The Business of Life: E-Learning Threatens Publishers

I remember the Old School way.

Go to Penn's Van Pelt Library, find the book I needed, slog over to the copy machine and feed in dimes. Not any more.

"...[getting a book] ... is as simple as logging into an e-mail account, clicking on a few links and printing it," wrote ANICK JESDANUN about a New York University student in an Associate Press article. No going to the library, no waiting on line, no waiting to Xerox.

JESDANUNA wrote that publishing companies are worried precisely because of that ease and convenience — it's another way for publishers to lose sales.

The Association of American Publishers already has contacted one school, the University of California, San Diego, claiming "blatantly infringing use is being made of numerous books, journals and other copyrighted works."

NogginLabs making inroads in e-learning

The Chicago Sun-Times reported that the eight-year-old company, NogginLabs has won its first Innovate Illinois Award, and intends to use the prize to patent its technology.

The technology, called the Instructional Genome, uses artificial intelligence to change Web-based instructional programs on the fly, eliminating the need for human programmers to start every project from scratch. The result: a sophisticated, interactive program that engages learners in a way a "talking head" instructor never could.

An extra feature is that the Web-based curricula doesn't require high-speed Internet connections.

"My goal is to identify every way anyone can learn anything, and to have a technology that can create an e-learning system that responds," said NogginLabs co-founder and CEO Brian Knudson.

its most challenging project is building a 12-hour curriculum to teach clinical psychologists how to lead group-therapy sessions using a technique developed by Marsha Linehan, a Seattle psychologist who helps people with borderline personality disorders.

The curriculum simulates a therapy session with five clients, a therapist and a co-therapist.

The curriculum includes games, pretend conversations, lessons in Zen principles and exercises in concepts such as "core mindfulness."

The Instructional Genome works to make the characters respond to the changing dialogue of the group therapy session, and at the same time, teach the therapists new concepts.

Om.

Context Sensitive Learning

Context Sensitive Learning(TM) is a methodology developed and pioneered by Trainer1.com an independent e-learning company. The company's founder, Neil Lashter, will be presenting the CSL concept at the Aviation Industry CBT Committee (AICC)'s E-Learning Symposium - being held in Helsinki, Finland, from 27th June to 1st July.

About Context Sensitive Learning(TM)

Context Sensitive Learning(TM) (CSL) enables organisations to provide their staff with information and communications technology (ICT) training in a user-friendly way. The CSL (TM) learning materials are written by the user's organisation - in the same way as learning materials are written at present but using different techniques. Using Trainer1's software as a 'front end tool' companies allow users to access any piece of existing learning or information within their organisation in any transferable format.

Users ‘sign in’ to the system – either as pre-registered users or as ‘guests’ – and meet a screen containing a number of ‘categories’. They progress to view, for every piece of learning or information in that category, its title, an overview, a description of it, its size and a link to the actual material.

New Training Tool for Pharmaceutical Companies

In the United Kingdom today it was reported that GeneEd and Zenosis, providers of life science e-learning in the US and Europe respectively, are working together to create a new product that will help pharmaceutical companies increase workforce productivity.

Computer Business Review Online reported that the two firms said they intend to offer life sciences organizations an integrated learning and knowledge transfer service that includes discovery and development tools, regulatory and compliance training, sales force therapeutic area and disease-state training, manufacturing product scale-up and commercialization, physician product education and patient education and outreach.

Sunil Maulik, CEO of GeneEd, said: "With the formation of this strategic partnership with Zenosis, we can help our clients circumvent the development, regulatory and sales hurdles they face in providing cutting-edge cures for human health."

The companies anticipate the first products from the integration effort to be available in the fourth quarter with a solution-set following shortly after.

Captivate: The New Robodemo

Want to learn more about the new and improved Robodemo e-learning tool? The old Robodemo has been re-packaged and upgraded by its new license owner - - Macromedia - - into a product called Captivate. There is an interesting case study on training challenges at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas (UNLV) and how the university uses Captivate to train faculty. “Captivate makes it very easy to build interactive demos and tutorials,” says Sam McCool, a web instructional design specialist at UNLV’s Teaching and Learning Center (TLC). “You can quickly capture not just screen shots, as well as sequences of online activities—the mouse movement, rollovers, any kind of information that comes up on the computer screen. The result looks like a movie—and not just like a series of screen shots.”

Learn C# By Building A Video Game?

Saw this post on the Rextech blog. Basic was the last language I learned back in 1980 and I've had zilch-o interest in programming beyond some HTML code. However the title caught my eye. Apparently Microsoft is offering a series of eight one-hour webcasts on learning its new C# language via creating your own video game. The course is brought to learners via the company's Live Meeting website. Live Meeting is an interactive space to conduct virtual meetings.

The 411 on Live Meeting as an advanced teaching technology impressed the Rextech blogger, "... the class was a lot more interactive than many classroom sessions I've attended. The instructor had polls scattered throughout his presentation, so that we could all get a sense of where students were. For example, he had a poll asking how many years of programming experience we had, and the resulting graph helped him and us understand how in-depth he could go without losing too many students. For a class this size (150 or so) he got an answer much faster than an in-person lecturer could have obtained by polling students in his classroom..."

