Formation Continue du Supérieur

By Jason A. Llorenz. Like all college and university faculty, August means finalizing fall syllabi and lesson plans, and pre-reading articles for fall courses. For many professors, this process includes thinking (or rethinking) on how to leverage social media to engage students in the semester's learnings. More...

By Max Kutner. Northeastern University executed one of the most dramatic turnarounds in higher education. Its recipe for success? A single-minded focus on just one list.
From the start, schools have argued that the rankings are subjective. Defenders of the rankings maintain that the system exposes students to more schools and helps the consumer compare products. Regardless, students, graduate schools, and employers have embraced the list, giving it unprecedented power. An unintended result, however, is that schools need to spend more to stay competitive in the categories that U.S. News considers important. Universities may be in the business of education, but it’s a competitive business in which all compete for students and revenue. With an arms race to the top, higher education has soared out of reach for an increasing number of Americans. NU tuition alone in 1989 was $9,500; today it’s $42,534. More...

By Shahida Sweeney. University fast-tracks investments in data analytics to tailor programs for students.
Victoria University (VU) has gone live with an integrated learning platform that uses data analytics and mobile apps to help design, deliver and manage anywhere, anytime learning programs for more than 40,000 students.
This blended learning strategy replaces an antiquated learning management system, said VU’s associate director of blended learning, Dr Lisa Germany. More...

By Jon Marcus. Two years. That’s how long it takes William Lankin’s fast-growing electrical contracting company to teach new hires with four-year university degrees the tricks of the trade.
These college grads “have learned the book stuff, but they don’t have real-world experience,” said Lankin, vice president of Industrial Electric. “They don’t know how to work with other people, or subcontractors — how to actually do business.”
Bringing them up to speed while paying them a salary is time-consuming and expensive, and even then there’s no guarantee that they’ll be good enough to keep. More...

By Timothy Pratt. Paying to get in, degree as reward, may raise success rates, advocates say.
Dary Merckens was in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, several weeks before moving to Las Vegas. He was also entering his second month in a master’s degree program at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. Merckens, who is 30, can take his education with him. That’s because he’s enrolled in Georgia Tech’s new online master’s degree in computer science. More...