LOS ANGELES – February 1, 2012 – The University of Southern California (USC) Rossier School of Education (MAT@USC) and USC School of Social Work (MSW@USC) web-based graduate programs have released a new mobile application that allows students to access multi-media course content and intra-school social networks, all from their Android smart phone. The launch follows the introduction of a similar iPhone/iPad app on iTunes last year.

While some higher education institutions offer select mobile technology or online classes to students, the MAT@USC (Master of Arts in Teaching) and MSW@USC (Master of Social Work) programs are thought to be among the first to offer comprehensive access to recorded lectures, course content, videos and social networking features via a mobile app.

“Integrating mobile technology into the Rossier School’s online learning management system was a natural next step,” said Karen Symms Gallagher, dean of the USC Rossier School of Education. “We think having quick access to multi-media course content is something more and more students at universities will come to expect in the future.”

“We’re definitely pushing the technology envelope with this new mobile app,” said Paul Maiden, vice dean at the USC School of Social Work. “Our MSW@USC students are located all over the country on different time zones and have demanding work schedules. Having access to lectures and assignments on your phone takes the idea of mobile learning to a whole new level.”

The MAT@USC and MSW@USC graduate degree programs are offered via a highly advanced web-based learning management system that uses robust social networking platforms and face-to-face, “Skype-like” interactive technology to create a real-time, personal classroom experience. The programs’ students are based throughout the United States and the world.

USC Android App Release

Similar to the programs’ iPhone/iPad app, the new Android app features visually impressive, yet easy-to-navigate interfaces that allow students to:

• View recorded lectures and course materials, including lessons, documents and videos
• Find and connect with other classmates in their program
• Interact with their professors and students
• Receive notifications of upcoming live sessions and assignment due dates
• Participate and post photographs, documents and videos in socially-created communities
• Take cloud-synced notes that sync across mobile and web systems

The new Android app can be downloaded from the Android Market on any web-enabled Android phone. Only students enrolled in the MAT@USC and MSW@USC programs via the schools’ online learning platforms can log in and use its features.

The Android and iPhone mobile apps are an integrated feature of the MAT@USC and MSW@USC online learning management systems, developed and managed by the education technology company 2tor, Inc. of Maryland.  2tor partners with preeminent institutions of higher education to deliver rigorous and selective degree programs online to students globally. The Android and iPhone app technology was developed by TouchAppMedia, a New York-based mobile technology firm that specializes in developing front-and-back-end mobile solutions for education and media organizations.

About the USC Rossier School of Education

As part of the University of Southern California and located in the heart of urban Los Angeles, the USC Rossier (ross-EAR) School of Education is one of the world’s premiere centers for the study of urban education, preparing teachers and educational leaders who are committed to strengthening urban education locally, nationally and globally. USC Rossier is leading the search for innovative solutions to the challenges in urban education, and creating mutually beneficial partnerships to rethink curricula, develop sound policy and improve educational environments (http://rossier.usc.edu).

About the USC School of Social Work

The University of Southern California’s School of Social Work (www.usc.edu/socialwork) ranks among the nation’s top 10 social work graduate programs and maintains the oldest social work master’s and Ph.D. programs in the West. With its reputation for educational excellence, cultural diversity and significant research funding, the school prepares students for leadership roles in public and private organizations that serve individuals, families and communities in need. The USC School of Social Work was the first to endow a center for interdisciplinary social work research – the Hamovitch Center for Science in the Human Services – and remains a pioneer in translational research, experiential learning and academic innovation.

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When 2tor employees explore the company’s new Landover headquarters, one of the required stops on the tour is Chip Paucek’s office.

As the company’s former Chief Operating Officer and recently appointed CEO, Paucek is the first to tout that his office — now outfitted with a fish tank, a world map mural and bright red couches — was the high-tech education company’s first operations center. Growing rapidly from one room and fewer than 10 employees when it was founded in 2008, 2tor’s Maryland office is now buzzing with nearly 250 employees (and counting) across four floors on Corporate Drive.

“It was a natural move for us to shift 2tor’s headquarters to Landover, with the majority of our employees being based here,” said Chip Paucek. “As a long time Maryland resident, I’m so proud to have been affiliated with so many local businesses including Hooked on Phonics in Baltimore.  I live and boat actively in Annapolis.  Old Bay runs in my blood at this point.”

