Articles about Education

The higher education sector has seen a big increase in cryptocurrency mining activity according to a new report from AI security company Vectra.

Vectra used its Cognito platform to monitor traffic and collect metadata from more than 4.5 million devices and workloads from customer cloud, data center and enterprise environments. It discovered that, of all the cryptocurrency mining detections, 60 percent occurred in higher education.

Continue reading →

Today is a huge day for Apple fans — a new iPad! The company's latest tablet is extremely affordable at $329, and schools can get a $30 discount, bringing the price to just $299.

What makes this low-cost education-focused iPad so special is its Apple Pencil support -- something that was previously limited to "Pro" iPad devices. The problem? The Apple Pencil can be a bit too difficult for small hands to manage. To solve for this, Logitech has created the "Crayon" -- a writing device that is compatible with the new iPad. Best of all, it is more affordable than Apple’s offering at just $49.99!

Continue reading →

Cyber security is seen as one of the biggest threats to business. Yet employees are not being supported by their organizations when it comes to investing in their continued education and career development.

Crowd sourced IT and security training solution Cybrary, along with cyber security research body the Cyentia Institute, have produced a report looking at the cyber skills gap.

Continue reading →

It's been a while since Apple introduced a new product and it looks like the wait will soon be over, as today it announced its first major event of the year. It'll take place later this month and it focuses on education, one of the company's core markets.

The location for the spring event is a bit unusual, given that Apple has a perfectly good venue in its spaceship campus in Cupertino. It'll be held in Chicago, at the Chicago High School, Lane Tech, on March 27. Given the theme, we're likely to see new hardware aimed at educators and students.

Continue reading →

Learning can be fun. Actually, scratch that -- learning should be fun. If a child or adult is bored while studying or being taught a new lesson, something is wrong. True, not all subjects are interesting to all students, so that is why it is imperative to match students with topics that truly interest them. In other words, it can be better to focus on strengths rather than weaknesses.

If a college student is interested in coding, for instance, there is no shortage of curriculums to support that -- depending on the university, of course. The thing is, you can only learn so much from books and lectures. Like anything in life, hands-on experience can trump everything. That's why Google's "Summer of Code" program is so important. If you aren't familiar, it gives university students the opportunity to work on an established open source project. The mentor organizations that are participating aren't third-rate either. For example, students can work with Kodi, GNOME, and LibreOffice, to name a few.

Continue reading →

When it comes to Chromebooks, Acer is one of the premier manufacturers. From the early days of Google's desktop OS, Acer has produced quality computers running the Linux-based Chrome OS. Best of all, Acer's Chromebooks and Chromeboxes are often quite affordable. This makes sense, since the company is largely a value-focused manufacturer. Quite frankly, Acer and Chrome OS are a match made in heaven.

Hot on the heels of announcing its all-new Chromebook 11, the company today unveils three new Chrome OS computers -- Chromebook 11 C732, Chromebook Spin 11, and Chromebox CXI3. While the Chromebooks will likely get much of the attention, I am quite smitten with the Chromebox. This diminutive desktop is absolutely gorgeous, and it is chock-full of useful ports. The Chromebook 11 C732 is also quite intriguing, thanks to its optional LTE connectivity!

Continue reading →

It is imperative that students learn about computing in school -- the earlier the better. The problem? Sometimes teachers aren't very knowledgeable about computers. In other words, some of these educators simply aren't qualified to teach young people about computing. In order for these people to teach future generations about computing, they must first learn about it themselves.

Today, Google announces that it is donating £1 million worth of computer training to U.K. teachers. Don't misunderstand -- the search giant is not just throwing money at the situation. Instead, Google will be having some of its employees provide actual time and assistance to these educators -- how cool is that?

Continue reading →

When I was a kid, one of my favorite meals was meatloaf -- yeah, I am a stereotypical red-blooded American. My mom would make this dinner regularly, but she had a secret ingredient -- carrots! Yeah, she would mix mushed carrots into the ground beef loaf. Guess what? I couldn't tell the difference, and so, I was eating vegetables. Hiding healthy foods in other ones has become quite popular in recent years -- there are even cookbooks that teach it.

Unfortunately, some children can be just as averse to learning as they are to eating vegetables. Sure, some kids are avid learners and eaters of healthy food, but if they aren't, some parents can be in for quite the struggle. Today, Microsoft showcases a new way to teach children coding by tricking them into thinking they are playing Minecraft. You know what? That is rather brilliant!

