Archive for 'Revolution'
eduFire and The Fitness Angel Make History: Live, Video Fitness Classes Started Today
Posted on 10. Feb, 2011 by Ryan Busch.
The health & fitness industry is huge and home exercise videos have long been a hot item for people trying to get into shape. But just like books and static video classes only offer a little educational and instructional help–fitness videos have the same drawback. eduFire is changing that–the same way that it changed video into a social learning experience…
Meet Carroll Roberts (aka The Fitness Angel)
Carroll taught a historic class on eduFire today and I wanted to let everyone know about it. Carroll is going to be offering regular personal training, live on video, through eduFire. You can take these classes from anywhere with an internet connection and you actually engage Carroll, ask questions, and get specific fitness answers just as if you were in the same room with him.
Several members of our community attended and we all had a great time. So check this out–meet Carroll and learn more about this fun fitness class.
Way to go Carroll!
Try: Absoglutely with The Fitness Angel
Carroll Roberts teaching a live fitness class on eduFire
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Tis the Season to Teach
Posted on 15. Dec, 2010 by Ryan Busch.
Tis the Season to Teach
Hello eduFire!
On the heels of yesterday’s exciting news about eduFire’s return–we have another exciting announcement.Because you were so patient. Because we love you. Because we want to have a great end of the year…
Teachers will earn 100% of the fees that they charge for classes taught from December 15, 2010 to December 31, 2010.
That’s right–you keep it all–we are even going to pay for the transaction costs that Paypal charges us. This is our gift to you for being the best teachers in the world. There is only one exception–this only applies to classes, not 1:1 sessions. 1:1 session will continue to be done as normal.
What does this mean for you? Here are some thoughts:
- Schedule and teach as many courses as you can!
- Get out and tell as many people as you can to take your courses!
- Charge for courses–free courses are good for marketing, but charging for courses allows us all to keep eduFire working. Consider discounting (rather than free)—you’re getting a bigger percentage, so pass on the love and get more students.
- Promote, Promote, and Promote some more!
All of these things will help you to make more money, gain new students, bring more people to eduFire, and add to our community. All good things that will continue to build your opportunities to become world renowned teachers.
We are still working to get things back on track and we’d like to work closely with each of you as we work to get operations back to 100%, so all we ask is that you coordinate with Marco to ensure that we are only offering one class at a time during this period. This will allow us to better monitor the user experience.
I wish you all happy teaching–now get out there and tell everyone you know (get out your email lists, blogs, twitter accounts, facebook–whatever you have) to come take courses on eduFire before the end of the year. Classes taught on January 1, 2011 are back to normal–so go get ‘em!
Wishing you happy teaching,
Ryan Busch | President | eduFire
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Earn Your College Credit on eduFire (a.k.a. Time to change the game)
Posted on 23. Nov, 2009 by jon.
On Friday I blogged about what went down at Berkeley last week. And it’s not just Berkeley. All around the country (and the world for that matter) millions of students are fed up with their higher education options. They’re taking on way too much debt to earn degrees that often aren’t worth what the students thought they’d be. And with unemployment rates historically high they’re often not making the money they need to service that debt. And the price and debt are often only the start of the problems. There are growing concerns about a whole host of issues ranging from quality to overcrowding.
We’ve spent a lot of time at eduFire thinking and discussing how we can play a role (even if it’s only a small one at this juncture) in making things better. So it’s with a lot of pride that I’m excited to announce today for the first time that we’re launching a series of courses that will allow you to earn college credit at over 2,900 colleges and universities. The best part is that the total cost will be approximately 80-90% lower than what you’d pay at a traditional college or university (or an online university like Phoenix or Kaplan for that matter, they aren’t really any cheaper than most brick and mortar unis). Here’s how it works:
Step #1 – Take any one of our new CLEP Preparatory Courses on eduFire (complete list here and more details below). The CLEP exam is administered by The College Board and is a way for students to earn equivalency credit at colleges and universities that accept CLEP credit (here’s a complete list…it’s extensive). CLEP credits are a way for people to demonstrate their knowledge of a particular subject in lieu of sitting for the relevant course at their school. You can think of CLEP kind of like “AP for adults” or as a means of “testing out” of a subject.
