eCornell

eCornell Voted “Best Leadership Development Program” by Readers of eLearning Magazine

eCornell’s suite of online Leadership & Strategic Management Certificate Programs has been named “Best Leadership Development Program” at the 2009 Best of eLearning Reader’s Choice Awards hosted by eLearning magazine. The winners in 16 categories were announced at the virtual eLearning! Summit on November 5.

eCornell was also a finalist for “Best Software-as-a-Service Learning Management System (SaaS LMS).” Readers nominated and voted for products and solutions via eLearning magazine’s online ballot. The 2009 program received 1,755 nominations, twice the volume from a year ago.

“The Best of eLearning Awards program is the only reader’s choice awards in the market,” said Catherine Upton, group publisher of eLearning and Government eLearning magazines. “Recognition of this type is increasingly important as more companies deploy e-learning initiatives to impact business and improve efficiencies. The Best of eLearning program offers professionals a reliable resource to learn from users and gather information that influences their future purchases.”

eCornell offers more than 20 online certificate programs, and six in Leadership & Strategic Management that received the honor:

• Business Leadership Skills
• High Performance Leadership
• Leading Management Teams
• Executive Leadership
• Change Leadership
• Managing for Execution

Selected voter comments about eCornell will be published in the January 2010 issues of eLearning magazine and Government eLearning magazine and include:

• “Their method of teaching is very suitable and meets the students at their very point of need. It’s also very applicable to the student.”
• “This is a brilliantly structured course. It encourages students to use discussion forums very efficiently and it’s almost like a live class discussion—even with a diversity of time zones in our class.”
• “I have learned a lot from eCornell online classes. It’s the best place to take courses and expert advisors are always available when needed to help with questions and answers.”

“It is extremely gratifying to be honored by our enterprise customers and students,” said Chris Proulx, CEO of eCornell. “This open vote enables the users of eCornell’s online training programs and those of our competitors to cast a ballot. It’s an important measure for the products and services in our industry. To be recognized among the top training providers validates that our solutions provide engaging learning for students and bottom-line performance results for our enterprise customers.”

eCornell and the Military Spouse Career Advancement Account (MyCAA) Program

At eCornell we understand and appreciate the sacrifices the spouses and dependents of our brave men and women in uniform make to support those who serve.  Accordingly, we are proud to join the Department of Defense (DoD) in a new financial aid program designed just for military spouses.  We are a participating school in the DoD’s recently established Military Spouse Career Advancement Account (MyCAA) program, offering our online certificate programs to eligible participants.

The MyCAA program provides up to $6,000 of financial assistance for military spouses who are pursuing degree programs, licenses, certificates, or credentials leading to employment in Portable Career Fields.  Portable careers are those that are likely to provide job opportunities in most locations where military service members are stationed, and many of eCornell’s 21 certificate programs meet the MyCAA portability requirements.  To be eligible, you must be either the spouse of an active duty member (excluding the U.S. Coast Guard), or the spouse of a federally activated member of the National Guard or Reserve Components.   The MyCAA program uses the Defense Eligibility and Enrollment Reporting System (DEERS) to determine if a spouse is eligible.

An Ivy League Credential at Little or No Cost
At eCornell, we know that spouses serve, too.  You and your family pack up and move at a moment’s notice whenever your sponsor receives PCS orders.  You take care of the household when your sponsor deploys or goes TDY.  You are all too familiar with the routine of changing schools, finding affordable housing, and sacrificing your own careers to support your military spouse as you move around the world.  In recognition of this dedication and hardship, eCornell has designed certificate programs to help you enhance your current career field or find a new one.  In partnership with the DoD’s MyCAA program, we stand ready to make your career and education goals an affordable reality.

The Enrollment Counselors at eCornell are eager to assist the spouses of our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines who may be interested in one of our MyCAA eligible certificate programs.  Since the list of Portable Career Fields is constantly undergoing updates, we recommend you contact us to determine which of our 21 certificate programs have been approved for MyCAA funding.  Our counselors may be reached by phone at 1-866-eCornell or by email at info@ecornell.com.

