Friday, 8 August 2014

Free Online Education To Break Away Academic Conventions

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We are living in an era, which possesses all kind of conveniences, in terms of time, technology and even education. Previously the educational course, which seemed to be impossible to achieve due to the lack of time, money and due to the adequacy of personal and professional responsibilities, today, with the graduation of time and technology, that academic degree can be attained easily. Thanks to the radically evolved online learning, today a four years long programme does take only 2 years.

The E-learning As The Replacement Of Traditional Education
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There was a time when a classroom was defined by the presence of blackboard, chalk, benches, and a cohort of students, listening to the professor's lectures. But the picture in recent time has completely been veered. A study by The National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) shows that, 32 percent undergraduate students prefer to pursue their study while maintaining their full time job. All a modern age student seeks is an accessible, flexible, innovative and job-oriented education programme.

Here lies the secret, why the majority of undergraduate learners are inclined towards the ventures of online education. The e-learning programmes not only welcome students into a world of education without boundaries, but they also bestow an abundance of aspects that make students seek online graduation degrees.
  • Online education programmes minimize the complications and limitations of time & place.
  • For those, who already started to go ahead with their professional careers, online graduation courses make the resources and technologies affordable and approachable.
  • This breakthrough in education allows people from all over the world to acquire not only a degree but also excellence.

However, some contradictory opinions are there to challenge the online learning models, stating that, there will remain a need for traditional college education as it provides students with a plenty of important benefits like students-teacher interaction.

The Impact Of MOOCs
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Since their advent in 2011, MOOCs have been creating an immense impact on academic world, becoming a genre of their own. The absence of tuition fees, flexible courses and a without boundary study system have increased the number of students per course. Today MOOCs are hosted by many eminent universities around the world , such as Harvard, MIT, Stanford and so on.

  • HarvardX & edX
One of the prominent platforms, that have partnered with MOOCs, is edX and HarvardX is one of the 29 institutions, whose contents appear on edX. In spite of the its unsteady scale, edx's software, Open Response Assessment (ORA), provides about 2.5 million students with grades and contents. After being skilled and equipped about the ideas that usually come from students , ORA can provide with feedback to students' questions. Commenting on edX and ORA, Piotr Mitros, edX’s chief scientist, states, “ If you asked me, ‘Do you want a school experience where every single piece of text is graded by machine?’ I’d say, ‘That’s a straw-man. Nobody is proposing that.”

To Conclude

A letter, published in The Chronicle Of Higher Education, witnessed the view of the philosophy faculty of San Jose State University that described the MOOC as a “serious compromise of quality of education”. Their fear was that MOOC will soon replace flesh-and-blood teachers and the traditional classroom will go into extinction soon. This letter prominently conveys that MOOC renders a huge access and flexibility of online learning to the people from every genre.

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Thursday, 7 August 2014

The University Degrees-Worth Having Today!


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With the rising academic tuition fees and evolving job scenario, if anything matters most, is choosing the appropriate stream to go with. The distinct educational stream, with which one achives his/her graduation degree, can either set up a lifetime career and high earning or sink into a heap of disappointments.

Consequently, today's education is not only for education's sake, it more tends to incline towards the need of employers.

When Education Is Job Oriented

National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) has done a survey that reflects the desire of the eminent corporate employers. Noticing & measuring the hiring process of some big corporate houses like Chevron, ConAgra Foods, Ernst & Young, Genworth Financial and Seagate Technology, NACE has pointed some university degrees, that top at the employers' list. They are Engineering, Business, Accounting/Finance,Computer Science/IT & 5. Economics.

Engineering
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Employers from many IT sectors, banks, finance & consulting areas and many other prominent business sectors desire to recruit employees with expertise like logical thinking, problem solving & strong numeracy, which are an engineer's key skills.

Many large engineering employers call for Mining, mechanical, electrical, petroleum and metallurgical engineering courses, as job opportunities continue to grow larger in these sectors.


Business

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One of the fundamental qualities that recruiters seek in an employee, is having good commercial awareness. Students, studying business, possess that comprehension, that they effectively apply to the job. Be it an undergraduate business degree or an MBA, the analytical & problem solving ability and the ability to think logically will earn the business degree holders both money and placements.

Accounting/Finance-

Every large or small business sector, be it good or bad time, is in the need for accountants with a clear knowledge of finance. So plenty of opportunities are out there.
According to Bill Demario, chief operating officer of Ajilon Professional Staffing, “By 2016 there will be a dramatic need for more accountants”.

Computer Science/IT-
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Though US has recently witnessed a significant uplift of career scopes in Computer Science & IT, the prowess that the study of these stream offers is valued on a global scale. The GCA’s December 2011 ‘Grad Stats’ survey found that a computer science graduate’s starting salary was approximately AU$51,000.

Economics

A degree in economics provides one with a wide array of both subject-specific and transferable skills. All these skills are highly sought after by employers from different genres like banking, accountancy, tax advice, acturial work, insurance & trading.

Some Other Degrees, Worth Having
  • Health Care & Medicine
A research, done by Graduate Careers Australia (GCA), displays that, more than 97 per cent of medicine & pharmacy graduates found full-time employment within four months of graduation.
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  • Education
It is conspicuous that the demand of mathematicians will never fade away. Research shows that 86.5% of degree holders land with jobs within 6 months of graduation, being employed to eminent positions.
  • Human Resources Management
With the rapid growth of resources, engineering and health industries , the need for top-down organisation are also uplifting. Taking right decisions and maintaining order within the company, as well as handling relations with others in the industry, do play a vital part in an organization's success.

To Conclude

Now-a-days, pursuing a graduate degree in the distinct fields that lead to specific professional positions more tends to be the goal of study and having academic qualification rather than acquire knowledge.

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