Growth in the cybersecurity industry is quickly outpacing the number of skilled workers available to fill the need, with estimates putting the global cybersecurity workforce gap at more than 3 million people. That shortage of IT talent is particularly acute in higher education, where salaries and benefits often can't compete with the corporate sector. In light of those issues, the University of South Carolina Aiken recently found a creative way to staff a new security operations center — and give students hands-on cybersecurity training at the same time. We spoke with Ernest Pringle, vice chancellor for Information Technology and CIO at USC Aiken, about creating a student-led SOC, helping students put cybersecurity theory into practice, forging regional cybersecurity partnerships, and more.
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Music: Mixkit
Duration: 29 minutes
Transcript
Imagine a learning environment that, much like a Star Trek Holodeck, changes based on a user's individual requirements. It understands the learner's strengths and weaknesses, anticipates next steps, recommends the best learning content, moves at the learner's pace, and removes unnecessary friction within the mechanics of learning. With today's advancements in generative AI, that vision of personalized learning may not be far off from reality. We spoke with Dr. Kim Round, associate dean of the Western Governors University School of Education, about the potential of technologies like ChatGPT for learning, the need for AI literacy skills, why learning experience designers have a leg up on AI prompt engineering, and more. And get ready for more Star Trek references, because the parallels between AI and Sci Fi are futile to resist.
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Music: Mixkit
Duration: 31 minutes
Transcript
Much has been made of plagiarism concerns around the use of ChatGPT in education, and there's no doubt that generative AI technology will impact the role of writing both in higher education and in society in general. But as our guest Mark Warschauer points out, the use of AI for writing and communication presents an inherent contradiction: Those who can best write with AI will be those who can best write without it, because they'll need to be able to write good prompts, evaluate the AI output, and edit the resulting text into a usable final product. Warschauer is a professor of education and informatics at the University of California, Irvine, and founder of UCI's Digital Learning Lab. We talked about the potential of AI for teaching and learning, overcoming faculty skepticism about AI tools, research questions that should be asked about AI in education, and more.
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Music: Mixkit
Duration: 26 minutes
Transcript
ChatGPT is groundbreaking, but it's also merely the first in what will likely be a series of innovations built on foundational developments in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and natural language processing that are going to change the world. Higher education is already feeling the impact of generative AI technology in terms of plagiarism and instructional design concerns, but these challenges also come with immense opportunities to personalize learning and streamline time-consuming tasks. We spoke with Mark Schneider, director of the U.S. Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences, about how AI is transforming education and the evolving role of humans in an AI-powered future.
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Music: Mixkit
Duration: 26 minutes
Transcript
Campus Technology recently published 14 technology predictions for the coming year, based on input from higher education and ed tech industry experts across the country. A key statement on that list was this: Digital accessibility will be central to an inclusive campus culture. As Brian Fodrey, assistant vice president for Business Innovation at Carnegie Mellon University, put it, "Campus leaders must be thinking about how we are preparing our respective communities to take a more proactive and comprehensive approach to removing barriers and promoting all aspects of digital equity…. Prioritizing digital accessibility practices in all aspects of campus operations and life creates a more supportive community and inclusive culture for all."
That focus on digital accessibility is central to instructional design practice at Colorado State University Global. As the nation's first fully online, accredited nonprofit state university, CSU Global strives to achieve universal design standards in all of its programs, and to make courses accessible to a wide range of learners. We spoke with Associate Vice President of Digital Learning Andrea Butler and Director of Instructional Design Diona Hartwig about the importance of designing for accessibility from the start, ways to engage students in the online environment, and how inclusive design ultimately serves all students.
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Music: Mixkit
Duration: 28 minutes
Transcript
Earlier this year, Lumen Learning announced a partnership with Howard University to help develop equity-centered learning solutions for a new statistics course and platform. The goal: to develop more effective and culturally relevant courseware for minority and low-income students and improve outcomes in gateway courses. Howard faculty and students are providing feedback throughout the courseware development process, such as how specific courseware features might be used and best practices for supporting faculty in their courseware implementation. For this episode of the podcast, we spoke with Dr. Morris Thomas, assistant provost for digital and online learning and director of the Center for Excellence in Teaching, Learning & Assessment at Howard, and Kim Thanos, founder and CEO of Lumen Learning, about developing courseware with an equity-first perspective, giving students multiple pathways to success, building in support for faculty, and more.
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Music: Mixkit
Duration: 38 minutes
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