Professional Education

Today, there is a seemingly infinite amount of information we can easily access and share online. However, today’s educators and course developers are still confined by numerous technical barriers that prevent them from sharing the resources needed to create modern education materials.

We’re hoping to change that.

Over the past year, more than seventy institutions have joined Blackboard to begin developing xpLor, a cloud-based learning object repository that will be the industry’s first to support multiple learning management systems (LMS). With the ability to work across LMS platforms, xpLor aims to make it easier for educators to manage and share rich content regardless of what system they are using or their institutional affiliation. xpLor would also make it easier for educators to collaborate in – or crowdsource – the development of course materials.

With xpLor, educators around the world will be able to:

• Share rich content between systems inside the cloud without importing and exporting

With a new semester kicking off at many professional colleges and universities, we’ve
been thinking about the ways these institutions will evolve over the coming year.  There’s no doubt that technology will continue to play a pivotal role in the way career colleges educate learners – helping these schools maintain their leadership in leveraging technology for student success.

Here are the top five ways professional colleges and universities will continue to get the most out of technology in 2013:

MORE hybrid and online-only classes
Did you know that 30% of today’s higher education students take at least one class online? Recent studies show that those numbers are growing, and we believe professional and career colleges continue to lead in the pack when it comes to transitioning classes to the online environment. Of the many benefits to online learning, perhaps the most pertinent to career colleges is that e-learning will allow more non-traditional students to gain access to higher education.

MORE mobile course content
We’ve written before that nearly half of all students already use smartphones for school-related tasks, and with increasing adoption of smartphones and tablet PCs alike, we expect this number to grow in 2013.  Professional colleges and universities are already delivering campus news and information, as well as course content, on mobile devices, and we look forward to seeing how they develop mobile-specific content such as lectures and exam delivery this year.

As colleges and universities of all types continue to expand their online learning offerings, professional institutions continue to lead the way in adopting the latest technologies to enhance the educational experience. So, we asked some of our cutting-edge professional college and university clients about their journeys into online learning, and what ‘best practices’ and ‘lessons learned’ they uncovered along the way.

In our new infographic, we explore some of these findings, questions, tasks, and ‘bumps in the road‘ schools often face as they develop and execute an online learning strategy, such as:

• Creating a business plan
• Avoiding mission creep
• Knowing your market and how to reach it
• Preparing your faculty

As we prepare for another great year on the Next Level Learning blog, we wanted to look back at some of your favorite posts from 2012.  So, without further ado, here is a list of some of our most popular blog posts from the past year:

 

Career Colleges
Mulgrew: “The lecture does not work.” Do you agree? At this year’s Professional Colleges and Universities Summit, Frank Mulgrew of Post University discussed the disadvantages of passive learning at career colleges. This post explores his arguments as well as the important role active learning plays in professional education.

For those who haven’t heard about Blackboard Learn for Salesforce, I want to share a video that highlights the ways this solution enhances sales training for businesses of all sizes.  Blackboard and Salesforce are an ideal combination for companies that want to get the most out of training by aligning learning content with individual sales goals, allowing you to see the direct impact that training has on sales performance. Companies that already leverage Blackboard Learn for Salesforce have seen the results of this powerful partnership of learning and sales, including:

• More engaging and enjoyable learning experience
• Increased sales productivity for trainees
• Faster time to deployment of new learning content

Check out the video below to learn more about Blackboard Learn for Salesforce, and visit our website to see how this solution can have a real impact on your business.