Contact us today to learn how we can help you use your MyCAA benefits to secure an Ivy League credential at little or no cost to you.  And again, thank you for your support to the men and women who keep us free.

What Costs MyCAA Does and Does Not Cover
The MyCAA program pays for education and training programs, tuition, and licensing/ credentialing fees. This includes the fees for certificate programs. Since eCornell programs do not require any additional books, supplies, or equipment, the MyCAA will cover the entire cost of an eligible certificate program up to the program limits.

How MyCAA Financial Assistance Works
Interested spouses must first establish a MyCAA account, and can do so by visiting the MyCAA website: https://aiportal.acc.af.mil/mycaa.  Once a spouse provides profile information, MyCAA will verify DEERS eligibility.  If verified as eligible, a military spouse will be allowed to create a Career and Training Plan and request financial assistance when they are within 90 days of course start dates.  A Career and Training Plan includes the spouse’s Portable Career Field, name of school, and course information (course titles, codes, costs and start/end dates).

Getting Additional Information About MyCAA
There are some excellent sources of additional information about the MyCAA program.  Military OneSource has a detailed, downloadable MyCAA FAQ Guide.  Additionally, Military OneSource Career and Education Consultants can help spouses explore career interests, evaluate school options, and compare programs of study.  Their toll free number is 800-342-9647.

The Ever-Expanding U. of Phoenix

In the world of for-profit higher education, and higher education in general, the University of Phoenix has historically been viewed as the 800-pound gorilla.

As of Tuesday, it may be more like a 1,000-pound gorilla. As Phoenix's parent company, the Apollo Group, reported its fourth quarter and annual earnings Tuesday, it announced that the university's enrollment of degree-seeking students grew to 443,000 as of August 2009, up 22 percent from 362,000 in August 2008. The biggest growth in Phoenix's enrollments, by far, came among students seeking associate degrees, which rose by 37 percent, to 201,200 from 146,500 in 2008.

About two-thirds of the university's new students as of August are female, 27.7 percent are African-American, and about half are 30 or over.

The university attributed the sizable increases to a range of factors, including increased efforts in retaining students, expanded marketing, and the "current economic downturn, as working learners seek to advance their education to improve their job security or reemployment prospects." Many community colleges and several of Phoenix's major peers in for-profit career education, including Kaplan Higher Education (21.9 percent) and Corinthian Colleges, Inc. (24.4 percent), have reported sharp upturns in student enrollments this fall.

Read the full article.

5 Ways E-Learning Can Improve Your Leadership Development Program

Why Leadership Development is Important
Leadership development is a high priority and increasing as an overall percentage of training delivered in many organizations because of several positive business benefits:

• Financial return.
• Employee satisfaction and retention.
• Building bench strength.
• Strategic and competitive advantage.
• Enhanced productivity and faster resolution of problems.
• Continuous innovation.
• Organizational agility.

Leaders drive performance, and the higher the leader and the broader the scope of his or her responsibility, the greater the impact that the individual can have on an organization. So while it may difficult to measure exactly now much leadership development programs contribute to something like financial return, it is generally accepted that good leaders and managers produce higher performing teams that produce better results.

Demographic shifts are also forcing companies to focus on their leadership development efforts. With almost 80 million baby boomers approaching retirement in the next decade, there will be significant impact on pipeline of available leadership talent, and the cost of recruiting and retaining competent managers is going to increase.

E-Learning Can Improve Leadership Development Programs
While e-learning is not a complete solution when it comes to leadership development, it can be used to increase its effectiveness in several important ways:

Increased Reach
Traditionally, leadership training has been confined to employees who can attend a classroom event. This makes it difficult and/or expensive to reach geographically dispersed employees. The increasingly global and mobile nature of today’s workforce means that many employees may be left out of traditional classroom-based leadership training programs.

