Learning Management System in school is software designed for teachers to create, manage, and deliver various aspects of a module, like lectures or assignments. With the pandemic taking over the world, LMS has found its way into the education system, especially K-12 education. Even after the pandemic ended, many prestigious institutions still use LMS to assess efficiently and grade assignments, powerful resources, analytics, etc., and much more.

Many educational institutions are now adapting tools like LMS to make learning more engaging and accessible. Blackbaud LMS is one example that helps with essential functions like assignments, graded discussions, rubrics, competency-based education, and so much more. It also has mobile learning support that helps make learning accessible to most. 

With that being said, let’s look at 6 excellent benefits of implementing LMS in K-12 education.

Centralized resources

One best thing about using LMS in the education system is that all your data will be in one place, accessible to all with just one login. Before LMS, educators would have to give students multiple logins to various resources to access study materials. Learning management systems can consolidate all the resources in one place and make everything accessible with a single login. It reduces the chance of misplaced and damaged documents as LMS is a storage hub for all. Also, many textbooks can be shared through LMS, so students can skip purchasing or carrying them to class daily. They can take their mobile and access the book from the system.

Diverse assessments and grading options

LMS provides you with a diverse way to assess your students. You can prepare a multiple-choice questionnaire that will give immediate feedback upon completion. Alternatively, you can have an external site, like video formats, and apply questions and topics from there, to which students can upload their answers in a video or podcast. 

It also saves a lot of time for teachers by making grading more straightforward. A multiple-choice questionnaire can be graded automatically after the student is done. For detailed assignments, teachers can run plagiarism checks efficiently from an LMS. It makes everything easier as LMS removes the physical need to make sure all the assignments are collected. Everything is stored in the system and can be accessed and graded anytime and anywhere at the teacher’s convenience.

Easy communication

The hardest part of online learning is maintaining communication between students and teachers and students and their peers. A good LMS can make your classroom more social and interactive. Students can chat with each other whenever they need, no matter the hour. LMS also encourages social learning with discussion boards, interactive assignments, and group discussions. 

Personalized learning

Each institution has its own need and learning motto. An LMS helps them to customize the learning management system to serve the unique needs of each institution. It also allows students to personalize their learning journey. They can study at their own pace. It is even better if the school already provides self-paced courses. They can move faster or slower depending on how they adapt to the course materials. 

Parental participation

Parents and guardians now do not have to call the school for every little bit of information. They can log in to the institute’s LMS to access their child’s calendar, timetable, grades, and PTA dates. They can quickly gauge their child’s performance and effortlessly reach out to the respective teachers to converse. They can also use the platform to voice concerns or feedback directly to the organization. This helps parents be more involved and hands-on with their child’s education than the traditional setup. 

Saves time

Last, of all, LMS saves tons of time for students as well as teachers. It is easy for students to access materials in one place, so they do not have to spend time looking at various sources. They can also find their assessments and grades in one place, which helps them stay organized and at the top of their tasks. LMS also shows real time analytics for each student so the teachers can assess the data by looking at the analytics and see which students need an extra hand to catch up with the rest. 

So, what are you waiting for? Integrate LMS into your learning and see the difference today.

After working with plants and AI for years I’ve known it to be true. Dozens of cannabis growers I’ve interviewed knew it was true too. And now science proves it: plants emit sound, which means they can talk. Not like us: they talk more in clicks and ticks and using the help of artificial intelligence scientists have transformed plant talk into audible sounds we can hear. 

The click-like sounds, similar to the popping of popcorn, are emitted at a volume similar to human speech, but at high frequencies, beyond the hearing range of the human ear.

“We found that plants usually emit sounds when they are under stress, and that each plant and each type of stress is associated with a specific identifiable sound. While imperceptible to the human ear, the sounds emitted by plants can probably be heard by various animals, such as bats, mice, and insects,” the scientists announced. The paper was published in the prestigious scientific journal Cell.

