By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Bridge International Academies
Bridge International Academies, 2016/07/15
This appears to be a prospectus (11 page PDF) for Bridge International Academies, a global education company specializing in offering low-cost learning to impoverished children. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Guidelines for Quality Assurance and Accreditation of MOOCs
Allison Littlejohn, Nina Hood, Commonwealth of Learning, 2016/07/15
Report (36 page PDF) providing "a set of guidelines designed to support decision making about the sorts of quality measures that are appropriate in different contexts." The report includes input from a 2016 experts meeting, in which I took part. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. MIL-CRED
Advanced Distributed Learning, 2016/07/15
"Imagine how helpful a fully vetted, fully automated, personally controlled digital resume would be for both the individual as well as potential hiring managers in military, academic, and corporate organizations," says the invitation to this webinar (register here). This work is very similar to the personal learning records project we were running. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Want a Deep Dive on How Silicon Valley's Best Will Fix Education? Here's The Full Interview With Max Ventilla, CEO and Founder, AltSchool
John Battelle, LinkedIn, 2016/07/15
That moment when things go off the rails. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Metaknowledge
George Musser, Aeon, 2016/07/15
This essay makes one good point and a bunch of bad points. The good point is that the 'wisdom' in the wisdom of crowds isn't going to be taken merely by counting votes or taking averages. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Are those hearts strings connected? – the power of fleeting connections in a digital pedagogy
Peter Bryant, digital stranger, 2016/07/14
Good post looking at the concept of 'fleeting connections' in some detail. As suggested by VTE Live, one of the purposes of a MOOC, as opposed to a community of practice, is to create short-term low risk temporary networks where people can benefit from the diversity and interaction without making a lifelong commitment. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Authenticity and Co-Opting Voices of Color without Permission
Rafranz Davis, 2016/07/14

I think there's some pretty good advice in this post, and it goes well beyond the warning in the title. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Memory Machines: Learning, Knowing, and Technological Change
Audrey Watters, Hack Education, 2016/07/14

Good post from Audrey Watters representing a step forward in her thinking (as we write more, these steps become smaller and less frequent, and harder to take). More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Empirical proof that Terms of Service are "the biggest lie on the Internet"
Cory Doctorow, BoingBoing, 2016/07/14
This article makes the oft-made point that few people read terms-of-service. And that's why they are called "the biggest lie on the Internet" - "they are based on the idea that the people who trade their privacy and rights in exchange for a service are making a bargain that they understand and agree to." But suppose people took the hour or so required to read the terms-of-service for these web services. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The map of future models
turchin, Less Wrong, 2016/07/08
This post reminds me of my own article on change from a few years ago, but it has many more models than I include. I would have preferred to see more discussion of each model, with examples actually included in the text, but the grid format makes for a handy reference. More...