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ConnectYard Launches a Hosted Social Learning Service on the Facebook(R) Platform

Posted on: Tuesday, 20 January 2009, 06:30 CST

Web 2.0 social learning service helps colleges and universities extend learning to where students live and socialize

WAYNE, N.J., Jan. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- ConnectYard, Inc. today announced the general availability of the Company's Web 2.0 social learning service -- the ConnectYard(R) Student and Enterprise Edition -- powered by Facebook Connect. The ConnectYard solution leverages social networking to support "better teaching and learning" by helping students expand student-to-student and student-to-faculty connections for collaborating beyond the classroom -- which has been shown to be a key component of student persistence.

"We are pleased and excited to offer a service that will truly extend the learning environment into where today's students live and socialize -- online. We know that a number of Universities have had great success integrating learning into students' physical living environments through the establishment of living learning communities," said Donald Doane, the Company's CEO. "Similarly, ConnectYard allows institutions to establish virtual learning communities, or Yards, that are integrated with popular social networking sites like Facebook as well as University services, which serves to keep students involved and engaged both in and outside of the classroom."

ConnectYard is a budget-friendly, subscription-based service offering that eliminates the need for additional IT staff and support. In today's challenging economy, as colleges and universities look to trim expenses, many are implementing creative solutions like ConnectYard that can impact multiple domains with minimal overhead.

The formal launch will be strengthened by ConnectYard's participation at the Educause Learning Initiative - 2009 Annual Meeting. This year's meeting is titled "Social Learning for the 21st Century" and will be attended by a diverse group of leading higher education professionals, that significantly influence the direction of teaching, learning, and technology, and the corporations providing the technology to advance that change.

ConnectYard provides a virtual learning community that incorporates key features of physical learning communities and much more. In particular, ConnectYard:

• Facilitates forming study groups, sharing educational information and materials, finding educational assistance and keeping informed of campus-related events;

• Encourages student-to-student and student-to-faculty communication. ConnectYard utilizes Facebook Connect, which allows messages to be passed to Facebook through ConnectYard. Equally as important, participants can keep personal details hidden from study partners, students, and faculty;

• Promotes distributed collaboration. ConnectYard contains a suite of tools including group walls, discussion boards, whiteboards, chat, teleconferencing, calendaring and document sharing. The synchronous (chat, teleconferencing) and asynchronous (walls, discussions, etc.) discussion modes support varied learning methods;

• Improves students' time spent on-task. ConnectYard provides extensive notifications for important events via email, Facebook, and/or text messaging. This allows for an important bridging between students' academic and social worlds;

• Identifies key resources to improve student learning outcomes. ConnectYard incorporates a unique matching engine that "pushes" students study partners, content, and events that are relevant to their interests, i.e. rank, class, and major, as well as social and learning interactions on the site.

About ConnectYard

ConnectYard, Inc. specializes in helping colleges and universities tap the power of social media for student recruitment, retention and alumni re-engagement. The Company's Web 2.0 solutions improve the college educational experience by extending the learning environment into where students live and socialize. The Company believes this approach will ultimately change the culture of learning by fostering online educational communities that enable students to tap the resources, talents, and experiences of individuals with similar interests reaching beyond their traditional academic networks.

ConnectYard, Inc. was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in Wayne, New Jersey. For more information on how ConnectYard can help your institution maximize student recruitment and retention, please visit http://www.connectyard.com or contact us at 973-494-8041.

Facebook(R) is a registered trademark of Facebook Inc.

CONTACT: ConnectYard, Inc. 973.494.8041 info@connectyard.com

http://www.connectyard.com

This release was issued through eReleases(TM). For more information, visit http://www.ereleases.com.

SOURCE ConnectYard, Inc.

Source: PR Newswire

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