But technology-based learning content can provide basic soft skills training and information to any learner with an Internet connection. E-learning can effectively eliminate the barriers of time and geography.

Consistency
Ensuring a consistent approach to leadership often means instituting a talent management process based on a system of competencies that align with specific company objectives. If leadership competencies are identified for all levels and job roles, there can be a systematic process for assessing employees and recommending training interventions based on job role and level. Competency management gives organizations better visibility into their leadership strengths and weaknesses, and aids in long-term planning.

Speed & Efficiency
While leadership training must include “high touch” activities to be effective, e-learning can often be used to reach the training goal quicker and at a lower cost. There are numerous models for blended learning ranging from the very simple to complex. One of the most common is to use e-learning as a pre-requisite to classroom training. This can shorten the overall time needed for employees to complete training. It also ensures that learners arrive at the training event with a common understanding and baseline of knowledge, ready to take advantage of the unique benefits of being with other students and a live instructor.

E-Learning also shortens the amount of time that employees are physically away from their jobs. Online learning also offers the opportunity for learners to take classes when it is most convenient for them, and to progress as quickly or slowly as necessary.

Skills can also be assessed online prior to training, which may allow some learners to test-out of certain parts of training. Shortening time away from the job can be an especially important benefit in leadership training, which often involves key employees with significant responsibilities.

Reinforcement Over Time
Training impact tends to fade over time. But research shows that when learning is reinforced before and after the training event, the positive effects are greater and last longer. Managers can use e-learning to reinforce key points of training, thereby taking leadership development from a series of disconnected events to more of a continuous development process.

Support Collaboration & Relationship Building
Managing global teams is a reality in today’s workplace, and also one of the greatest challenges managers face. Technology such as the virtual classroom, blogs, wikis and social networks are being used to support collaboration for geographically dispersed teams. “Blended” does not have to imply “classroom.” Many of today’s leadership programs are exclusively conducted virtually. In this format, participants take online courses that are augmented with online collaboration sessions, conference calls or virtual collaboration exercises.

University of North Carolina Moves Intro Spanish Class Entirely Online

After several years of experimenting with “hybrid” Spanish courses that mix online and classroom instruction, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has decided to begin conducting its introductory Spanish course exclusively on the Web.

Spanish 101, which had featured online lessons combined with one classroom session per week, will drop its face-to-face component in an effort to save on teaching costs and campus space in light of rising demand for Spanish instruction and a shrinking departmental budget.

Foreign language classes, like those in just about every subject area, have of course been offered online for years. And online courses have become a key way for some languages to be taught at smaller colleges that might not produce enough students to fill a section. ... Advocates for such courses have generally said that they are essential when in-person instruction wouldn't otherwise take place. What makes Chapel Hill's announcement notable is that it's about Spanish. And if there is one foreign language at American colleges and universities that never struggles to produce demand for in-person sections, it is Spanish.

Under the new system, a single professor would preside over four sections of the class, with support from graduate assistants. ...

department officials said they don't expect the online-only format to hamper learning.

Read the full article.

Open Courses: Free, but Oh, So Costly

Online students want credit; colleges want a working business model

He was on a hang glider, and he slammed the ground hard on his chin. Recovery from surgery on his broken back left the 39-year-old high-school dropout with time for college courses.

From a recliner, the drugged-up crash victim tried to keep his brain from turning to mush by watching a free introductory-biology course put online by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Hooked, he moved on to lectures about Cormac McCarthy's novel Blood Meridian from an English course at Yale. Then he bought Paradise Lost.

A success for college-made free online courses—except that Mr. Ziegler, who works for a restaurant-equipment company in Pennsylvania, is on the verge of losing his job. And those classes failed to provide what his résumé really needs: a college credential.

Colleges, too, are grappling with the limits of this global online movement. Enthusiasts think open courses have the potential to uplift a nation of Zieglers by helping them piece together cheaper degrees from multiple institutions. But some worry that universities' projects may stall, because the recession and disappearing grant money are forcing colleges to confront a difficult question: What business model can support the high cost of giving away your "free" content?

