LINKS TO USEFUL WEBSITES

This page offers brief descriptions and links to selected helpful websites for education, dialogue and research.  Feel free to suggest other websites we should list at email@learninglife.info.

Other Organizations Promoting International Virtual Exchange

East Carolina University
ECU’s Global Understanding Program connects ECU students with other students in universities across the world to dialogue and collaborate for greater cultural understanding.

Global Nomads Group
Connects youth across the world to dialogue and work on media projects together.

iEARN
The oldest and largest international network of schools and youth organizations engaging teachers and youth in live dialogue for educational purposes.

PenPal Schools
Engages students in more than 70 countries in curriculum-guided writing exchanges.

Shared Studios
Connects individuals and groups in different countries inside converted shipping containers or “portals” placed in public places in cities across the world.

Soliya
Uses live dialogues through the internet to nurture cross-cultural understanding at the university level.

Virtual Exchange Coalition
Brings together organizations working on “virtual exchange” or live internet dialogue, and seeks to promote best practices.

Data & Research Resources in Education

College Affordability and Transparency Center
The Center is part of the U.S. Department of Education and helps college and prospective college students navigate the world of higher education by cost, value, student body size, major, graduation rates, and other criteria.

Edutopia
Edutopia showcases replicable, evidence-based models and innovations in K-12 education, and funds research to improve education.

Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)
An online search engine of the U.S. government’s Institute of Education Sciences, ERIC offers a wealth of reports and academic articles (including many full-text articles and reports) on all kinds of education topics.

National Center for Education Statistics (NCES)
The U.S. Department of Education’s NCES provides a wealth of data and analysis about education in the U.S. and other nations.

Data & Research Resources in Other Areas

Digital Public Library of America (DPLA)
The DPLA is an online collection of millions of photographs, maps, sounds, manuscripts, books, and more from museums, archives, and libraries across the United States.

Pew Research Center
The Pew Research Center produces surveys and reports on U.S. and international social, political, media, and religious trends.

U.S. Census Bureau
The U.S. Census Bureau provides a wealth of statistics on U.S. (and some international) population, education, business, employment,  health, housing, income and poverty.

World Bank Country Data
The World Bank offers information and statistics about countries’ economies and environments.

World Fact Book
The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) World Factbook provides information and statistics about each country’s geography, people, government, economy, energy, communications, transportation, military and transnational issues.

Education News

Edudemic
Edudemic is an educational technology site that offers ed tech news as well as ideas, forums and resources for teachers and students.

EducationNews
EducationNews delivers news about K-12 and higher education in the US and abroad as well as about ed technology, policy and parenting.

Hechinger Report
Reports news about innovation and inequality in education.

NPR: Education 
National Public Radio news and commentary about education mostly in the United States.

WENR: World Education News & Reviews
Covers educational news and issues across the world.

e-Learning Resources

Coursera
Coursera offers inexpensive online courses or “MOOCs” (Massive Open Online Courses), skill learning, and degrees on many subjects taught by university professors or other experts worldwide.  Other websites offering free or cheap MOOC-based e-learning include Kahn Academy (see below), OpenLearning, Udemy, Saylor Academy, FutureLearn and edX.

Khan Academy
Another online learning platform offering free “practice exercises, instructional videos, and a personalized learning dashboard” for courses in math, science, engineering, computing, arts and humanities, and economics and finance. 

Open Educational Resources (OER) Commons
OER Commons provides free teaching and learning resources in many subject areas.  Teachers and learners can submit their own resources on this open-source site.

TED-Ed
TED-Ed is a place for educators to create and share YouTube educational videos.

Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free, crowd-sourced, online encyclopedia offering information about millions of persons, countries, events, topics and more in many languages, including English, German, Spanish, French, Russian, Japanese and Chinese.