The move to a new Maryland headquarters supports the company’s aim to be near the highly-educated workforce the state has to offer.  2tor plans to continue its hiring spree and currently has dozens of positions across the board, from account management, marketing, operations, human resources, analytics and administrative roles.
Founded by Paucek and John Katzman, former leaders of Hooked on Phonics and the Princeton Review, respectively, 2tor is the nation’s highest-funded education technology start up that delivers graduate degrees online by forming partnerships with top-tier research universities. The company was able to raise $65 million in funding to date, with Bethesda-based Novak Biddle Venture Partners as an investor.

2tor’s partner programs combine real-time online classes, a dynamic learning management system and an immersive social network, 2tor’s programs are built collaboratively with each university partner’s renowned on-campus curriculum and professors. The company’s current partners include the University of Southern California, Georgetown University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Today, more than 3,000 students are enrolled and more than 500 students have graduated from 2tor programs and come from almost every U.S. state and 30 countries.

At the Landover headquarters, the company highlights the strong connection between 2tor and its university partners. Each program is represented with official mascots, flags, custom beanbag chairs and walls painted precisely to university color specifications.

Learn more about 2tor’s partnerships:

•  MAT@USC: Master of Arts in Teaching from the University of Southern California, Rossier School of Education
•  MSW@USC: Master of Social Work from the University of Southern California, School of Social Work
•  Nursing@Georgetown: Master’s in Nursing from Georgetown University, School of Nursing & Health Studies
• MBA@UNC: Master of Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Kenan-Flagler Business School

 
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Over the course of the last few years, professors have had to find new ways to communicate with their students. Whether it be through peer instruction, Twitter or classroom blogging, the traditional lecture has become severely flawed. In the standard classroom, 95 percent of the students can be found on their laptops, and the only way to keep them from surfing astray is by engaging them once, and then keeping them engaged, and that all starts on the first day of classes.

Edward Boches, chief innovation officer at Mullen, is now teaching at Boston University. Called Strategic Creative Development, his course is designed to have students “study, dissect, analyze and conceive creative ideas that include traditional advertising, but that emphasize social media, digital platforms, mobile apps and platforms and gaming dynamics to understand how brands connect with consumers in the new age of participation.” How could one find that information, though? Just by browsing Storify.

Boches put a twist on the standard syllabus, formatting it with Storify, which allowed him to link the students’ required reading to Amazon, so they could easily purchase the books they need, as well as incorporate video that helped inspire and shape his class. By using Storify, he’s been able to turn his class into more of a story, which is an integral part of advertising.

He’s also linked his syllabus to Coursekit, a new course management tool that lets students post links, videos and files, write blog posts, access their class calendar and communicate more easily with each other. Boches has even made everything available on Springpad, giving students the opportunity to save and share their work, and he’s created a YouTube channel designed specifically for the course, filled with advertisements his students can refer back to.

His goal? To expose students to the various platforms. Although he is having them tweet with the hashtag #BUSCD, he admitted he’s also trying to show them newer platforms that he thinks are part of the future.

“I think we live in an age when communication and collaboration is digital,” Boches said. “I figure I can’t really teach as much as I can foster an environment of learning. In that case, students learn from each other as much as from me. But extending the classroom to the digital platforms — learning, interaction, debate, dialog and sharing continue to take place all week long.”

To Boches, the key components of an effective advertisement remain, “great content and memorable ideas,” saying the platforms need to be enduring, the apps useful and everything, overall, highly entertaining so they’ll be shareable. If students leave his class with only one nugget of knowledge, he said he hopes it’s to “Think like inventors, not like ad-makers. Inventors create things that are new, meaningful, useful and lasting.”

Through the various platforms he’s incorporated into his class, he’s given his course the chance to outlast. At the end of the semester, students throw away their syllabus. Now, it can be found everyday on the Internet. By throwing slides online, outsiders can also access his content. Boches said his introductory presentation already has 1,500 views and 36 downloads, and classes only started two weeks ago.

Between programs like MITx and 2tor, it’s clear the future of education is quickly evolving, and professors will need to continue to adapt. Like Jeremy Johnson, the co-founder of 2tor said, “We need to view all of this as an opportunity. We’re about to experience the renaissance of education.”

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Twenty years ago, the MBA was unquestionably the degree of choice for ambitious young managers; these days, the picture is less clear cut, as shifts in the global economy highlight the need for competing types of management education and greater student choice.

While the MBA still dominates the North American degree market, a diverse range of programmes are blossoming in developing economies.

South America is emerging as a non-degree market, with executive education the norm in Brazil. In China, executive or part-time MBAs are the premium programmes. In India, the flagship postgraduate programmes are targeted at those straight out of undergraduate courses.