Oracle Learning Management

Oracle Learning Management is providing free case studies on best practice uses of its LMS. The product offers "... scalable infrastructure ... to enable organizations to offer Web-based and classroom training and to automate key business flows, including order processing, training delivery, and assessment. The application permits learners to interact with content, instructors, and peers at their own pace while maintaining a consistent, standards-based approach to training widely dispersed staff ..."

MCOL Releases 2005 Managed Care Training e-Learning CD-ROMs

MCOL, a well-known business-to-business health management and managed care resource company, announced the new release of the popular e-learning applications: version 7.0 of the Managed Care Training Manual CD-ROM and the 2005 version of the Managed Care Training Kit Pharmaceutical Edition CD-ROM.

The Managed Care Training Manual is priced at $79 for individual licenses, with site licenses available. The updated and optional companion Instructor's Kit CD-ROM is now available for qualifying site license customers.

The Managed Care Training Kit Pharmaceutical Edition CD-ROM is priced at $89, which includes the Training Manual as well as a number of specific tools for pharmaceutical professionals involved with managed care.

Click here for additional details and purchase information or call 209-577-4888.

Manufacturing and Development Go to School @ Purdue University's New Pharm Ed Center

Purdue University, through its research foundation, will unveil its new Chao Center later this month, a combination of pharmaceutical education with manufacturing and development.

"Purdue pharmacy students will be able to familiarize themselves with good manufacturing practices (cGMP) procedures policy as they watch these processes in a working manufacturing and development facility," said John M. Pezzuto, dean of Purdue's College of Pharmacy, Nursing and Health Sciences.

The $6.5 million 12,000-square-foot pharmaceutical manufacturing and development Chao Center for Industrial Pharmacy & Contract Manufacturing was made possible via a $5 million gift from alum Allen Chao and his wife. The center will be dedicated to assisting with the development of legacy drugs treating diseases and conditions that affect low-income patients around the world. The center will also focus on developing brands made in small volume that while less profitable, still offer treatment options for crucial infectious diseases. Graduate and undergraduate students in the Department of Industrial and Physical Pharmacy and faculty campuswide will gain experience with real-world production in a facility that meets the most stringent government standards, called good manufacturing practices.

Thompson NETg

Thomson NETg the leading provider of knowledge on demand to global enterprises and part of The Thomson Corporation (NYSE: TOC; TSX: TOC), has introduced a new offering of expert-led Live Now virtual classes for Business & Professional Development.

As with all Thomson NETg Live Now virtual classroom events, these new expert-led Live Now events for Business & Professional Development include:

* Expert-led, virtual classroom training through which learners can interact with instructors during class.

* Access to Expert Now, a recorded version of the live, expert-led training event, for 24x7 access to the instruction.

* A learn-by-doing environment with engaging activities and multi-pathsimulations to allow learners to practice new skills in a safe environment.

* Classroom support materials that include an online student guide that can be searched and printed.

* Unlimited 24x7 access to a personalized online learning portal powered by KnowledgeNet, NETg's Web-based enterprise learning platform, that launches and manages the entire learning experience.

Try a free NETg demo and see how their products attempt to deliver powerful knowledge on demand.

Groundbreaking E-Project at UVA

A groundbreaking alliance between the University of Virginia, Microsoft Corp, Hewlett Packard and Thomson Learning is getting positive feedback from students. According to study results released today, the majority of participating students report that the new digital tool package either increased understanding or retention of class content, or stimulated greater interest in coursework.

The results mark the first research findings of a pilot project that was launched at the start of the 2004 academic year aimed at identifying and measuring the value high-tech tools and rich digital content could bring to students and instructors. The first phase of the project involved 362 UVa students enrolled in the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences' fall 2004 biochemistry, psychology and statistics classes, as well as their
instructors.

Students participating in the technology-rich courses provided formal evaluations of the tools and materials and gave predominantly positive feedback on the content, Microsoft(R) OneNote(R) software and the HP Tablet PC 1100.

A number of benefits and advantages emerged from the study, including:

* Digital materials and advanced tools can stimulate students' interest in their courses -- 67 percent of the surveyed students reported an increased interest in the course as a result of using the integrateddigital solution.
* Thomson Learning's online resources helped students understand and retain class material -- on average, 66 percent of students reported that Thomson resources and content improved their understanding of a topic and 62 percent reported Thomson resources improved their ability to retain/remember.
* Microsoft OneNote note -- taking software had a beneficial impact on learning -- 71 percent of the surveyed students reported an improved ability to understand and remember class content, using the software in class lectures and specially-designed templates as study aids.
* HP Tablet PCs are valuable additions to course materials -- 83 percent of students viewed the HP Tablet PC as favorable and approximately 80 percent of students used the Tablet PC for applications beyond the pilot class such as note-taking in other classes and e-mail.