Utah State University recently mothballed its OpenCourseWare venture after running out of money from the state and from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, which has financed much of the open-content movement. ...

More free programs may run aground. So argues David Wiley, open education's Everywhere Man, who set up the Utah venture and is now an associate professor of instructional psychology and technology at Brigham Young University. ... "Every OCW initiative at a university that does not offer distance courses for credit," he has blogged, "will be dead by the end of calendar 2012."

Read the full article.

Cornell Launches New Online Graduate Certificate in HR Management

ILR School’s new e-learning program provides nine Cornell credit hours.

eCornell and Cornell’s ILR School are pleased to announce the launch of the Graduate Certificate in Human Resources Management. This new online certificate program is the first of its kind by the ILR School offering nine graduate credits towards a Cornell Master of Industrial and Labor Relations or Master of Professional Studies from ILR.

The new program is designed for human resources professionals seeking to develop executive-level HR and management skills. The program can be completed entirely online in as little as nine months. The curriculum can be customized to allow students to tailor their course options to meet individual learning objectives and offer unprecedented access to ILR faculty through an innovative combination of:

• Interactive online HR courses.
• An immersive leadership experience.
• Live and recorded webcasts with expert ILR faculty.
• A Portfolio project in which students apply the coursework directly back into the workplace.

The Graduate Certificate in Human Resources Management includes courses written by ILR Dean Harry C. Katz; Samuel B. Bacharach, McKelvey-Grant Professor; Christopher J.  Collins, Associate Professor and Director of the Center for Advanced Human Resources Studies; Patrick M. Wright; William J. Conaty, GE Professor of Strategic HR; and Ronald L. Seeber, Professor and Associate Dean, ILR School and Cornell University Vice Provost for Land Grant Affairs.

Learn more about the Graduate Certificate in Human Resources Management or read the news release announcing the Certificate.

Online Collaboration Tools Survey

How do you collaborate online? Chat,blogs,wikis,forums?   Take a short survey.

T. Colin Campbell on Larry King Live Tonight!

On Monday, Oct 12, Dr. T. Colin Campbell, author of the online certificate program Plant Based Nutrition is scheduled to appear on the Larry King Live 9pm EST on CNN. 

The discussion will center on the risks/benefits of eating animal foods, inspired by the recent victim of the eColi virus in the news. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/04/health/04meat.html?_r=1

eCornell Named Finalist for “Best Leadership Development Program” & “Best SaaS LMS” by Readers of E-Learning! Magazine

eCornell’s  Enterprise Learning Solution has been named a Finalist in two categories of the 2009 Best of  E-Learning! Awards hosted by E-Learning! Magazine: “Best Leadership Development Program” and “Best Software-as-a-Service Learning Management System (SaaS LMS).”

The winners in 16 categories of the “Best of E-Learning” Reader’s Choice awards will be announced at the virtual E-Learning! Summit on November 5 and in the January 2010 issues of E-Learning! magazine and Government E-Learning! magazine.

“It is extremely gratifying to be honored by our enterprise customers and students,” said Chris Proulx, CEO of eCornell. “This open vote enables the users of eCornell’s online training programs and those of our competitors to cast a ballot. It’s an important measure for the products and services in our industry. To be recognized among the top training providers validates that our solutions provide engaging learning for students and bottom-line performance results for our enterprise customers.”

“The Best of E-Learning! Awards program is the only reader’s choice awards in the market,” said Catherine Upton, group publisher of E-Learning! and Government E-Learning! magazines. “This year, the E-Learning! Magazine Group received 1,755 nominations, twice the volume of last year’s program, making each category very competitive.”

Readers nominated and voted for products and solutions via E-Learning! magazine’s online ballot. All ballots were cast between August 1 and September 30, 2009. Each ballot was reviewed and validated by the editorial team.