In the fourth Bric country, Russia, the MBA also takes a back seat, says Valery Katkalo, dean of the Graduate School of Management at St. Petersburg State University. “Currently the full-time MBA is not the product delivered by Russian business schools. I do not see a particular demand for [it].”

In Europe, the surge in demand for pre-experience masters in management degrees has overshadowed the MBA, with many established schools seeing a decline in applications. In countries such as Germany, the MBA is still a fledgling product, explains Jens Wüstemann, president of the Mannheim Business School. “Fifteen years ago, the MBA was unknown in Germany. We are trying to educate the market.”

Even in the US, the home of the MBA, fragmentation in the market – or customisation, as deans prefer to call it – is increasing, says David Schmittlein, dean of MIT’s Sloan school and a long-time advocate of programme choice. “There’s been a lot more discussion.”

So, just as the US exported the MBA to Europe 50 years ago, today there is an increasing demand for European-style pre-experience masters in ­management degrees in North America, as well as for specialised degrees in finance, accounting and marketing.

The latest technology has also sent many MBA schools back to the drawing-board. Even the top-ranked schools are acknowledging the changes. “I think people will look at different formats,” says Glenn Hubbard, dean of Columbia Business School in New York. “I think people may want to get an MBA in a slightly different way.”

While every business school is exploring the option of blended learning, in which courses can be either online or based in the classroom, in 2012 all eyes will be on the Kenan-Flagler school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In 2011 it launched MBA@UNC, essentially an online MBA, but with the same premium fees as the full-time degree. If successful, it could set the benchmark for other highly ranked schools.

In the scrabble to attract the top students, this kind of differentiation has become the name of the game, says Richard Lyons, dean of the Haas school at UC Berkeley. “Business schools are taking more of a stand and saying, ‘This is what we are about.’ We’re saying this is our identity; this is our history; this is our place. We’re going to play it our way.”

But as the ticket price of an MBA goes up, so does the student demand for high-quality teaching and services. Dave Wilson, president of GMAC, the body that administers the GMAT entry test for business schools, warns of the dangers. “The faculty are a fixed cost, just like the building. There’s a limit to what they can teach,” he says. “Now they have to teach MBAs for medical students or MScs in finance.”

But market-sensitive business schools are learning to embrace the new reality. At IE Business School in Madrid, for example, the 633 full-time MBA students now choose which 80 elective courses will run from the 150 proposed by faculty. “It’s demand driven,” explains strategy professor David Bach.

As numbers on MBA programmes in Europe and the US plateau or decline, business schools everywhere are counting the costs, and fundraising campaigns are squarely back on the agenda as state funding evaporates. But in Asia, different funding models are emerging, such as corporate foundations, to take the place of the state and the wealthy alumnus.

As Nitish Jain, president of the SP Jain Center of Management, points out: “It will be private enterprise that funds Asia’s growth in education.” One example is Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business, which made a splash in 2011 by opening facilities in London, reversing the prevailing trend in which western schools set up programmes in Asia. This year, the Chinese school is planning to start teaching in New York as well.

As established business schools scurry to educate those from different cultures, the curriculum’s focus has moved from the content to the context in which business operates. “What does it mean to put capitalism through the moral filter of Islam?” asks William Boulding, dean of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. “We’d better begin to understand that.”

As well as damping the number of MBA applicants, the continued economic uncertainty has brought other changes. Students are now opting for longer programmes. At Esade in Barcelona, where students can complete their MBA in 12, 15 or 18 months, most are eschewing the shortest course. Of the 180 students, only 20 in the class of 2012 will finish their degree in 12 months – the rest are opting to study over a 15- or 18-month period. “What we didn’t expect at all was the [low figures for] 12 months,” says Gloria Batllori, executive director for the MBA.

Oxford University’s Saïd Business School is also tapping into the trend. Peter Tufano, the newly-appointed dean, plans to launch a 1+1 system this year, in which postgraduate students will be able to obtain two degrees in two years, the first a masters in a specialist subject, such as environmental management or education, the second an MBA.

Consumer choice, it seems, will increasingly be the name of the game.

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Last Thursday, Apple executives flew in to NY  to announce their investment in the e-book market and partnership with several large academic publishing companies, including Pearson and McGraw Hill.

However, the education sector has been going through digital changes for quite some time; and leading the way are several NY-based startups.

According to Crain’s New York Business, people like John Katzman, founder of The Princeton Review, online education is becoming less of a second-class learning tool, and more of a mainstream model. Katzman launched the company, 2tor Inc., which developed a digital learning system that creates a global classroom allowing real-time, virtual interaction between students and professors. The system has been adopted by top schools such as Georgetown’s nursing school and the MBA program atUNC Chapel Hill.

