IBL News

Author: IBL News

  • Class Enhances Its Zoom-Based Platform with a Breakout Room Feature

    Class Enhances Its Zoom-Based Platform with a Breakout Room Feature

    IBL News | New York

    Class.com unveiled this month an enhanced breakout room feature, along with other functionalities for its educational platform built on Zoom, following its business view of making virtual instruction more like face-to-face learning environments.

    The breakout feature will facilitate group collaboration and allow instructors to:

    • View all breakout rooms at once in one place.
    • Monitor activity in breakout rooms at the same time.
    • Send chat messages to and from individual breakout room groups.
    • Share web pages, videos, and files with specific breakout rooms.
    • Launch individual teaching or training activities to specific breakout rooms.

    These features will make it easier for instructors to facilitate group collaboration online and enhance learner engagement and success with online learning.

    “The ability to work in smaller groups has been shown to be an effective method to motivate learners, promote active learning, and develop key critical-thinking, communication, and decision-making skills, which is why this feature is so important to current and future customers,” wrote Michael Chasen, education software pioneer and CEO at Class.com.

     

  • Almost 800 Million Youngsters Do Not Have Basic Literacy Skills, Says UNESCO

    Almost 800 Million Youngsters Do Not Have Basic Literacy Skills, Says UNESCO

    IBL News | New York

    A dramatic reality that rarely makes headlines: A total of 773 million youth and adults worldwide do not have basic literacy skills and therefore are deprived of access to decent jobs and participation in their communities. Two-thirds of them are women.

    The United Nation’s UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning provided this date while calling the international community to increase funding and political will to advance into universal literacy.

    Currently, the funding gap to reach functional literacy is $17 billion. Countries like Burkina Faso, Haiti, and South Sudan are in the most need of funding.

    The COVID-19 outbreak has shown the dramatic face of the lack of literacy. “The pandemic clearly showed that literacy saves lives,” said David Atchoarena, Director of the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL).

    “Only if people can read and write will they be able to access life-saving information and be empowered to act responsibly during emergencies such as the one the pandemic has brought about.”

    This month, on International Literacy Day, Audrey Azoulay, Chief of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), pointed out that his institution is prompting to “rethink literacy in our contemporary world as part of the right to education and a means to create more inclusive and linguistically and culturally diverse societies.”

     

  • Udemy.com Offers Business Customers Hands-On Labs for Skills Development

    Udemy.com Offers Business Customers Hands-On Labs for Skills Development

    IBL News | New York

    Udemy Business expanded with a new offering: Udemy Business Pro, which brings together interactive labs, skills assessment, pre-curated Udemy Paths, workplaces for risk-free practice environments, and hands-on labs across critical skills in Information Technology, Software Development, and Data & Analytics.

    “Seventy percent of employees say they haven’t yet mastered the skills they need for the job they have today,” according to Gartner. “Additionally, only one in five employees say they have the skills they need for both their current roles and future careers.”

    The Covid pandemic has accelerated already changing skill requirements across industries. Udemy’s 2021 Workplace Learning Trends Report revealed that data science and data analysis experienced a major increase in demand across various industries.

    The report found that companies saw a 466% increase in data modeling training from 2019 to 2020, and a 1,488% increase in data warehouse training, demonstrating a major emphasis on data analytics skill-building.

    “Udemy Business Pro will bring personalized, practical, and hands-on learning to essential technical roles, which we believe will ultimately improve productivity and help organizations build technical teams ready for the challenges of tomorrow,” said Greg Brown, President of Udemy Business.

  • A Majority of New Online Learners Are Women, Finds Coursera’s Report

    A Majority of New Online Learners Are Women, Finds Coursera’s Report

    IBL News | New York

    More women are participating in online learning and certificate training programs aimed at entry-level digital jobs. A total of 52% of new online learners in 2021 were women, up from 47% in 2019, despite the unemployment crisis caused by the pandemic disproportionately impacted them.

    This data highlights a narrowing gender gap in distance learning, reflected in a study of Coursera (NYSE: COUR), released yesterday.

    “Our research suggests that gender gaps in online learning narrowed during the pandemic, even as gender employment gaps widened,” said Jeff Maggioncalda, CEO at Coursera. “We are encouraged by how women are embracing online learning to develop new skills that can help accelerate their return to work and promote economic mobility.”

    The Women and Skills Report (PDF download), which includes data from 40 million new learners registered during the pandemic, indicates that top skills include leadership and STEM skills, like communication, management, entrepreneurship, probability and statistics, computer programming, and theoretical computer science.

    Top courses taken include COVID-19 Contact Tracing from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and The Science of Wellbeing from Yale University.