Continue reading →

Open source is changing the world, and it is important that children get educated on the subject as early as possible. It's a competitive workforce out there, and students need to be prepared. Of course, learning about open source doesn't have to be a chore -- gaining knowledge can sometimes be fun too.

Google does a lot for the open source community -- far more than just contributing code. Actually, the search giant hosts two very important education-focused open source events -- "Google Code-in" for younger teen students and "Google Summer of Code" for University-level learners. Today, the company announces the 8th annual edition of the former -- Google Code-in 2017. Not only can these teens gain experience by working on an open source project, but they can also win prizes!

Continue reading →

I absolutely love Chromebooks. Well, not for me exactly, but I love suggesting them to other people when appropriate. While they aren't for everybody, they are brilliant when they can meet a user's needs. The underlying Chrome OS operating system is based on Linux and is extremely secure. In fact, it can be argued that Google's laptop operating system is the most secure OS for web browsing. If you are tired of fixing either a friend or family member's Windows 10 PC, and they live in a web browser, get them on a Chromebook and get some of your time -- and sanity -- back.

Today, Acer unveils a new laptop running Chrome OS. The "Chromebook 11 C771," as it is called, is designed primarily for education (where they really shine), plus as thin clients for businesses too. The notebook features an 11.6-inch display with optional touch, and up to 13 hours battery life. Since it is designed primarily for students, and they can be rough on computers, the C771 has military grade (MIL-STD 810G) durability and a spill-resistant keyboard. It can even survive a 4 foot drop.

Continue reading →

Chromebooks are great for many scenarios, but they really shine for education. Why? Well, they are often inexpensive, and best of all, they are very secure thanks to the Linux base and restrictive software design. ASUS has a new such laptop called "Chromebook Flip C213." The 11.6-inch notebook is designed to be very rugged so that if a student abuses it, it should hopefully survive. ASUS even promises an impressive 12+ hours of battery life.

This convertible laptop is powered by a 2.4GHz Intel processor and features 4GB of RAM. This should run Chrome OS very well. Besides the traditional camera at the top of the screen, there is an additional camera above the keyboard. When the laptop is folded to a tablet, that second camera becomes a "rear" camera. Cool, right?

Continue reading →

If you are a student or teacher, I hope you are having a fun and relaxing summer vacation. It can be very rewarding to just shut your brain off for a couple of months. Unfortunately, the new school year will be here before you know it. If you need new technology for the upcoming semester, such as a laptop or tablet, now is the time to start looking.

When shopping for technology items, it is always wise to look at Apple. The company's hardware is second to none, and both its iPad and MacBook products come with free iWork software for word processing, editing spreadsheets, and creating presentations. This software suite is brilliant for education. Best of all, for a limited time (until September 25), if you purchase a compatible tablet or computer from Apple, you can score some free Beats headphones!

Continue reading →

It is widely recognized that supercomputers are now regarded as the 'third pillar' of modern research due to the important role they play in speeding up calculations and analysis, some of which would previously have taken many years to complete. Supercomputers are used alongside scientific theory and experimentation to complement the scientific research process.

The value and importance of High Performance Computing (HPC) at universities has grown massively over the past decade, and it’s no exception at the University of Bristol. We’ve invested more than £16 million in HPC and research data storage over the past 10 years.

Continue reading →

Google has developed an educational program with the aim of helping children make better use of the internet. It's a drive to "help kids learn how to be smart, positive and kind online, just like we teach them to be offline" and it's called Be Internet Awesome.

Pavni Diwanji, vice president of Engineering For Kids and Families at Google says: "We need to provide guidance as they learn to make their own smart decisions online." The program has been developed with a number of key online safety experts and includes an educational game called Interland.

Continue reading →

When the education-focused Windows 10 S was announced, many people were dubious that it could be a success. Limiting the operating system to apps from the Windows Store seems like a recipe for disaster. That opinion is understandable, as we have sort of been down this road before with Windows RT -- which failed. The concept can confuse users.

I was sort of hopeful for Windows 10 S when Microsoft made a shocking announcement at Build 2017 that it is bringing Linux distributions to the Windows Store. This gave the impression that students using the S variant of the OS would be able to tinker with Linux. Unfortunately, this is not the case as Microsoft will be blocking Linux on the new OS. In other words, not all apps in the store will be available for Windows 10 S.

Continue reading →