In fact, the online education market has grown so much that Jeremy Johnson, Chief Marketing Officer at 2tor, predicts that many schools will go out of business as people begin to adopt the online programs.

That being said, there are also critics of the digital move. These people believe that direct interaction between student and teacher is necessary, and are afraid that online tools will simply be used as a cheaper alternative. On the flipside, others believe it is imperative to cater to generation that has grown up in a digital age, and that a move to digital education will help to do just that.

According to Crain’s, It is estimated that the online learning products and services market will grow to $11 billion in 2015.

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Last Thursday morning outside Apple’s press conference at the Guggenheim Museum, news-team sound trucks stretched an entire block, possibly setting a record for the amount of coverage for an announcement about textbooks.

But the introduction of interactive, instructional e-books for the iPad was also a signal of larger changes taking place in the classroom. In the midst of its Internet moment, education is going through a digital disruption similar to the ones that have shaken up the music industry, newspapers and trade-book publishing.

Apple’s event was also symbolic of New York’s role in that transformation. Executives from the Cupertino, Calif.-based company came all the way to Fifth Avenue because, by and large, this is where the academic publishers are.

Partly spurred by its concentration of intellectual talent, New York is also becoming a hotbed of innovation in educational technology. Venture capital investment in education-related startups in the metro area totaled $95 million in 2011—an 84% spike over the prior year, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers/National Venture Capital Association. The number of startups receiving investment money rose to 14, up from eight in 2010.

In the long run, newfangled interactive textbooks like the ones Apple and its publishing partners previewed last Thursday are likely to be a minor aspect of education’s digital revolution. But Apple’s entry is certainly helping the revolution along.

“It gets people to pay attention to the work we and other folks have done over the last three years to shift the industrial production model of education to more of a GPS-driven, personalized learning [model],” said Vineet Madan, senior vice president of strategic services at McGraw-Hill Education. The publisher has five titles available on the new iBook platform, including high-school texts Algebra 2012 and Biology 2012. “It gets them to think other things are possible in teaching and learning.”

Online learning updated

Those other things include the online learning system developed by 2tor Inc., a company launched in New York four years ago by John Katzman, the founder of test-prep company The Princeton Review. With the help of broadband connections and mobile technology, the startup has revamped the old distance-learning model, which has long been considered a second-class form of education prized mainly for its convenience.

The 2tor iteration creates a kind of intimate global classroom that allows for real-time interaction between students and their professor, and has been picked up by four elite institutions, including the nursing school at Georgetown and the M.B.A. program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Company executives say their classes are just as good as those offered on campus and that, more and more, online learning will be a way that universities expand—and survive.

“The high end of the academic world is a very large market, and one that is going to see significant disruption over the next 10 years,” said 2tor Chief Marketing Officer Jeremy Johnson. “Many schools will go out of business, and you will see far larger programs online.”

Investors also see a growing market in digital education companies. In 2011, deals in the ed-tech sphere totaled $10 billion, which was flat compared with the prior year, but up from $5.4 billion in 2009, according to figures just released by investment banking firm Berkery Noyes.

The rush to a digital future has plenty of critics, however. They see direct student-teacher contact as indispensable, fear a push toward technology for its own sake and worry that digital tools will be used primarily as cheaper alternatives to teachers.

But educational experts say that digital tools are needed to reach students who have grown up in a digital world. And educational innovators insist that technology can provide new paths to learning.

“Until now, we haven’t had the ability to capture, process, synthesize and use these enormous amounts of information and data,” said David Liu, chief operating officer of Knewton, a New York-based adaptive-learning company that uses algorithms to figure out how different students absorb information. The firm recently began a partnership with academic publishing giant Pearson. “This is a one-time-in-history moment for education.”

Funding slows down

Despite what may be a historic moment, it’s not clear that New York startups will continue to get financing at the rate they have been, as venture capital firms grow wary of where the economy is headed. In the fourth quarter, VC financing in the New York area plunged 40%, compared with the prior quarter, to $545.1 million.

But experts say the tech-education industry is just getting started. The U.S. business for e-learning products and services in the pre-K to 12-and-higher education markets will grow to $11 billion in 2015, from $7.6 billion in 2011, according to research firm Ambient Insight.

“We are just in the beginning stages of disrupting everything, from textbooks to learning applications,” said Jalak Jobanputra, an investor who has been looking at tech-education firms in New York since the late 1990s. “The market should be able to support multiple players in each segment, and those players have not yet been established.”

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