The study was led by Prof. Lilach Hadany (left)  together with Prof. Yossi Yovel at Tel Aviv University, . 

“From previous studies we know that vibrometers attached to plants record vibrations. But do these vibrations also become airborne soundwaves – namely sounds that can be recorded from a distance? Our study addressed this question, which researchers have been debating for many years,” says Hadani.

How to record the sounds made by plants

At the first stage of the study the researchers placed plants in an acoustic box in a quiet, isolated basement with no background noise. Ultrasonic microphones recording sounds at frequencies of 20-250 kilohertz (the maximum frequency detected by a human adult is about 16 kilohertz) were set up at a distance of about 10cm from each plant.

The study focused mainly on tomato and tobacco plants, but wheat, corn, cactus and henbit were also recorded.

Prof. Hadany explains: Before placing the plants in the acoustic box we subjected them to various treatments: some plants had not been watered for five days, in some the stem had been cut, and some were untouched.

“Our intention was to test whether the plants emit sounds, and whether these sounds are affected in any way by the plant’s condition. Our recordings indicated that the plants in our experiment emitted sounds at frequencies of 40-80 kilohertz. Unstressed plants emitted less than one sound per hour, on average, while the stressed plants – both dehydrated and injured – emitted dozens of sounds every hour.”

The recordings collected in this way were analyzed by specially developed machine learning (AI) algorithms. The algorithms learned how to distinguish between different plants and different types of sounds, and were ultimately able to identify the plant and determine the type and level of stress from the recordings.

Moreover, the algorithms identified and classified plant sounds even when the plants were placed in a greenhouse with a great deal of background noise. In the greenhouse the researchers monitored plants subjected to a process of dehydration over time and found that the quantity of sounds they emitted increased up to a certain peak, and then diminished.

“In this study we resolved a very old scientific controversy,” says Prof. Hadani. “We proved that plants do emit sounds. Our findings suggest that the world around us is full of plant sounds, and that these sounds contain information – for example about water scarcity or injury. We assume that in nature the sounds emitted by plants are detected by creatures nearby, such as bats, rodents, various insects, and possibly also other plants – that can hear the high frequencies and derive relevant information.

We believe that humans can also utilize this information, given the right tools – such as sensors that tell growers when plants need watering. Apparently, an idyllic field of flowers can be a rather noisy place. It’s just that we can’t hear the sounds.”

In future studies the researchers will continue to explore a range of intriguing questions: What is the mechanism behind plant sounds? How do moths detect and react to sounds emitted by plants? Do other plants also hear these sounds? 

The new sci-fi series Extrapolations takes a look at the world in 2038 depicting how humanity adapts and survives climate change. The show features “urban mining” as a main industry in a world over-consumed and warmed to the limits of its survival. What can we extract from our past once all the resources are used up? 

Rare earth metals, the vitamins to modern industry, power the kind of future we want to support: wind turbines, electric cars and rechargeable batteries. But these materials are limited in supply and the mining industry that pulls rare metals from the ground is fraught with regulatory hurdles and environmental woes. Most people don’t want a lithium mine in their backyard no matter how lucrative it might be for the nation.

Regenx from Canada has evolved the concept of mining: they are urban mining in the classic sense and pointing the way to cleaner and more sustainable ways of recovering minerals from industry. Traded on the TSXV: (RGX) and OTCQB: (RGXTF), Regenx has developed a smelter-free alternative to recovering the valuable rare metals palladium and platinum. 

The company’s founders came from the mining industry and saw the writing on the wall: “The mining business is changing with legislative requirements, environmental issues. Mining had to change,” says Greg Pendura, the CEO of Regenx. “We wanted to develop technologies that brought eco-friendly technologies to mining.

Jump ahead and watch our interview with Regenx CEO Greg Pedura:

He tells Green Prophet: “Mining is a tough industry: you are out in the elements but we can mine 365 days a year, indoors. It is kind of a cliche, this “urban farming” but we really can do it in an eco-friendly manner.”

