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"The rising discount rate, coupled with enrollment declines at several of the institutions surveyed, is a reflection of the myriad forces that are making it harder for colleges to get students and their families to pay top dollar for a college education. Those forces include a decline in the number of traditional-aged college students, increased competition for students with the ability to pay, decreased household incomes, increased scrutiny of tuition hikes, and more questioning of the value of a college degree."

"Between 2006-07 and 2011-12, average published tuition and fees at public four-year colleges and universities increased by about $1,800 in 2011 dollars, an annual rate of growth of 5.1% beyond inflation. The average net tuition and fees in-state students pay after taking grant aid from all sources and federal education tax credits and deductions into consideration increased by about $170 in 2011 dollars, an annual rate of growth of 1.4% beyond inflation."

"The Teacher Challenge is made up of free professional learning challenges where educators are stepped through weekly tasks that increase their skills while being supported by mentors. The Challenge is open to any educator who wants to increase their skills."

Social media is now an active reality for marketers. No longer something to consider as an option, marketers are rapidly increasing their budgets in this space and trying to leverage social media to best connect with consumers. Many marketers believe social media is a low risk, high reward channel. However, these 5 pitfalls will increase your risk and lower the reward, leading you down the path to social mediocrity.

The House education committee, led by Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., released its reauthorization proposal over the summer in four smaller bills that respectively focus on simplifying the financial aid application process; increasing transparency by creating a centralized "College Dashboard" containing information on student outcomes; increasing financial awareness by providing counseling options for students and families; and promoting innovation through competency-based education pilot programs. All but the first bill have been passed in the chamber, but Democrats have criticized the House package for not doing enough to curb the high cost of college.

"A year-to- year increase of 226,375 distance education students, a 3.9 percent increase, up over rates recorded the previous two years. More than one in four students (29.7 percent) now take at least one distance education course (a total of 6,022,105 students)."

"What will online education look like if students' access to the internet is more compounded by their structural inequalities than it is already? How can we, in good conscience, use online technologies to increase access to higher education if the cost of using the internet rises while corporate control of the internet increases?"

"Each attempt to "motivate" himself will only increase his stress and guilt as it widens the gap between his motivation and his follow-through, between how badly he wants to work out and his failure to do so. We have a misconception that if we only cared enough about something, we would do something about it. But that's not true. "

"To ensure that education is more relevant to the needs of students and the labour market, assessment methods need to be adapted and modernised. The use of ICT and open educational resources (OER) should be scaled-up in all learning contexts. Teachers need to update their own skills through regular training. The strategy also calls on Member States to strengthen links between education and employers, to bring enterprise into the classroom and to give young people a taste of employment through increased work-based learning. EU Education Ministers are also encouraged to step-up their cooperation on work-based learning at national and European level."

The prices of traditional textbooks continue to increase, further driving up the cost of Higher Education. CTE's goal is to help save OU students money while delivering highly engaging and pedagogically sound course materials. There are a number of options to supplement or replace high cost textbooks such as free online resources, lower-cost digital books and course packets and downloadable open-access textbooks.

"Pew released its annual State of the New Media report highlighting a continued decline in all forms of journalism except online. Yet online reporting has come with an increase in journalists using social media"

Colleges are raising tuition and fees every year, at a rate of increase that far outpaces any reasonable expectation. One might think this is the kind of thing that couldn't continue forever, but that's precisely what has been happening over the past several decades. Prices have gone up, and buyers have poured in anyway, buoyed by a flood of seemingly cheap government money in the form of student loans. As with any bubble, there are doomsayers who are mostly ignored and cheerleaders who say that this time it's different. But-as with any bubble-reality is starting to intrude.

Open education is about sharing, reducing barriers and increasing access in education. It includes free and open access to platforms, tools and resources in education (such as learning materials, course materials, videos of lectures, assessment tools, research, study groups, textbooks, etc.). Open education seeks to create a world in which the desire to learn is fully met by the opportunity to do so, where everyone, everywhere is able to access affordable, educationally and culturally appropriate opportunities to gain whatever knowledge or training they desire.

A true educational Commons would be a force for reducing academic hierarchy and income inequality. I'm all in favor of that. You say you are too. But is that what you are telling your partners in finance and university administration? Or are you telling them that they can accumulate even more of what they already have-money and prestige-while appearing to be giving it away? I will know my course has been successful when my students understand Coursera's business model behind offering free higher education globally (along with the promise of greater social equality) as an exciting venture capital investment opportunity through which to increase privately-held wealth and lock in existing educational hierarchies.

First is the idea of raising expectations and raising standards. Another piece: data-driven instruction. Every teacher in our state now spends 90 minutes a week sitting down with five peers to just drill into what the data is telling them about student performance. There's research that says the most effective economic development that a state could make is in early childhood education. We're increasing over a five-year period from 20 to 80 the percentage of high-need kids who are enrolled in preschool. That's a game changer.

"We present the concept of quad-blogging, and its potential for facilitating and enhancing peer-to-peer learning in higher education, specifically in a massive open online course (MOOC) by increasing peer engagement, promoting the practice of blogging and fostering the formation of professional learning networks through social media."

The college, with the cooperation of faculty and students, made a move toward using OERs. The two-year project began in April 2012 and is supported by student technology fees. The goal was to embed OERs into the 10 classes with the highest enrollments and to save students $250,000. A year later, 39 sections of 19 individual classes-from biology, to English, to computer courses-use digital materials rather than traditional textbooks. Faculty isn't required to participate, but the number of teachers using OERs is growing. To date, the college has saved students $266,000.

"As the demand for online education continues to increase, institutions are faced with developing process models for efficient, high-quality online course development. This paper describes a systems, team-based, approach that centers on an online instructional design theory (Active Mastery Learning) implemented at Colorado State University-Global Campus. CSU-Global Campus is a newly-created online campus within the Colorado State University System, and launches in Fall 2008 with fully-online undergraduate degree completion programs and Master's degrees."

"His positive view about online education was strongly supported in a new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll. Among the registered voters who participated in the survey, 59% said they agreed with the idea that increasing the number of online classes at California's public universities will make education more affordable and accessible. However, 34% expressed fears that expanding online classes will reduce access to professors, diminish the value of college degrees and not save money."

"The dramatic increase in online education, particularly Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), presents researchers, academics, administrators, learners, and policy makers with a range of questions as to the effectiveness of this format of teaching and learning. To date, the impact of MOOCs and emerging forms of digital learning has been largely disseminated through press releases and university reports, with only limited peer-reviewed research publication. The proliferation of MOOCs in higher education requires a concerted and urgent research agenda. The MOOC Research Initiative (MRI) will fill this research gap by evaluating MOOCs and how they impact teaching, learning, and education in general."