Eleven years ago today, the Department of Education released the culminating report of its Spellings Commission on the Future of Higher Education. That report, spearheaded by then-U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, laid out a bold vision for greater accountability and transparency in the postsecondary education system. But over a decade later, few of the […] … learn more→

In a healthy, growing economy, one group should not be gaining at the expense of others. A rising tide is said to lift all boats, but does it? Consider where things stand in the US today. The aggregate US GDP may have grown over the past 40 years, but increasing income inequality has resulted in a very large […] … learn more→

Although I got reasonable marks for my creative essays in high school, literary criticism was never my strong suit. One of the issues with my analytical writing was that I didn’t really understand how to use verbs. It wasn’t until I nearly finished my masters degree that I found out that verbs function in academic […] … learn more→

Educational psychologist Dr Benjamin Bloom wanted to understand how people learn. So in 1965 he and his colleagues created Bloom’s taxonomy: a system for identifying, understanding and addressing learning. They came up with a system that’s composed of two elements: thinking and the ability to apply knowledge, and then feelings and emotions. When a student […] … learn more→

As the student loan debt is now getting closer to 2 trillion dollars than 1 trillion dollars1, it’s time to consider how it happened. “Cargo Cult” refers to religious splinter groups that kept forming among the stone-age tribes in the Pacific as they encountered modern civilization, during the 20th century. The best book to discuss […] … learn more→

While some of my esteemed colleagues are heralding the imminent arrival of robot teachers, stating that current advances will bring “the greatest revolution in education since the printing press”, I have to disagree. This is not because I am a latent technophobe. Regent’s University London, for example, is currently investigating the very latest assistive technologies, including how […] … learn more→

Personally Identifiable Information, or PII, is unique information used to identify individuals. PII includes contact information such as phone numbers and addresses or more private information such as a Social Security numbers. For most people the amount of PII found online isn’t worrisome. If you do an online search of your name, you might see […] … learn more→

It should come as no surprise that the first recorded use of the number zero, recently discovered to be made as early as the 3rd or 4th century, happened in India. Mathematics on the Indian subcontinent has a rich history going back over 3,000 years and thrived for centuries before similar advances were made in […] … learn more→

Studies of five melon varieties reveal increased yield statistics by using pruning and tutoring Following a study conducted by a known trellising net manufacturer in collaboration with the Universidad Autonoma de Sinaloa, the quality of melon crops can be greatly enhanced by using greenhouse cultivation methods, resulting in greater yields per hectare of up to […] … learn more→

My career has been divided between school and university teaching: in both I made late discoveries. I’d been a teacher of English in high schools for almost 20 years before it became clear to me that the most significant component of what I was doing with my students was what I call “making meaning”. Each […] … learn more→