Describes how San Diego State University created a collaborative, objective, and quantitative metric, or rubric, to support its decision-making process regarding a Web portal. Discusses how the rubric was used to score different portal software systems during demonstrations and as a checklist and inventory to describe potential options. (EV)

Describes how the University of the South Pacific has created a satellite-based computer network aimed at greatly expanding its offerings to students on remote islands. (EV)

This interview with Allan Ellis focuses on a history of computer applications in education. Highlights include work at the Harvard Graduate School of Education; the New England Education Data System; and efforts to create a computer-based distance learning and development program called ISVD (Information System for Vocational Decisions). (LRW)

Describes one teacher education college's experiences with designing and implementing technology standards for teachers, as required by the International Society for Technology in Education. Addresses program rationale, initial implementation, division of content, feedback from faculty and students, and effects on instruction. (JPB)

Presents an analytic framework to describe and analyze students' answers to proof problems. Employs the framework to investigate ways in which dynamic geometry software can be used to improve students' understanding of the nature of mathematical proof and improve their proof skills. (Author/MM)

Reports on the Partnership for Excellence in Teacher Education (PETE), an NSF-funded project to promote reform in mathematics and science teacher preparation that features the redesign of teacher preparation to reflect current research on learning and teaching. Concludes that new tools of technology have the potential for enhancing education but…

Presents three Internet-based activities for teaching elementary students about the Underground Railroad. The activities include creating a freight-train of facts about the Underground Railroad, mapping the routes of the Underground Railroad, and participating in an electronic simulation of life as a fugitive slave. (SM)

Presents evaluative work based on the computer algebra system (CAS) TREEFROG which enables drill-and-practice examples to be attempted with immediate, and ultimately intelligent, feedback. Contends that by using a suitable repertoire of black and white box CAS, a full range of algebraic skills can be developed. Presents preliminary evidence based…

Describes two strategies for implementing active learning in physical chemistry, one involving supplementing the traditional lecture course with heavily computer-based active learning exercises carried out by cooperative groups, the other using cooperative learning almost exclusively supplemented by occasional mini-lectures. Both approaches seemed…

A benchmarking study of business school faculty (80 of 250 responded) identified technology uses for course preparation and delivery. Extrinsic factors (institutional characteristics and faculty demographics) were not consistently related to technology use, whereas intrinsic factors were influential. (Contains 22 references.) (SK)

Explores how the alliance between Microsoft and Blackboard, a company whose software helps colleges put their courses on the Internet, is making some college officials wonder what the deal means for their operating systems and budgets, and for higher education in general. (EV)

Investigates methods for classifying problem solving strategies of high school students who studied infectious and non-infectious diseases by using a software system that can generate a picture of students' strategies in solving problems. (Contains 24 references.) (Author/YDS)

Presents seven mini-lessons on chaos theory and fractal geometry for use in a high school setting. Examples include the Sierpinski Triangle and Julia Sets. (MM)

This 1967 paper examines the importance of keeping student health records, proposing that modern data processing methods be used to keep those records more efficiently. The paper describes how efficiently a computer could keep such information and makes a brief cost-benefit analysis of computerizing student health records. (SM)

The concerns-based adoption model (CBAM) was used to analyze results of a study examining the use of student-owned portable computers at a secondary school. CBAM was found to be very useful in explaining the actions of teachers and in providing a basis on which to develop a theoretical model for the implementation of portable computers in schools.…