine’s Top Ten College Presidents and one of America’s Best Leaders by U.S. News & World Report, respected author, and huge advocate of the sciences (to put it lightly) – it was clear this man was passionate, but what’s made him successful in education where so many others have failed? If you ask Hrabowski he’ll say technology, but if you listen to Hrabowski you’ll say innovation. Two sides of the same coin, but without innovation there is no technology.
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by Rebecca Hellman

Enhancing Education through Innovation

Enhancing education through innovation is at the heart of everything we do at Blackboard. From our beginnings where we produced one of the first learning management systems (LMS) in higher education, we’ve expanded into K-12, adult learning and international markets while also broadening our product focus to include mobile learning, collaboration tools, analytics and more. As Blackboard Learn President, Ray Henderson, wrote about on his blog, Blackboard’s Next Act: Opening the Lens on Our Vision for Education, “we believe that to help build a better education experience we need to continue to expand our products and services in areas across the institution. There is a new form of innovation taking root in our organization as we rethink how we can better serve educators by considering new ways to tackle some of the biggest challenges they face.”
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by Rebecca Hellman

Do More in Blackboard Learn with Partnering Technologies

How can you do more with Blackboard? Many platforms now offer application integrations to enhance their core technology offering. For Blackboard clients, that’s no different. Blackboard Extensions offers a variety of Blackboard Building Block applications that can be seamlessly integrated into the Blackboard Learn platform. This week, you can learn more about our partners Prometric and SymposiumLIVE by attending two free webinars.

Prometric provides secure testing and assessment services; their session will focus on strategies that allow colleges and universities to offer online programs while validating and confirming student identity and protecting course exam content. To register, click here.

SymposiumLIVE allows you to manage, publish and host multimedia by leveraging a content delivery network of 73,000 servers worldwide. Their presentation will explore possible uses and benefits of video, both inside and outside the classroom environment. To register, click here.

Tuesday, October 26th 2-3PM EST

Webinar: Theft, Threats and Cheating: Ensuring Security in the Online Education Process

Register Now HERE 

 

Thursday, October 28th 2-3PM EST

Webinar: SymposiumLIVE- Education Unleashed

Register Now HERE

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by Rebecca Hellman

Do More with Blackboard’s eTextbook Integration and NOOKstudy

Almost any recent article or blog post about textbooks echoes the refrain from students and faculty that textbooks are expensive. So, the growing trend by publishers is to offer digital versions of textbooks (eTextbooks) as lower priced options. However, many of these publishers only offer this content in exclusive platforms preventing broad adoption.

NookStudy
There are significant savings associated with eTextbooks: students can save up to 50% versus the cost of a textbook, they lighten the load by eliminating the need to carry books, handouts and notes from class to class, and not to mention, are better for the environment. Barnes & Noble’s NOOKstudy is a new, free eTextbook reader application that offers one platform (and one login) to a user’s complete digital reading library.

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by Rebecca Hellman

Do More with ShareStream’s Rich Media Building Block in Blackboard Learn

Sharestream_logo_library_redThanks in part to Charles Leonhardt’s vision, ShareStream has become a valuable tool to deliver audio and video content at Georgetown University over the past four and half years. Mr. Leonhardt, Georgetown’s Principal Technologist, serves as the university’s strategic lead, and consequently biggest cheerleader, for its rich media initiative. Developed in collaboration with Georgetown University, the ShareStream Rich Media Platform provides a turnkey system for creating, editing, storing, managing and securely delivering rich media assets.  Rich media is at the core of developing 21st century skills and is a valuable addition to the overall teaching and learning experience.  Through a tight integration with Blackboard Learn™, faculty, students and administrators can seamlessly integrate cutting-edge media into online course delivery.

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