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Written by Dennis Carter
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Using one computer to power many has saved money as school budgets have been slashed, but too much of this good thing can lead to “virtualization sprawl”—an emerging problem that one campus IT leader is determined to avoid.
Karl Herleman, CIO at Miami Dade College (MDC), has, like many technology decision makers, moved his eight-campus school toward virtualization in the past three years. This means one computer in a campus computer lab can power several machines, reducing the IT department’s costs and saving the college on its monthly energy bills.
MDC has trimmed its energy consumption by 10 percent since 2008, thanks largely to virtualization, Herleman said.
And while virtualizing computers and trimming budgets will bring a smile to the faces of deans and provosts, Herleman said, creating too many virtualized machines on a college campus can create a “sprawl” effect that makes it difficult for the college’s IT team to manage the growing number of computers.
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Written by By Dennis Carter
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Barnes & Noble has joined the growing list of companies and organizations giving college students electronic alternatives to their pricey textbooks with the book retailer’s free NOOKstudy software that could save students 40 percent at the bookstore.
The NOOKstudy software will be usable on PCs, Macs, the Apple iPad, and, of course, the Nook when the program is released in August. More than 500,000 free eBooks will be available through the software, according to the Barnes & Noble web site, including some texts that might be required for college students.
Barnes & Noble will partner with learning management giant Blackboard in its NOOKstudy launch, allowing students who use Blackboard’s online learning platform to buy and read texts available in the NOOKstudy library, which will be stocked with more than 1 million eBooks in all.
Students will be able to highlight passages, take notes, and search for those notes in NOOKstudy eBooks, according to the Barnes & Noble announcement.
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Written by Maya T. Prabhu
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In a move to help rural schools keep pace with more developed districts, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) said it will create an Online Learning Registry that will provide access to historical, artistic, and scientific primary-source materials.
Education Secretary Arne Duncan made the announcement July 21 at the National Rural Education Technology Summit held at the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI).
“Knowledge knows no boundaries, and we cannot allow distance to stand between students, education, and opportunity,” Duncan said. “We have the hardware, the latest software, and huge investments are being made in the build-out of the National Broadband Plan to connect us as never before.”
The registry is one of the recommendations the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) made in its National Broadband Plan to give more students and teachers access to high-quality digital content that the federal government owns.
“No technological innovation in our lifetime has greater potential to transform education than high-speed internet,” said FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski.
“The National Broadband Plan recommended that the federal government increase the pool of high-quality digital resources that educators can easily find, access, and combine with other content to help their students learn. I am very pleased to see this recommendation being adopted.”
Many of the resources that will appear in the Online Learning Registry have associated educational materials that have been created by education professionals, and some of those educational resources are available online. However, currently it is difficult to find these many resources, because they are available across numerous agencies.
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