Our CLEP Courses are taught by amazing instructors (bios below), some of whom you may have taken classes from previously on eduFire. In addition to live lectures (which of course are available on-demand) you’ll also have a whole host of supporting materials to learn from. For instance, for the Macroeconomics course that I’m teaching you’ll also be learning from some of the top economists in the country including podcasts and blogs from Ivy League professors and some of the top luminaries in the world of economics. We’ll also be having some fantastic guest lecturers in our live classes!
#2 – Once your course is complete on eduFire then simply sit the CLEP exam. The CLEP exam will run you $72. Let’s stop for a moment and consider the cost of taking a course on eduFire plus the CLEP exam versus another popular option. The Macroeconomics course will run you $20 per session and is five sessions for a total of $100. Add that to CLEP exam fee and you have a total cost of $172 for the three credits you’ll receive.
Now compare that to the cost of three credits of The University of Phoenix. U of P is typically between $400 and $500 per credit (depending on your location). So those same three credits at Phoenix will run you at least $1,200. You’ll save at least 86% by taking the course on eduFire and sitting the CLEP exam. That’s a lot of money and perhaps as importantly, a lot less debt to take on. Not bad…
Here are a few of the courses we’re starting with on eduFire.
CLEP College Mathematics – College Mathematics is taught by Mair Lloyd. Mair graduated from Oxford (yes, that Oxford!) and has been teaching on eduFire for over a year. She has a huge list of credentials including a post graduate teaching qualification. And you can even follow here on Twitter here.
CLEP Introductory Psychology – Marco has been on eduFire since the very beginning and is the heart and soul of our community. He also happens to be an expert in the field of psychology. He has a BSc. Honours Degree in Psychology from the Open University and is a Graduate Member of the British Psychological Society.
CLEP Spanish Language – There’s no better to teach the Spanish CLEP prep course than Ximena Rojas. Ximena has a Master of Arts from The University of Tennessee (Go Vols!) and a law degree from the Universidad Mayor de San Andres. She has been a professor at the Universidad del Valle in La Paz, Bolivia and has decades of teaching experience.
We have several other courses on the schedule already including English Composition (taught by Karen Weil), College Algebra (taught by Kamal Das) and Macroeconomics (taught by yours truly!). You can find the complete list here. More to following in the coming months as well!
I’d love to wrap this up by sharing a bit about why we’re doing this. Way back when eduFire was just an idea we blogged about making education more equal and accessible. The launch of our CLEP courses and the ability for people to save thousands of dollars by earning college credit through classes they are taking on eduFire is yet another step in that direction. We think it’s ludicrous that we as a society are asking young adults to take on crushing amounts of debt simply to get an education. We think it’s equally ridiculous that students all around the world shouldn’t have an opportunity to pull together the best educational resources and thread them together into something that gets them significantly closer to a degree.
So that’s what we’ve been done. We’ve been inspired by a lot of other amazing people that are shaking up higher education like the folks at University of the People, Straighterline, Tech University of America, Peer2Peer University, Academic Earth and more. And we’re incredibly excited to join these pioneering institutions and change the game for millions of students around the world. If you want to help in any way just drop us a line. We’d love to have you onboard.
(P.S. A HUGE debt of gratitude to Josh Kaufman at PersonalMBA.com for providing a huge amount of inspiration for this in the form of blog post “Hacking Higher Education, Part 1: How to Obtain an Accredited Undergraduate Degree in 1 Year for $4,000“. We owe you a round Josh!)
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Don’t think there’s a big problem with education? OK, watch this video…
Posted on 20. Nov, 2009 by jon.
What happens when you hike tuition on students 32 percent in a single year and cut salaries for some of your best and brightest teachers?