     

  • 2U’s CEO Says His Company Will Incorporate Its Job Placement Tool on edX’s Courses

    2U’s CEO Says His Company Will Incorporate Its Job Placement Tool on edX’s Courses

    IBL News | New York

    2U’s CEO, Chip Paucek, asked edX partners to give his company a shot. “All we need is an opportunity to prove that the future of edX will grow; the brand will grow,” he said during an interview with EdSurge.com posted yesterday. “You will see us begin to advertise edX outright and grow the learner base. And I think that’ll be good for everybody.”

    Public, for-profit company 2U (NASDAQ: TWOU) — which bought edX Inc from MIT and Harvard last June for $800 million — is following a brand strategy similar to Alphabet and Google to keep edX’s partners on board. Chip Paucek already used this analogy during his first public appearance with Anant Agarwal, CEO at edX, at ASU-GSV Conference in San Diego.

    “Our brand is more akin to Alphabet than it is to Google. People know our corporate name because we are a public company, but people don’t associate our brand with learning. Whereas with edX, the brand is just incredible,” he said to Jeffrey R. Young on EdSurge.

    edX is the third big profile company acquired by 2U, along with the boot camp provider Trilogy Education and short online courses provider GetSmarter.

    One way that 2U will benefit from edX’s large base of learners, once the deal is officially approved, is, according to Paucek, to incorporate 2U’s job placement tool, called the Career Engagement Network, within edX courses. The service was developed by the Trilogy boot camp to match its students with prospective employers.

    “We will roll it out to all of the edX paid customers,” said Paucek. edX’s Anant Agarwal said in the same interview on EdSurge that the career-services tool answers a request that some partner colleges have long wanted but that edX had not had the time or resources to develop.

    Puacek noted that some edX partners may want to buy other services from 2U as well.

     

  • Amazon Will Pay Full College Tuition to Its U.S. Front-Line Employees as Part of $1.2 Billion Ed Plan

    Amazon Will Pay Full College Tuition to Its U.S. Front-Line Employees as Part of $1.2 Billion Ed Plan

    IBL News | New York

    Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) will invest $1.2 billion by 2025 in providing further education and skills training to more of its 750,000 operations employees in the U.S.

    The eCommerce giant announced this month that it will fund full college tuition, as well as high school diplomas, GEDs, and English as Second Language (ESL) proficiency certifications for its front-line employees—including those who have been at the company for three months.

    In addition, Amazon said that it will provide three new education skills training programs to help them transition into jobs as data center technology technicians, IT engineers, and user experience designers.

    “Amazon is now the largest job creator in the U.S., and we know that investing in free skills training for our teams can have a huge impact for hundreds of thousands of families across the country,” said Dave Clark, CEO of Worldwide Consumer at Amazon.

    A research study conducted by Gallup and commissioned by Amazon on upskilling found that 70% of American workers would switch to a new job if offered free skills training opportunities.

    The report states that employer-funded upskilling for young adults entering the labor market is more important than paid vacation time.

     

  • Chegg Sued by Competitor Pearson For Alleged Copyright Infringement

    Chegg Sued by Competitor Pearson For Alleged Copyright Infringement

    IBL News | New York

    Chegg Inc (NYSE: CHGG), a Santa Clara, California–based EdTech company with a market capitalization of 11 billion, was sued by publishing giant Pearson Monday for alleged copyright infringement.

    The complaint, filed Monday in the District Court of New Jersey, came only a few months after a partnership between the two companies ended, under the new leadership of Andy Bird, the CEO of Pearson.

    In addition, the move takes place when Pearson Plc is launching a subscription service for U.S. students to its 1,500 textbook titles for a monthly fee of $14.99, according to Financial Times.

    Pearson alleges that Chegg has violated its rights on a “massive scale” by reproducing hundred of thousands of questions from Pearson textbooks and selling them with answers as part of a $14.95 homework help subscription service for students (Chegg Study). 

    “Those answers are derived from and often copied directly from Pearson’s end of chapter questions themselves,” a press release from Pearson said.

    Pearson’s complaint lists 150 of its textbooks “copied or paraphrased from the original question.” For example, Chegg Study lists more than 700 answers for questions from Campbell Biology, a popular biology textbook.

    Chegg began in 2005 as a textbook rental service but now draws its main revenue from subscription services around homework answers. During the pandemic, Chegg’s revenue rose above 60% to $644 million. Now Chegg has a market valuation higher than Pearson with its 177-years of history.

    Chegg has been criticized by educators who argue that it’s a service that enables widespread cheating by offering a massive library with answers.

    The Californian company was licensed to publish materials by Pearson, but since June 1, its right to display content expired, according to the British giant.

    Chegg said it is in “full compliance with copyright law” and will “fight Pearson’s allegations vigorously.”

