Five Reasons Why the New Second Life Viewer is Good for Education, Nonprofits & Governments I just started today playing with the new Second Life 2.0 Viewer (still in beta), but I can already see it has a lot of potential to open the door for more nonprofit, educational and government applications for virtual worlds.

DEFINING EXCELLENCE….. Responding to the Cultures of the Technological Classroom "Now in the 21st century, we refer to 21st century learners as a new breed of students, on the cusp of a technology that seems to hold no limits and we ponder what will be the education of a ten-year old child today ten years from now when this child is in college? Unlike almost any era that preceded today, the future is already here and moving at the metaphoric speed of light. So what ‘s a school to do?"

In RezEd Podcast, Episode 1, Larry Johnson, Chief Executive Officer of the New Media Consortium (NMC) speaks about his recent testimony before Congress on Virtual Worlds.

RezEd Podcast Episode 45: The RezEd Community In Focus What could be the final podcast of the series. Hear from RezEd creators and community members of the future direction of the Hub for Learning and Virtual Worlds.

"Using Second Life "vPortfolios" to mirror ePortfolios in a Graduate Library Science program" by Jeremy Kemp Students are excited that they can save time using Second Life with powerful modeling tools and interactive scripts to arrange their work and explain its significance.

Bringing Virtual Worlds into the Classroom through the Backdoor: After School
SciFair is a project-based learning program directed at engaging middle school students (actually grades 5 - high school depending on the site) in researching, designing, and building their own virtual world.

6th Annual Second Life Community Convention in Boston, MA, August 13-15, 2010. For more details and to register to attend, submit a proposal, sponsor, or volunteer, please visit http://slconvention.org

Applications open for Global Kids free PD trainings in virtual worlds this June. To apply, go to http://tinyurl.com/summerVWCB2010. Remember, applications are due by June 1, 2010

Second Life Work offers compelling, cost-effective virtual education solutions to amplify an existing curriculum or create new models for engaged, collaborative learning.

SLOODLE Game Show for Second Life "I just released a video on YouTube detailing a new tool I've been developing..."

Are you new to virtual worlds? If so, don't fret. RezEd is the place for you. To get introduced to Virtual Worlds, please click on our Virtual Worlds 101 Guide and the Second Life Toolbox, currently under development.

Global Kids’ Second Life Curriculum covers everything an educator or student would need to know to use Second Life, whether on their own or within an educational setting. The curriculum is composed of nine sequential “levels.” Each level is composed of modules which, in turn, are composed of individual lesson plans or “missions”. In total there are 163 missions. Read more

VW Developer Metaplace Acquired by Playdom: The virtual world / social game development company Metaplace has been acquired by social game company Playdom. Techcrunch reports that Playdom will use the virtual world game engine Metaplace has developed to create even more games in that genre.

Linden Lab®, creator of 3D virtual world Second Life®, announced a strategic restructuring to increase focus on the company's consumer business. As a result, Linden Lab anticipates staff reductions of approximately 30 percent.

Raph Koster on the Future of Virtual Worlds Raph concludes that large scale VW platforms are not going to be the future, at least for now. Instead, the existing social network, online game, and social media platforms are increasingly adopting various aspects of virtual worlds (leveling up, formal