Near riot conditions at Berkeley today.
I haven’t read all of the stories so I don’t want to comment much on what’s going on across the Bay Bridge from eduFire HQ. But I can say this. There’s most definitely something going on right now in education.
Students are being saddled with unnecessary debt to gain degrees of questionable value.
A nation that prides itself on having the highest quality higher education system is flat out not meeting the needs of millions of students. And there’s a lot at stake here. Because those students who will drop out of school because they can’t afford tuition or taking empty, meaningless jobs after graduation instead of pursuing their true passion because they need to pay back the huge student loan debts that took on during school represent a tremendous lost opportunity.
To all those who are out there on the front lines fighting to create a better educational system (you know who you are), we here at eduFire salute you. And to those who are more interested in maintaining the status quo, well, go watch that video again. The status quo ain’t working and we’re in dire need of change. I haven’t been blogging much lately in part because I’ve already shared a lot of my thoughts on eduChange and in part because we’re working day and night here at eduFire to actually be a part of that change.
My hope is that what’s going on at Berkeley right now will be a wake-up call to many people that a lot of work needs to be done and that future generations won’t have to riot to call everyone’s attention to the fact that the most important thing that we can do to ensure that we have a prosperous society is to focus on improving the education of our youth.
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What is the Future of Teaching?
Posted on 01. Sep, 2009 by jon.
Great article from Josh Catone in Mashable yesterday entitled What is the Future of Teaching? I posted a follow-up in the comments and wanted to share. Here it is. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts in the comments!
Great article Josh. I’ve spent *tons* of time thinking about this over the last decade. Here’s my quick take:
#1 – Online vs traditional learning can be viewed across three vectors: Cost, convenience and quality.
There is little doubt that its cheaper to run classes online (no facilities costs, less personnel required, etc.). There is also little doubt that online classes are more convenient. You can take them from home, office, etc. and likely have a more flexible schedule than traditional classes offer.
However, the big question is around quality. I’d offer (and this is coming from the CEO of a company that specializes in online classes) that on quality alone traditional classes are still better. But what’s interesting is that the gap is narrowing quickly. It’s not at all unrealistic to envision a future in which the online class is significantly more engaging and effective than its offline equivalent. If that happens then guess what? Game over for the traditional class model (after all, why would you choose something that is more costly, less convenient and lower quality?).
#2 – I do disagree with the notion that the price of education is going to zero.
I believe in The Grand Unified Theory of the Economics of Free (I think that’s the right title…it’s a TechDirt post from back in the day) which states while abundant resources will trend towards zero (their marginal cost), the spreading of those very same resources will drive up the prices for scarce resources. In music, a band gives away MP3s (abundant resource) and makes more money from concert tickets. MIT gives away OCW material but more people hear about MIT (especially in developing countries) which leads to more demand for MIT degrees.
The abundant resources (e.g., textbooks, audio/video recordings of lectures, etc.) will tend towards free. That makes total sense. What will not tend towards free will be things like the value of a scarce degree (Ivy League degrees are likely to become valuable not less), a teacher’s time or the attention of the students. To say that education will be free assumes that the marginal costs of those things are zero which is almost certainly not true. Sure you’ll always have people who might volunteer to teach a free class (just like a band might play a benefit concert for free) but that doesn’t mean this will happen at scale anymore than any other industry can expect to draw talented people in if they aren’t being paid.
#3 – Flat out, we need better tools.
And to get better tools we need more innovation and investment. While education is a huge industry ($2 trillion by many estimates) I think it’s safe to say that social gaming has received more investment in recent years despite being a much (much!) smaller industry. The problem is that while it’s easy to look at a social game and figure out how to squeeze out some short-term cash it is much (much!) harder to look at a big industry with huge structural problems and figure out how to improve it. And improving it likely will take a lot of time and patience. It won’t be a “Build one thing in year 0. Have billion dollar company in year 3.” scenario.
