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College graduates who showed paltry gains in critical thinking and little academic engagement while in college have a harder time than their more accomplished peers as they start their careers, according to a report released today. The report, "Documenting Uncertain Times: Postgraduate Transitions of the Academically Adrift Cohort," follows up on the highly influential and controversial book Academically Adrift, which was published one year ago. The report is being released at the annual meeting of the Association of American Colleges and Universities, and it expands upon many of the themes that the book explored by following a subset of students from the book into early adulthood.

"This is the final report, in a series of four reports, produced by the CEO Forum on Education and Technology during a five-year exploration of the impact of educational technology. The CEO Forum's mission for the five-year initiative was to provide reports to inform educational decision makers about effective uses of educational technology. The report concludes that effective uses of technology to enhance student achievement are based on four building blocks which are alignment, assessment, accountability, and access and analysis. Its definition of student achievement includes 21st Century skills. The report describes 21st Century skills as "a new set of skills necessary to prepare students for life and work in the digital age. These skills include digital literacy, inventive thinking, effective communication and high productivity abilities" (p. 32). The CEO Forum asserts that to obtain the maximum return on investments in technology, educational organizations need to focus their technology efforts on the four building blocks of student achievement."

"Imagine the moment when these completion exams permit a person to assemble learning from a variety of academic institutions and life experiences to complete a degree. At that moment, the monopoly of institutions over source and cost loosens, and the student gains control of how knowledge is to be gained and at what price. At that moment, the sources of learning are severed from credentialing. At that moment, American higher education is radically changed."

"Lee Rainie discusses Pew Internet's most recent findings about Americans use the internet and their mobile devices to learn, share, and create information. He explores how the changed media environment is affecting learners' expectations about the availability of information and the ways in which learning takes place. In this new environment, the traditional boundaries between home and school, teacher and pupil, public and private are breaking down and that is affecting the way learning occurs. Lee also describes how Pew Internet has looked at these subjects and the ways in which schools and families are responding to them."