Typically today when a car dies or its catalytic converter replaced, it gets smeltered or goes to landfill. While not present in electric vehicles, a catalytic converter is an essential part of our still thriving petroleum-based economy serving diesel cars and trucks. It controls emissions by breaking down toxic gasses turning them into water and carbon dioxide. Palladium and platinum is needed for building new catalytic converters and these metals will play a critical role in the cleantech industry.

Peak palladium and platinum?

“What it takes to find platinum and palladium and then to mine it, is a huge footprint,” Pendura explains. Naturally extracting it from the trash is both common sense and a good business opportunity.

Each catalytic converter is valuable at the end of its life cycle because each contains between 3 to 7 grams of platinum and palladium. But getting those materials out can be toxic and bad for the environment. With 84% of the world’s annual supply of palladium used in catalytic converters it is easy to see how a limit on this resource can yet affect the price of next year’s car purchase or rental which have already gone sky high. 

In November, 2022 a catalytic converter theft ring in the US was busted for stealing catalytic converters from cars and trucks transforming them into half a billion dollars worth of rare metals.

Consider:

•   2,110,000 oz. of palladium was used in the production of catalytic converters in North America in 2021
•     27 million auto catalytic converters become available for scrap each year but only 30% of the palladium is recovered
•     Diesel catalytic converters are expected to grow from USD 24.7 billion in 2017 to USD 39.3 billion in 2025
•     Hydrogen fuel cells, medical devices, electronic glass, hard disc drives (cloud data storage), fertilizer, physical investment (coins), safety products, jewelry, dentistry, all of these rely on palladium and platinum

Why Regenx competes with smelting 

Faced with operational inefficiencies and operating past capacity, it is likely that no new smelters will be built in North America so the industry is being pushed towards a better solution for recovering rare metals. Regenx is filling that gap –– offering an attractive investment opportunity that has positive environmental impacts. 

Some $20B USD worth of these rare metals are dumped in the landfill, never to be recycled or seen again. Regenx puts itself as the first-to-market non-smelter company to extract precious metals from diesel catalytic converters. The company can recover 90% of the precious metals from old diesel catalytic converters with no toxic byproducts.

They are the first to market this novel solution and showcase their abilities through a joint venture with a Tennessee-based company, Davis Recycling.

Recyclers like Davis Recycling are also urban miners, a term coined in the 1980s by Professor Hideo Nanjyo at Tohoku University. An urban mine is a stockpile of rare metals in electronic waste and industrial equipment. Urban mining is the process of mechanical or chemical means for recovering the metals.

A statement for impact investors and the hydrogen economy

The Regenx process emits less carbon dioxide compared to traditional mining and smelters. Its costs are stable and predictable, and the company will generate additional future revenue through carbon credits, an attractive sell to ESG funds and impact investors.

The market can’t wait: supply chain issues from Russia and South Africa are crippling the availability of rare metals, and with Regenx, American and Canadian recycling companies can produce close to home. 

As of today, Regenx is the only commercially viable solution for the recovery of precious metals from catalytic converters besides smelters. The company plans on recovering 70,000 oz of platinum and palladium per 10 tonne/day/facility with anticipated annual revenues in excess of $100M USD. Future plant expansions are planned. 

“It is a key point in the automotive industry, the chemical industry. They have shareholders they want to appease as well and are becoming more vocal about sustainability and the environment, so the whole concept of cradle to grave or the circular economy is attractive,” says Pendura. “Our ability to do [urban mining] in an eco-friendly manner is getting attention. There is no doubt about it.”

Future-proofing the jobs of students today? “Hydrogen fuel cells use a tremendous amount of platinum,” notes Pendura: “I think it will be one of the major markets in the future. Anyone in precious metal recovery, you are putting yourself in a very attractive position if you are a student or an engineer.”

::Regenx