TALENT DEVELOPMENT
Think Together | September 13, 2022
Think Together, one of California's largest nonprofits serving K-12 schools today announced it has completed the merger with Orenda Education, a top school improvement and professional development consultancy. Upon the close, the combined organization will serve more than 200,000 students across the state with more than $150 million in annual revenue. Moreover, the organization will be better positioned to rapidly scale their impact.
"We're thrilled to bring our two organizations together in our combined efforts to improve student success and close the achievement gap,This merger is the natural evolution of Orenda's existing relationship with Think Together and solidifies our joint commitment to ensuring that the more than 2 million California students that are performing far below grade level have the support they need during the school day and beyond to succeed academically."
Think Together Founder and CEO Randy Barth
Over the past seven years, Think Together and Orenda have had an affiliate agreement in place while the full acquisition builds the long-term financial and operational capacities for Orenda to continue to scale. Orenda's work focuses on transformingeducation systems, either across a school district or by cohorts of schools, providing professional development to all levels of district staff, around a specific data-driven but people-centric school improvement model. Think Together partners with over 60 school districts and charter management organizations to provide more than 900 direct-to-student academic and enrichment programs at more than 450 school sites across California, serving more than 100,000 youth. Orenda Education works behind-the-scenes with school district leaders and educators to identify inequities in schools and then transform their systems to ensure all students have access to a premium education. "Think Together has always been an incredible partner, infusing the infrastructure needed to provide an efficient model for changing the odds for kids," said Orenda Education Founder and CEO Dr. Robin Avelar La Salle. "Our two models have always complemented each other but now, we can efficiently scale our vision for all students to receive the premium education they deserve." The acquisition comes as both organizations experience tremendous growth due in large part to new and renewed state investments in education to accelerate learning recovery efforts and provide educators with needed support amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. "Now more than ever, teachers, school leaders and administrators need to think outside the box to address the issues impacting students including socio-economic biases, social emotional learning, and more," added Barth. "Providing these much-needed supports to educators means districts and schools can provide the skills they need to teach, lead and counsel during and following a period of great disruption during the pandemic. Recently the U.S. Department of Education reported a dramatic decline in scores from the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) known as the nation's scorecard. Two decades of growth for American students in reading and math were wiped away by just two years of pandemic-disrupted learning, according to national test scores released last week. And, the declines were much larger for students at lower performance levels, widening already-huge learning disparities between the country's high- and low-achievers. Orenda's approach to school improvement has proven to accelerate student outcomes, such as mastery of grade-level standards (measured by math and English language SBAC scores), improved A-G class completion rates, and improved graduation rates. They also provide administrative coaching, teaching strategies, and leadership clinics. To expand these services, Orenda was recently awarded a $4 million Education Innovation and Research grant by the U.S. Department of Education to digitize and distribute their school improvement approach through an online platform that is effective and highly scalable to schools and districts in any geography, and to those who require less in-person support. Think Together adds Orenda to their growing list of services that support student education in and around the school day. Think Together's flagship afterschool programs support students in underserved communities with homework help, enrichment, social-emotional learning and physical well-being, all to enable students to strive for college or a fulfilling career. To provide high-quality programs, Think Together partners with philanthropic organizations like the Joseph Drown Foundation. "Breaking down the barriers to opportunity, equity and access in education by keeping students and their success as the centered focus is one of the most meaningful investments for our future generations" said Alyssa Santino, Program Director of the Joseph Drown Foundation. "Ensuring the educators, leaders and structures around students are supported and inspired and effectively trained with research-based, proven and engaging strategies is imperative for thriving students and communities. We are pleased to partner with Think Together and Orenda Education as they excel in this space and continue to transform the trajectory of students and the schools they attend." Barth sees the combination of direct services to students through expanded and early learning, coupled with equity-based professional development, as an effective combination to supporting student achievement alongside their school district and charter partners. Dr. Paul Gothold, Superintendent of County Office of Education in San Diego agrees. His former district, Lynwood Unified School District, realized astonishing improvements when partnering with both Think Together and Orenda, including increasing graduation rates from 56% to 90.8%, and A-G college eligible rates from 18% to 53%. Orenda provides the technical expertise for true district turn-around. The systems approach and professional development modules to build staff capacity ensures all leaders have the tools and resources to provide a premium education for all students, said Gothold. "With Think Together's financial and operational support, Orenda is well positioned to continue providing much-needed education innovation to schools throughout the state and beyond.
About Think Together
For over 25 years Think Together has partnered with schools and communities to pursue educational equity and excellence for all kids. As a nonprofit organization, Think Together innovates, implements, and scales academic solutions that change the odds for hundreds of thousands of California students. Think Together's program areas include early learning, afterschool, school support services and leadership development for teachers and school administrators.
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CORPORATE EDUCATION AND TRAINING
Coursera | October 03, 2022
Coursera, Inc. today announced the expansion of Clips, which now provides employees access to nearly 200,000 short videos and lessons designed to help them begin learning high-demand skills in under 10 minutes.
“Lack of career development is a key reason many employees leave an organization. Yet employees have less time to devote to learning than ever before, A growing number of employees are now looking to gain job-specific skills much faster through shorter, more targeted content. With this shift towards microlearning, Clips enables employees to learn specific skills with 5-10 min videos. It also provides clear pathways into courses for deeper skill development, while driving continuous learning to ensure employees have the right skills to accelerate company growth and innovation.”