  • Blackboard Gone Forever? Investment Companies Continue Reshaping the EdTech Market

    Blackboard Gone Forever? Investment Companies Continue Reshaping the EdTech Market

    IBL News | New York

    Veritas Capital, the private equity firm that will own Blackboard after its acquisition from another investment company, Providence Equity Partners, avoided providing any details about the deal yesterday. The New York-based firm didn’t even mention the purchase on its website.

    The move, performed in a context when EdTech companies are largely increasing their valuation and capital raising, wasn’t a surprise.

    Providence Partners has been trying to sell Blackboard since 2015, after noticing the Blackboard was increasingly losing ground in the market in favor of Instructure’s CanvasLMS.

    Precisely, yesterday the Cal Poly Pomona’s student newspaper posted an eloquent article titled “Canvas adoption erases Blackboard from campus.”

    Consultant Phil Hill wrote that it was “the end of Blackboard as standalone EdTech.”

    The Washington, DC – headquartered company that invented the LMS and overwhelmingly dominated the market for years was absorbed by a firm half of the size, Anthology, which was engineered mostly for financial purposes.

    Roughly speaking, and without further confirmation, the dominant speculation is that Blackboard was valued at below two billion dollars, given its struggle with the accumulating debt. Providence Equity Partners paid $1.64 billion to buy Blackboard in 2011. Exiting the company has taken them ten years.

    Meanwhile, Veritas Capital-backed Anthology, valued at $925 million last year, according to data provider PitchBook, seems to be the winner. Its CEO will run the merger company, while Blackboard’s Chief won’t play any managerial role, according to several sources.

    The deal is pending official approval, and it’s soon to tell how and when the venture capitalists —who run the EdTech market show — will convince retail investors to back this new venture.

     

  • Two Equity Firms Buy Blackboard to Merge It with Anthology, a Company They Already Own

    Two Equity Firms Buy Blackboard to Merge It with Anthology, a Company They Already Own

    IBL News | New York

    The private equity firms that currently own Anthology, Veritas Capital, and Leeds Equity Partners, will acquire the majority of shares of Blackboard Inc. from Providence Equity Partners LLC investment company for an undisclosed amount.

    With that equity stock, Veritas Capital and Leeds Equity Partners will create a merged company, which will be lead by Jim Milton, current Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Anthology.

    The combined company (as yet unnamed), valued at about $3 billion dollars including debt, will be majority-owned by Veritas Capital.

    Providence Equity Partners — which bought Blackboard in 2011 for $1.64 billion — will hold a minority stake in the combined company. The transaction is expected to be closed by the end of 2021, subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals.

    “Once the deal closes, Blackboard will no longer exist as a standalone EdTech company,” wrote expert Phil Hill on its blog.

    The merge of Anthology and Blackboard will result in one of the industry’s largest LMS management firms, with a workforce of 4,000 employees and over 4,000 colleges and universities as clients.

    Anthology — which is the recent gathering of Campus Management, Campus Labs, and iModules — accounts for 2,000 higher ed institutions in 30 countries.

    Blackboard claims it currently serves 150 million users in 80 countries.  For years, Blackboard was the dominant provider of learning management systems (LMSs) until Canvas LMS surpassed it.

    “Upon the completion of this merger, we will have a data-driven product portfolio that seeks to touch every constituent at the institution and will aim to transform the way education uses technology to engage, connect, teach, learn and drive efficiencies across the institution,” Milton said. “We are fully aligned around a deep focus on learner success.”

    “Together, Blackboard and Anthology will lead the next wave of EdTech innovation,” said Bill Ballhaus, Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, and President of Blackboard.

    According to Bloomberg, the resulting company will be valued at several billion dollars. A Bloomberg reporter was told that Blackboard was valued at $2 billion and Anthology at $1 billion.

  • Quizlet.com, on the Path to Becoming Public After Its Unicorn Status

    Quizlet.com, on the Path to Becoming Public After Its Unicorn Status

    IBL News | New York

    San Francisco-based, flashcard tool Quizlet.com is planning to become public after hitting the status of a unicorn, according to Techcrunch.

    To date, the San Francisco-based start-up has raised $62 million in funding. Investors include General Atlantic, Owl Ventures, Union Square Ventures, Costanoa Ventures, and Altos Ventures.

    Duolingo’s successful reception in Wall Street since it went public in July 2021 is encouraging the investment community to accelerate IPO plans, experts told IBL News.

    With 60 million monthly learners, Quizlet has added AI-based tutoring tools to their flashcards.

    Its free flashcard maker — which integrates with Google Classroom — has allowed the company to build a large-scale business. The company’s revenue comes mostly from Quizlet Plus paid subscription model. It charges $47.88 a year for access to more features, including tutoring services.