FOR GRADUATE STUDENT
The mission of the Graduate Student Council of the American Educational Research Association is to facilitate and promote the transition from graduate student to professional researcher and/or practitioner by providing opportunities within AERA for growth, development, and career advancement. The GSC publishes a newsletter, such as this one, three times a year, that highlights and addresses the needs of graduate students. There is also has a GSC listserv While scanning it today, we saw calls for papers from various journal editors, tips about SPSS, and an announcement about a YouTube video on how to submit an AERA proposal for the first time submitter.

2011 DIPLOMAS COUNT
The latest edition of Education Week's Diplomas Count, explores how understanding the link between learning and a career becomes more critical than ever for high school students preparing to graduate. The Diplomas Count theme this year, Beyond High School, Before Baccalaureate: Meaningful Alternatives to a Four-Year Degree, reconsiders the "college for all" movement and examines alternative post secondary options. In addition to the theme articles, this annual benchmarking research report provides nationwide data on graduation rates, which appear to be trending upward according to this year's report.

SETTLEMENT UPDATE
A Publisher's Weekly article reported "that no decisions have been reached on any key issues in the Google Book Settlement, but that the parties still hoped to see if an amicable resolution is possible." The judge in the case set July 19 for the next status hearing.

MOBILE COMPUTING SUMMARY
This brief summarizes the main themes from the EDUCAUSE Mobile Computing 5-Day Sprint, held April 25–29, 2011. This learning experience brought together presenters and hundreds of participants, who exchanged ideas and information via webinars, online conversations, Twitter, and blog posts. In addition to the summary, you can still explore the mobile computing resources and highlights from each day by visiting the day pages that are accessible from the left navigation sidebar on Sprint main page.

According to the conclusions drawn from the event, mobile computing "represents a disruptive change in the way education is delivered that will affect colleges and universities for years to come."

Software developer Mike Matas shows the first full-length interactive book for the iPad and iPhone-- with clever, swipeable video and graphics and some very cool data visualizations to play with. The book he demonstrates on TED is "Our Choice," Al Gore's sequel to "An Inconvenient Truth."

Push Pop Press and Melcher Media developed this software and will license it to publishers. Imagine your next book published in this format and its possible impact on learning!

NEW ONLINE SERVICE
The University Libraries are pleased to announce that Libra, U.Va.’s new digital institutional repository, is available for use by faculty.

The Libra service provides a central, stable location to store the collective scholarly output of the U.Va. community, including published articles and books, and makes open access works available for research, scholarship, teaching, and learning. Any faculty member may submit a work to Libra if they have retained rights to that work, or if the publisher grants permission.

The repository offers a simple interface for uploading, viewing and downloading publications. To use Libra:
• Visit http://libra.virginia.edu
• You may browse or search for items already deposited
• To deposit your own work, click on “Login” and log in via Netbadge
• Choose “Add Your Work” and select type of work from the drop-down menu
• Fill in required fields on the submission form and upload a copy of your work in PDF format
• Agree to a submission license to allow either public of U.Va.-only distribution of your work
• Submit your work

Note: The submission license does not require you to give up rights to your work; you retain all rights previously held.

For more information about Libra, see the FAQ available at: http://libra.virginia.edu/about.

To offer feedback, use the link to Libra feedback in the blue footer on the web pages.

For questions about Libra, contact: Kay Buchanan 434-982-2664.

FREE LESSON PLANS
The Copyright Alliance is a "non-profit, non-partisan educational organization dedicated to the value of copyright as an agent for creativity, jobs and growth." Copyright Alliance members have partnered with educational organizations like Weekly Reader, i-Safe and Young Minds Inspired to develop curriculum designed to help incorporate copyright lessons into classroom plans.

  NEWSLETTER
Click here to read previous issues of the Education Services newsletter produced by Kay Buchanan and Carole Lohman.