The Academy offers a wide variety of STEMx topics offered as online workshops, mini-courses, or "massively open online courses" (MOOC's) that are fun, practical, and engaging. Topics include "Helping students solve community challenges through app design" (offered by AppsforGood.org), "Game Design for Learning" (offered by LearningGamesNetwork.org), "Using Remote Science Labs" (offered by Northwestern University) and more.
Educators earn recognition from the host institution and from the HP Catalyst Academy by collecting electronic badges.
All told, 39,457 students and teachers will get Apple's iPad tablet with an annual cost of $266 per unit, including networking, and 24,128 will get Apple's MacBook Air with a cost of $319. Only 5,474 will use the HP ProBook 4440 laptop, equipped with Windows 7, which was the least-costly option for a laptop at $286.
The HP Catalyst Academy is a fresh approach to professional development that will accelerate professional learning among STEMx educators, providing personalized and powerful learning experiences that inspire and transform teaching practices.
A course driven by 20 practical questions about wireless, web, and the Internet, about how products from companies like Apple, Google, Facebook, Netflix, Amazon, Ericsson, HP, Skype and AT&T work.