We’re a finalist in the Software & Information Industry Association’s 25th Annual CODiE Awards!
SEATTLE — March 1, 2010 — Giant Campus, the nationally recognized leader in innovative technology education programs for youth and adults, today announced the Software and Information Industry Association (SIIA) has named the company’s Online Game Design course a finalist for the prestigious CODiE Awards in the Best Instructional Solution in Other Curriculum Areas category. The Online Game Design course, available through licensees, Giant Campus Academy, and tuition-free Giant Campus of Washington, teaches high school students how to design Adobe® Flash® games for online play. Student enrollment for this Giant Campus course has grown more than 300 percent from 2009 to 2010.
Read more of the release here: http://www.giantcampus.com/about/press-room/articletype/articleview/articleid/71
FLA 120: Online Game Design [Video]
Ever played Bejeweled, Tetris, Snake, or Frogger online? Check out our video for our Online Game Design course (this course has been named a 2010 CODiE award finalist) and see what it takes to develop these type of games.
USA Today: More high-schoolers reinvent or skip their senior year
Interesting article in USA Today about a growing trend of high school seniors, growing restless and unsatisfied by the current offerings in their school, choose to reinvent it on their own or skip out on parts of it.
A selection from Greg Toppo’s article: “Trimble is part of a small but growing group of students — most of them academically advance and, as a result, a tad restless — who are tinkering with their senior year. A few observers say the quiet experiment has the potential to reinvent high school altogether.”
These stories get me going every morning. Helping students and schools reinvent high school education is what we do at Giant Campus every day. Make high school more relevant for our students and get them prepared for the future. Our motto says it all: Real Classes for the Real World!
Here’s a link to the full article at USA Today:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2010-02-25-senioryear25foronline_st_N.htm
A Visit to White Salmon Valley
Last Thursday we visited our partner school district – White Salmon Valley – in White Salmon, Washington. We were there to meet with our colleagues on the district staff, but we also dropped in on a group of students who are taking our Game Design I course. Columbus High School, part of the White Salmon Valley district, has offered a hybrid online classroom experience for its students for the past five years. Under the guidance of Marian Udelhofen, CHS students take classes ranging from AP Calculus to Computer Literacy from instructors located around the country. Students appreciate the flexibility of the online courses and they enjoy having extra time to delve beyond the basic course requirements. Here’s a shot of two Game Design I students, who are working with GCWA’s Mr. Miller this semester. So far, the students have given Mr. Miller a major thumbs up!
Game Design I Students, Columbia High School
FLA 110: Flash Animation [Video]
Interested in flash animation? Check out our video….
PRG 110: Introduction to C++ Programming [Video]
Looking to program your own game? Or looking into a career as software engineer? Take a look at C++ programming can help:
MacDill teen wins T-shirt design competition, Giant Campus Student!
Another fantastic demonstration of the robust quality technology education that Giant Campus provides at our Military Bases. The winner, Nick, created his design while working with Laura of Giant Campus, one of our on-site trainers at MacDill AFB. Laura provided the technology training that helped Nick take his creativity from concept to reality.
Here is an excerpt from the Air Force News Service article:
2/4/2010 - RANDOLPH AIR FORCE BASE, Texas (AFNS) – A MacDill Air Force Base teen recently won the MyAirForce.com T-shirt competition. Nick Berglund, the son of retired Army Lt. Col. Rich and Robin Berglund, won the competition out of 61 submissions in the youth category. Col. Lawrence Martin, the commander of the 6th Air Mobility Wing, presented the award to Nick at his quarterly town hall meeting in a packed base theater. Nick was brought by his family under the guise of seeing a free movie following the meeting.
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- Nick accepting his award
Great article in Forbes about Online Learning in K12 Schools
I just read a great article in Forbes on the effectiveness of online learning and use of technology curriculum in the classroom. Features nice highlights of our industry friends K12 Inc. and Apex Learning.
My favorite exerp from the article: “The “guide on the side” model takes off a lot of the pressure on teachers in terms of lesson plan design and content delivery. If they act as classroom supervisors rather than domain experts, allowing technology to play the latter role, the likelihood of children learning better even from teachers who do not have the appropriate background is considerably higher.
Maybe President Obama needs to mandate the use of a certified online curriculum for all public schools to give America’s K-12 kids a chance to become competitive in the 21st century!
Great article by Sramana Mitra over at Forbes! Here’s a link to the full article: http://www.forbes.com/2010/01/14/online-education-innovation-intelligent-technology-mitra.html
Web design software
Our curriculum team is beginning a revision of our Web Design course, and we’re considering possible software. Our existing course uses KompoZer, a free WYSIWYG program.
KompoZer has worked pretty well for us, but like most free software, it has its share of bugs and quirks.
As we research software for the new course, we’re considering Amaya, a strong contender developed by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium).
Amaya has some features that KompoZer doesn’t, such as a split view that shows both the design view and the code.
Like KompoZer, Amaya is free, open source, and cross-platform.
Do you have experience with KompoZer or Amaya? Let us know what you think!
Online learning receiving major recognition from a technology pioneer
I recently just read Bill Gates’ 2010 Annual Letter that was posted on the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation website. Within it, Bill Gates mentions how online learning can change the landscape in which education is being taught and presented to students.
“We need to bring together the video and interactive pieces for K–12 and college courses. We should focus on having at least one great course online for each subject rather than lots of mediocre courses. Once we have this material in place, it can be used in many different ways. A teacher can watch and learn how to make a subject more interesting. A teacher can assign subsets of the material to students who are behind and finding something difficult. A teacher can suggest online material to a student who is ahead and wants to learn more. A teacher can assign an interactive session to diagnose where a student is weak and make sure they get practice on the areas that are difficult for them. Self-motivated students can take entire courses on their own. If they want to prove they learned the material to help qualify for a job, a trusted accreditation service independent from any school should be able to verify their abilities.”
Read the full letter here: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/annual-letter/2010/Pages/bill-gates-annual-letter.aspx