But there are a lot of great people trying. Check out places like 2tor, Academic Earth, Cramster, Grockit, Knewton, LiveMocha, PrepMe, School of Everything, Smart.fm, TeachStreet, Tutor.com, Tutorvista and a whole host of others that I’m sure I’m forgetting to see what I’m talking about.
Oh, and of course us. :) (http://www.edufire.com)
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Using #teach-me on Twitter for Demand Driven Teaching
Posted on 30. Mar, 2009 by Koichi.
I came across this Tweet by Kareem (yep, one of the eduFire founders!) the other day. I thought it was pretty neat, but didn’t realize the potential of it until we talked about it a little. Twitter could be the home of a small revolution! We’re talking about “Demand Driven Teaching,” here.
So, say you want to learn something new, but have no idea where to find that Esperanto teacher of your dreams. With Twitter gaining more and more popularity, there’s bound to be someone there that knows and is willing to teach you Esperanto (and even get paid for it). Here’s what you’d do, if you were a student.
Students
Say there’s something you want to learn. You would fire up your Twitter account and type out a message. Perhaps you want to learn Spanish. You would type in something like “I need to know how to buy things in Spanish for my trip to Spain next month,” then end it with the hashtags #teach-me #edufire. This will show that you want a Spanish teacher, and you want to learn it on eduFire. You will then show up in Twitter’s Search function when you look for #teach-me.
Teachers
Of course, if you’re a teacher, you can always participate in learning something new as well, but you’re probably in it to find some students! The demand is already there, which is good for you, and people are making themselves easy to find. That’s great! All you would do is do a search on Twitter for #teach-me, and then maybe add what you teach, if you want to get more specific. For example, if you typed in #teach-me spanish, you’d find all the people that mentioned #teach-me and Spanish in their Tweets. There aren’t any right now, but hopefully that’s something we can change in the coming months! I would recommend getting a Twitter application like Tweetdeck to help organize your searches and get notified of changes faster!
Use #teach-me and #edufire to Win Prizes!
In April, we’ll be giving out eduFire t-shirts and free class coupons to students who use #teach-me and #edufire in their tweets. We’ll choose a couple of random tweets, as well as a couple of tweets we just really really like. Of course, all the tweets have to be something you actually want to learn (or be a tweet “spreading the word”), otherwise it’s missing the point, so no spamming the hashtag just for the heck of it! That’s cheating!
We look forward to seeing this tweet in action! I think there’s a lot of potential here – and a lot of students and teachers will be able to find each other when this thing takes off. We definitely need your help to spread the word, or to use this hashtag yourself! Thank you everyone for your support!
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Following the Brilliant Minds Behind Hacking Education
Posted on 06. Mar, 2009 by Koichi.
An incredible event went down in New York today: the “Hacking Education Conference.” Jon was there, and even though I wasn’t, I followed it on Twitter and was able to contribute a bit from across the country. Everyone at the conference (or tweeting about it) used the hashtag #hackedu to keep track. All day, I’ve been compiling a list of all the contributors to the #hackedu conversation and wanted to share them here with you, so even after the conference is over, you can continue to see what these educational geniuses are up to. Oh, and of course, with every Twitter-related article, a shameless plug: follow us over at @edufire. (more…)
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Hacking Education with #hackedu
Posted on 06. Mar, 2009 by Koichi.
You know how much we love education, and also how much we love Twitter, so when the two collide, we’ve got ourselves a funky dance. Jon Bischke (eduFire CEO, of course!) is currently attending an event called “Hacking Education” over in New York City. It’s unfortunate that all of us can’t be there, but if you’re on Twitter, you can get pretty close! There’s a ton of activity on Twitter regarding this, and all you have to do is put in the search #hackedu to get a play by play of what they’re doing.
