A recent article by the PRNewswire reviewed the online and mobile video presentation initiatives currently in place at Babson College. Using the Brainshark, Inc platform, students and faculty create and exchange virtual multimedia presentations that augment the face to face and online teaching environments. The cloud-based system is delivered on a variety of mobile devices,…
This time of year, grading tasks loom over our physical and virtual desks. Large piles of student papers, tests and presentations represent assignments we expect will reveal the relative learning, if only we can spend the time to look at each piece of evidence critically. Sometimes Teaching Assistants take on these grading functions, guided by…
This past fall, I audited Chuck Eesley’s Stanford Venture Lab MOOC course, “Technology Entrepreneurship.” With more than 34,500 students listed in the system, the experience provided an interesting view of what works in this MOOC environment. In the LinkedIn dedicated group, one of the students asked about the kind of competitive relationship that exists among…
This year we have seen some improvement in our national economy. In our educational institutions, we struggle continuously with relevancy and sustainability. In a recent Bloomberg Businessweek article, staff writer Alison Damast discusses the changes in business school masters programs toward specialized MS degrees in business competencies that are closely tied to job market expectations. …
The election season provides us with some unique opportunities to reposition student discussions regarding business and government. A recent opinion piece in The New Yorker magazine http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2012/10/29/121029taco_talk_editors provides some interesting content for debate. Following on a tech tip from the August 2012 strategy blog (http://strategy.mhhe.com/?p=19056), helping students to decipher valid news from unsubstantiated opinion is…
No matter for how many years we have been designing and teaching courses, there always is something new to learn. With the advent of the MOOC (massively open online course), a multitude of interesting free learning opportunities are available. Blackboard’s Coursesites is sponsoring another program this month called “Designing an exemplary course.” Take a look…
As our classrooms, virtual or physical, begin to fill with students, we know they will be looking to us to guide them. Each new class brings its own personality and across the years I know that my students have quite different interests and modes of communicating than those of a decade ago. To assist us…
While on vacation this summer, I came across the bi-annual sales in France known as “les soldes.” As any local knows, the discounts continue to increase until the end of the government legislated sales period. Are French shoppers any wiser than US shoppers about pricing strategy? In a recent study conducted by researchers headed by…
Summer finally is in full swing and for many of us is a time for recharging. Travel may be on the agenda for many, which gives us the opportunity to enrich our story bank and to validate our ideas. A selection of popular armchair travel books can be found at Goodreads www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/armchair-travel, if you…
Teaching across the boundaries with images
On a recent trip to an organic farm in the Southern California highlands, I came across these two women talking under an 1100 year old live oak tree. Though thirty years separated them and their life histories had little in common, the image captured shows them at ease in their conversation. The shared moment juxtaposed…
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