Leah Belsky, Chief Enterprise Officer at Coursera. “
The initial Clips on Coursera offering featured bite-sized videos focused on business, tech, data, leadership, and human skills. The expanded Clips offering now provides a more comprehensive library of content, including a higher volume of videos for skills that are becoming increasingly more important like leadership and management. Currently, 83 percent of businesses feel it is important to develop leaders at all levels. Yet less than 5 percent have actually implemented leadership training across every level within their organization. To help address this growing need, Coursera has increased the number of leadership and management-related Clips by 10x. As learners quickly gain skills through Clips, many then seek opportunities for deeper development. Thirty-six percent of learners that have viewed Clips to address their in-the-moment learning needs have gone on to enroll in at least one course1.
The most viewed Clips to date include a range of data, cloud, and productivity-focused content such as:
Welcome to Python, by University of Michigan [1 min]
Fundamentals of Data Science, by IBM [2 min]
The Business Case for Visionary Leadership, by University of Michigan [7 min]
Why is Storytelling Important?, by Macquarie University [9 min]
Key Cloud Service Providers and their Services, by IBM [6 min]
What is SQL Anyway?, by University of California, Davis [7 min]
Customize Google Calendar, by Google [4 min]
Taking Charge of Excel, by Macquarie University [6 min]
Global industry leaders and government organizations like Google, New York State Department of Labor, Alstom, and Bosch have adopted Clips to help accelerate skills development within their workforce. Google in particular has made Clips available to all employees worldwide, helping many learners obtain skills that will help them elevate their job performance and begin unlocking new advancement opportunities. With Clips, Coursera now offers fully scalable learning paths featuring everything from short videos and lessons to professional certificates, and degree programs. For my role, developing skills in programming, camera hardware, and design is crucial. Finding relevant courses to acquire these new skills, and gaining practical, hands-on experience has been a challenge,” said Doris Chen, hardware design engineer at Google. The Clips videos provide relevant content focused on everything from camera and imaging to optical system design. As I continue my training, I’m looking forward to enrolling in more advanced classes and potentially earning an additional degree online to help further my career.I have always been fascinated by the concept of skills development programs and self-paced learning, and the ways it can assist to level up your career,said Rajat Batra, software engineer at Google. “Clips takes this concept to the next level by adding short and focused job related videos. These videos act as a good starting point to develop a higher level of understanding for several concepts.Coursera for Business now enables over 3,500 companies across the globe to deploy world-class skills development content from top businesses and universities. The company’s skills platform gives organizations the ability to assess, measure, and benchmark skills in their workforce. Recent platform innovations including LevelSets are helping employees to quickly determine their proficiency in key skills and identify areas to focus on moving forward. In addition, SkillSets help employees develop specific skills for specific roles. These Skill Sets provide the foundation for Coursera’s Leadership and Data & Analytics Academies, which offer a packaged learning experience based on the depth of skill needed for specific roles across an organization.
About Coursera
Coursera (NYSE: COUR) was launched in 2012 by two Stanford Computer Science professors, Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller, with a mission to provide universal access to world-class learning. It is now one of the largest online learning platforms in the world, with 107 million registered learners as of June 30, 2022. Coursera partners with over 275 leading university and industry partners to offer a broad catalog of content and credentials, including Guided Projects, courses, Specializations, certificates, and bachelor’s and master’s degrees. Institutions around the world use Coursera to upskill and reskill their employees, citizens, and students in many high-demand fields, including data science, technology, and business.
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EDUCATION TECHNOLOGY
Juniper Networks | August 10, 2022
Juniper Networks, a leader in secure, AI-driven networks, today announced that Online Education Services (OES), an online education enabler, has selected Juniper’s wired and wireless solutions to power its networking experience. With a secure AI-driven network, OES is set to advance the online education industry through its digitally enabled solutions alongside its partner universities.
OES was established in 2011 with the goal of delivering innovative education experiences that attract, engage and retain students. Through partnerships with highly regarded Australian education providers, OES provides the expertise to create engaging online learning experiences for students who are not catered for by traditional campus-based offerings. Through proven successful and long-standing partnerships, OES has supported universities to grow at scale and speed while maintaining the highest academic quality.
To sustain its continued business growth, OES relocated to a larger office building and required a high-performing network to support increasing demands and growing number of staff. In addressing this, Juniper’s Wireless Access Points with Juniper Mist Wi-Fi Assurance were deployed to provide access to high-speed and reliable connectivity powered by automation. Coupled with Mist AI, the overall management and operation of OES’s network was greatly simplified, while enabling AI-driven insights into its users’ experiences. The ease of implementation also allowed for continued agility, a critical factor for OES as it looks to expand its business locally and internationally.
“We are pleased to have been selected by OES to support their advancement in the online education industry. Through our AI-driven solutions, we have built a simplified and automated network that is agile enough to scale with OES’s growing business. We are confident that OES will reap the benefits of a seamless high-speed wireless connectivity as it continues to grow its business in accelerating the digital learning experiences for students around the world.”
- Bruce Bennie, Vice President & General Manager, Australia & New Zealand at Juniper Networks
With Juniper’s experience-first approach to networking, we have a secure and automated network that can be managed from a centralized location, allowing for greater efficiency across our IT operations. Through its AI-driven solutions, we are confident that Juniper will be able to continue to help us grow and scale our business with agility as we work toward further accelerating the online education industry, Said David Payne, IT Operations Manager, Online Education Services (OES), Australia.
About Juniper Networks
Juniper Networks is dedicated to dramatically simplifying network operations and driving superior experiences for end users. Our solutions deliver industry-leading insight, automation, security, and AI to drive real business results. We believe that powering connections will bring us closer together while empowering us all to solve the world’s greatest challenges of well-being, sustainability, and equality.
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