By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. James Farmer: Edublogs Being Blocked, Incorporated Subversion November 23, 2005

As james Farmer says, "you know you’re doing something right if people start trying to stop you" (I know the feeling). Still, it is a bit hard to understand why Farmer's outstanding edublogs service is being blocked by some school districts. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Colin Milligan and Scott Wilson: PLE Reference Model, the personal learning environments blog November 23, 2005

One of the outcomes of the conference on personal learning environments last week in Edinburgh was this PLE Reference Model. I like the way they map various usage scenarios, and the entity diagram (slide 19) is a thing of beauty. Still. Does it map into the e-learning framework (or whatever it's called this week) as suggested? Doeds the flow diagram (slide 25) capture what the PLE is really supposed to be. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Press Release: New York State to Roll Out MarcoPolo in Every Classroom, Marco Polo November 22, 2005

This is interesting. "MarcoPolo's resources, available online at no charge to teachers throughout the United States and around the world, are -- for the first time ever -- now aligned in New York not only at the state standards level, but also at the performance indicator level". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Michael Feldstein: LMOS Services and Service Brokers, Part II, E-Literate November 21, 2005

Some discussion of what a service-oriented learning management operating system would look like. Nice example, showing clearly the role of RSS in the system and illustrating how a student's stand-along blog, along with simple identity management, could integrate with the learning management system's record-keeping and discussion systems. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Gary Bustin: Overview of the ICT Industry With a Focus on Atlantic Canada, NRC / IRAP November 21, 2005

Good overview of the ICT industry with a focus especially on the challenges faced in Atlantic Canada. Outlines what venture capitalists are looking for (including: "where users can type in a postal/zip code, and the Web site will present headlines, photos and classified ads from all the local news sites" - I could produce that very easily, if any VCs want to give me a call...), barriers to entry, open source, and some interesting and telling comments on the nature of research in the field. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Gustavo Gonzalez: The Internet, Friend or Foe of Learning, TerraViva November 21, 2005

Interesting look at some of the issues raised by using computers in schools in Latin America (and in particular, Chile and Peru). This seems to be a key point: "Teachers who are not familiar with the use of information and communication technologies are at a clear disadvantage in relation to their students". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. George Roberts, et.al.: Reflective Learning, Future Thinking: Digital Repositories, E-portfolios, Informal Learning and Ubiquitous Computing November 21, 2005

After that title, I hardly need to write a summary. Seriously, there's some pretty good thinking in this document, including some points worth repeating as frequently as necessary: "Disaggregation of components and support for repository, e-portfolio and ubiquitous informal systems is necessary; central units supporting monolithic systems are unlikely to have the flexibility to respond to future needs.... The bottom-up approach was proving to be very successful and indeed called into question the need for a single institutional-wide (or national) repository, as opposed to community based systems". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Photo of Me November 21, 2005

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Doug Lederman: The ‘Crisis’ in Higher Ed Financing, Inside Higher Ed November 4, 2005

Summary of discussions surrounding the increasingly difficult funding issues faced by American universities, this set amid declining performance levels. This prompts some to tout private education service and others to point to the increasing disparity in society. As budgets continue to shrink - a trend accelerated by the observation that universities are increasingly serving only the wealthy - the crisis will worsen. Related: this article (via University Business) in the Times Argus: "It is not a question of 'if,' but rather 'when,' the middle class will be priced out of access to higher education". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Steven C. Shaffer: System Dynamics in Distance Education and a Call to Develop a Standard Model, International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning November 4, 2005

This is a very good paper that should be read especially by those of us working toward learning networks and related approaches to education. The author offers a good background of systems theory as it relates to education, highlighting with numerous telling points how failures to recognize systems in learning result in error. More...