What We're Reading
The Scholarly Kitchen considers the significance of flagship web locations in the current landscape of user-driven channels. Whereas the piece focuses on research publishers; there are interesting implications for NSDL project sites. See http://tiny.cc/YYUWp
Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project has released a report on a survey of the expectations of 895 technology stakeholders and critics in the areas of social, political, and economic change by 2020: The Future of the Internet. It's in interesting read - check it out!
The Scholarly Kitchen (a blog sponsored by the Society for Scholarly Publishing) reviews a newly released report of a five-year study done at UC-Berkeley: Assessing the Future Landscape of Scholarly Communication: An Exploration of Faculty Values and Needs in Seven Disciplines. The study conducted 160 in-depth interviews across 45 U.S. research institutions. The disciplines studied were archaeology, astrophysics, biology, economics, history, music, and political science. Not surprisingly, the conclusions are that academic culture is a slow-moving system, not eager to adopt and adapt to newer forms of scholarly publishing. (SP doesn't miss pointing out the irony that the report itself was self-published via Berkeley's eScholarship site).
Tip: Scholarly Kitchen is worth adding to your bookmarks - it's a good site that keeps track of developments and issues in scholarly publishing.
The School Library Journal features a great article on NSDL resources and services in support of STEM ed. Their take-away: " For librarians and classroom teachers searching for exemplary
lessons in science and math, NSDL offers exceptional resources for
classroom instruction while also providing educators with lessons that
directly correlate to national standards in science and math. There is
little doubt that this digital resource for K-12 science outshines the
rest by providing quality educational resources accessible to everyone.
As a result, the National Science Digital Library earns nothing less
than an A+ "
The 2010 Horizon Report, published by New Media Consortium and the Educause Learning Initiative is now available. This annual report is a goldmine of information, and details emerging technology trends that are likely to impact teaching and learning at the higher ed level over the next five years, challenges faced by educators, and key technologies to keep your eyes on. The online version enables commentary by readers, both by specific section, or in general.