Not only that, but as you can see in the image above, it’s one of the most popular topics right now, so check it out! I’ve found a ton of great edu-Tweeters by doing this, and have already learned a lot. Twitter truly is an amazing tool to follow conversations. Now we just need to get this conference streaming on eduFire…
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Can Anyone Teach?
Posted on 26. Feb, 2009 by Koichi.
In short, I think the answer is yes, but I really look forward to seeing what you have to say as well, in the comments! This can be a touchy subject – I’ve seen lots of debate go back and forth on this. I’ve seen “old school” (haha! pun!) teachers argue that in order to become a teacher, you must go to teacher’s school, and you must get a masters in teaching. If you don’t, then you don’t have the know-how or experience to become a teacher. On the other hand, I’ve seen others argue that anyone can teach. It’s not something you necessarily have to go to school for, and everyone has something that they can share with the world. Everyone has something that they are an “expert” in. I think they’re both wrong. (more…)
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What *will* change everything.
Posted on 04. Feb, 2009 by jon.
Every year an organization called The World Question Center posts a question to society’s leading thinkers. It’s known as the “Edge Question” and it’s one of my favorite things to read. This year’s question in particular is awesome:
What will change everything?
The sub-question was “What game-changing scientific ideas and developments do you expect to live to see?” and the answers are fascinating to read. One in particular that struck me was the answer of Chris Anderson, Curator of the famous TED Conference. His answer? A Web-Powered Revolution in Teaching. And if you’re a long-time reader of this blog you’ll notice that it sounds very familiar.
Consider this passage:
Five years ago, an amazing teacher or professor with the ability to truly catalyze the lives of his or her students could realistically hope to impact maybe 100 people each year. Today that same teacher can have their words spread on video to millions of eager students.
Compare with this blog post on eduFire from back in April of 2007:
Entrepreneurial Education refers to opportunities for scale similar to other industries. Top performers in other industries reach thousands or millions of people with their “content.” Top performers in education often reach only hundreds or dozens of people each year. In a world of Entrepreneurial Education that is ludicrous.
Here’s another passage from Chris’s answer:
For one thing, the realization that today’s best teachers can become global celebrities is going to boost the caliber of those who teach. For the first time in many years it’s possible to imagine ambitious, brilliant 18-year-olds putting ‘teacher’ at the top of their career choice list.
We’ve been talking about the concept of rock star teachers for some time now in blog posts like this one, this one and this one. In fact we’re even hosting an eduFire virtual conference this weekend titled Turning Teaching into Rockstars. Assuming you won’t actually be at TED you should attend! :)
Finally, one more piece of evidence that our frequencies are aligned:
But a young girl born in Africa today will probably have access in 10 years’ time to a cell phone with a high-resolution screen, a web connection, and more power than the computer you own today. We can imagine her obtaining face-to-face insight and encouragement from her choice of the world’s great teachers. She will get a chance to be what she can be. And she might just end up being the person who saves the planet for our grandchildren.
If you’ve read our very first blog post this might ring a bell:
Just a decade ago it was hard to imagine a child in Africa growing up listening to the best lecturers from Harvard and MIT. Today, with things like the sub-$100 laptop and mesh networking we’re almost there. The power of that idea is immense.
The next Einstein might be growing up in Madagascar right now.
The next Oprah might be a kindergarten girl in Sierra Leone.
I hope Chris is right. And I think he is. There are times when what we’re doing at eduFire feels like Woodstock. It’s like everyone is looking around at each other and realizing that this could change everything. And of course not just what we’re doing. What other kick-ass startups like Grockit and LiveMocha and TeachStreet and WizIQ and countless others are doing.
I’m reading Banker to the Poor right now and to be completely honest, it’s setting my hair on fire. What Yunus did was go into an area of the world where there was poverty and oppression and little hope and through his innovation helped to empower thousands and lift them out of poverty. Education offers the same opportunities. It already has lifted millions out of poverty in places like Singapore and India. And we’re just getting started.
It’s why we do what we do. Because we wholeheartedly agree with Chris. If we’re right, this will change everything.
