Newspapers In Education

Newspapers In Education
The Pioneer Press has partnered with a variety of businesses, individuals, and schools to provide the Pioneer Press Sunday edition for free to schools for the 2016-17 school year.  Newspapers In Education also has a variety of different web tools for education.  Schools can also subscribe to the daily paper for a fee.

Pioneer Press Free Sunday Edition Order Form

Free GED Testing

Below, you will find the press release from the Governor from April 7 announcing that GED testing will be free through July 2016.  If you know of someone that could benefit from this, please pass the word along!  This is a great opportunity.

ST. PAUL, MN – Today, Governor Mark Dayton and Lt. Governor Tina Smith announced that General Educational Development (GED) testing is available at no cost to eligible Minnesotans through July 2016, expanding economic opportunity for thousands of Minnesotans across the state.

“People who obtain a high school diploma can expect to earn significantly higher incomes in their lifetimes than those who do not,” said Governor Dayton. “This program will help reduce economic disparities in Minnesota, racially and geographically, to help ensure our economy works better for all Minnesotans. I urge the Legislature to approve funding this session to continue the program.”

Having a high school diploma or GED increases the earning power of individuals by 37.5 percent – that’s nearly a $10,000 per year median wage increase, which can make a significant difference for a Minnesota family.

“The GED provides a pathway to better jobs and opportunity,” said Lt. Governor Tina Smith. “This proposal will make the GED more affordable for more Minnesotans. I urge the legislature to support the Governor's proposal, and help build an economy that works for everyone, everywhere in Minnesota.”

Minnesota has long invested $125,000 each year through the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) to partially reduce the cost of the GED test for some Minnesotans. An additional $100,000 in funding from the federal Workforce Investment Act is making the GED test free for Minnesotans through July 2016. The Governor and Lt. Governor’s 2016 Supplemental Budget proposal would invest $120,000 to keep the test free for test takers into 2017.

MDE estimates that as many as 2,000 Minnesotans could benefit from this initiative in 2016. In 2015, more than 3,600 Minnesotans took the GED test. The GED test is comprised of four subject area tests, the total cost of which is normally $120.

For more information about the GED program, visit the MDE Adult Basic Education website. For more information and to register for the GED test, visitthe official GED website.
Permalink: http://mn.gov/governor/newsroom/index.jsp?id=1055-212679

Free Science Professional Development

KnowAtom
KnowAtom has tons of great resources for Science teachers.  They have everything from Evaluating your Science Curriculum for the Next Gen Standards to Understanding your Team Teaching Culture.  They also offer a variety of free webinars related to Science.  Check out this great resource today.

Also, don't forget about the Minnesota Math and Science Frameworks!

Opportunities for Teachers

GIS Educator Day: Oct. 7th

The organization of statewide GIS professionals invites all teachers to an Educators day at the at
the Duluth Convention Center 9 am – 4:30 pm. on October 7th. Teachers will learn about online
mapping resource (ArcGIS Online), available free to all schools. This FREE event (including lunch
and snacks) will include sessions presented by teachers and professionals for both beginning and
advanced users as well as specific sessions for science and social studies. The schedule provides
opportunities to collaborate with other teachers and GIS professions on projects for the classroom.
CEUs will be available for teachers and administrators. Visit the teacher registration page.

EdCamp Math and Science MN: Oct. 16th

Edcamp is a form of unconference for teachers. Unlike traditional conferences which have
schedules set by the people running the conference, Edcamp’s agenda is created by the participants.
Instead of a presentation, people are encouraged to have discussion and hands-on sessions. This
free event will be held at Eden Prairie High School and is sponsored by the Minnesota Science
Teachers' Association, and the Minnesota Council of Teachers of Mathematics. For information and
registration visit the Edcamp website.

Horizon's Report - Open Educational Resources

Open Educational Resources
The past two weeks we have looked at the fast trends that are driving technology adoption.  The next two weeks we will look at the mid-range trends.  These are trends that will drive technology adoption in 3-5 years.

Open Educational Resources (OER) are freely accessible, openly licensed documents and media that are useful for teaching, learning, and assessing as well as for research purposes (Wikipedia).  OER are becoming more prevalent in the educational system today.  They are also starting to gain acceptance among the academic community.  OER can be a free, openly licensed textbook to a free online course from MIT.  OER does not necessarily mean just free, but free and openly licensed.  In general, this means a person can take and use the material and make it their own.  When using OER please look at the fine print on the resource to see what you can and cannot do with it.  Below you will find a variety of OER databases with a lots of free and open resources.

OER Commons

Open Education Consortium

Saylor

Tech Tip - ClassTools.net

Classtools.net offers some great tools to be used in the classroom.  If you want your students to create Facebook pages for historical figures and/or characters in a book.  You can also create fake tweets and fake text messages from people as well.  Aside from those things, students can do much more with the many different tools on the site.  The best part, it's FREE!

Geographic Information Systems and Google Sketchup State Licenses

ArcGIS

Geospatial technologies are one of the three fastest growing technology fields (Source: U.S. Department of Labor). To introduce students to the geospatial tools and skills that will be required for many high-demand jobs of the future, Minnesota, through a partnership of organizations and individuals, have negotiated a statewide license for ESRI Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software.

The software will be available at no cost to qualified organizations in Minnesota. These include, but are not limited to:

• All K-12 public, private and charter schools
• Homeschools
• K-12 aged formal and non-formal youth groups (including afterschool and summer programs)

If your district is interested in acquiring a free site license for the ArcGIS software, have your technology coordinator contact mde.schooltechplan@state.mn.us or Doug Paulson, STEM specialist at MDE.

Google Sketchup

The Minnesota Department of Education also has a state site license for Google Sketchup Pro.  Google Sketchup is a 3D drawing program.  There is no cost to the districts as the state has secured funding through a variety of sources.  If your district is interested in acquiring a free site license of Google Sketchup Pro, have your technology coordinator contact mde.schooltechplan@state.mn.us or Doug Paulson, STEM specialist at MDE.