Higher education is seeing a rapid increase in the installation of competency based education. Traditional education has three main issues - 1) More people need education, but few can afford it 2) A traditional Degree can take too long to earn 3) Traditional Degrees don't really show the skill set of the graduate Competency based education helps to address these issues while providing students with affordability and flexibility as they continue their education.

in Spring of 2014, the Competency Based Education Network announced that 18 different universities will work together to test and use CBE and share their findings. This could help to revolutionize the education industry, which has remained the same for a very long time.

Elizabeth, It is something that we have been discussing for the past year at TSTC. It has it merits as well as disadvantages and would work better for some instructional areas than others, but I know that as a student I would have loved to have been able to do something like this. I think that WGU does something similar.

This looks like it could be very beneficial to a higher education instructor, especially as an additional Discussion Forum activity. I found this interesting article : http://www.sicet.org/journals/ijttl/issue0801/4_1_6_Wang.pdf that discusses wiki use in education that you may find enlightening.

Elizabeth, apparently when people comment, it can replace the original author. Hopefully the administrator of the group will be able to tell who was the original host/author of each post. I do apologize if I inadvertently made a setting selection that caused this to happen. This is definitely your original post. I wonder if by doing a sticky note it changed it to mine?

This website is filled with many current Web 2.0 tools that can be utilized in various aspects of education!

One of the most relevant links on the page is the one to do with Internet safety. It is very important that everyone involved in the online education process, from parents, to students, to teachers and administrators.

Another extremely helpful link is the Tech Tips. This page gives helpful advice on the utilization of the apps and has many helpful suggestions to make the integration of them into your workflow as easy as possible!

This informative article/web page had a lot of useful information regarding Discussion Forums. It started by defining what a discussion forum is, which is basically an LMS application that allows for restricted access communication between group members on a specified topic or subject matter. Discussion boards can be very helpful in making online students feel a part of a community and giving them a voice on a variety of subjects. They are very helpful in extending learning to beyond the classroom by forcing interaction amongst not only the students, but also amongst all the resources available to the students on a particular subject matter. It can increase instruction time and allows for a more democratic exchange of ideas between the participants. It is important to make sure that if you decide to utilize a discussion forum in your class that you are properly prepared and that you make the interaction a requirement of the course, otherwise it is likely that nobody will participate. It is also very important that you provide examples and clearly state your expectations of the participants, such as how many posts and responses they are required to do in a specific amount of time, etc.. As an instructor you will want to begin with a minimal presence and give the students time to acclimate themselves to the interface and the process of using the discussion forum. You will want to maintain a positive and professional attitude at all times and make sure that you are monitoring the involvement of the students regularly. When properly utilized, Discussion Forums can be a huge benefit and positive addition to a course, but I feel that it is important to make sure that the students see the added value of completing the assignments so that they will do a quality job and not feel as if they are being forced to do "busy" work.

I am not sure what causes it, but I inadvertently did the same to Elizabeth's post. Hopefully the administrators will be able to tell who the original host of a post is.