Using a large administrative dataset from a statewide system including 34 community and technical colleges, the authors employed an instrumental variable technique to estimate the impact of online versus face-to-face course delivery on student course performance. The travel distance between each student's home and college campus served as an instrument for the likelihood of enrolling in an online section of a given course. In addition, college-by-course fixed effects controlled for within- and between-course selection bias. Analyses yield robust negative estimates for online learning in terms of both course persistence and course grade, contradicting the notion that there is no significant difference between online and face-to-face student outcomes—at least within the community college setting. Accordingly, both two-year and four-year colleges may wish to focus on evaluating and improving the quality of online coursework before engaging in further expansions of online learning.

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In 2013 it felt like every week a corporation announced it was launching a startup programme – even Microsoft head Steve Ballmer made the trip to Berlin to open the company’s accelerator. The IT corporation joins supermarket Rewe, discount chain store Target, drink giant Coca-Cola, insurance company Allianz, optician Fielmann, Telefonica, mass media company ProSiebenSat.1, publishing house Axel Springer, pharmaceutical company Bayer, Deutsche Telekom, real estate portal Immobilienscout… Are you feeling overwhelmed yet?

Image: http://venturevillage.eu 

I know the feeling all too well now. My chest tightens with panic and my head starts to spin. I begin to focus on the thoughts racing  hrough my head and forget what is supposed to be coming out of my mouth. Sometimes I even forget to breathe, causing my voice to crack.

That’s how bad my fear of public speaking used to be. Each time I would stand in front of an audience, the ball of tension would start to form deep in my chest, and I knew all was lost.

Image: http://mashable.com 

Q: How can one safely share ideas prior to patent approval? Is a Non-disclosure agreement the only option? -James Chicago

Intellectual property is often the most valuable asset of a startup, so it's important to protect it. But often startups also need to share information to potential business partners. So how do entrepreneurs reconcile these two seemingly conflicting dynamics? Start by understanding the four types of intellectual property (IP), when and how to use non-disclosure agreements and when to apply common sense.

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It was a “Woodstock for robots,” said Boston Dynamics’ Marc Raibert, as sixteen teams from around the world came together at Florida’s Homestead Miami Speedway, December 20–21, 2013 to participate in eight demanding tasks in DARPA’s Robotics Challenge Trials.

And the winner was … SCHAFT from Japan, owned by Google. Atlas-Ian from Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition placed second; it developed software for Boston Dynamics’ ATLAS robot. CMU’s Tartan Rescue came in at third place. A team from MIT and  NASA JPL’s RoboSimian placed fourth an fifth.

Human beings are fascinating animals, capable of intense love or boiling hatred, deep contemplation or flagrant debauchery, selfless service or self-serving acts. Psychologists, neuroscientists, sociologists and other students of the human condition reaped a bounty of knowledge about the inner workings of today's Homo sapiens in 2013.

Image: http://www.livescience.com 

America’s economy may be picking up steam, but it remains a story of parts, with the various regions of the country performing in often radically divergent ways.

To identify the regions with the most momentum coming out of the recession, we turned to Mark Schill, research director for the Praxis Strategy Group, who crunched a range of indicative data from 2007 to today for the nation’s 52 largest metropolitan statistical areas. To gauge economic vitality, we used four metrics: GDP growth, job growth, real median household income growth and current unemployment. To measure demographic strength we looked at population growth, birth rate, domestic migration and the change in educational attainment. All factors were weighted equally.

Image: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:View_from_Tower_of_the_Americas.jpg 

Often, an idea is best expressed through an infographic. Here at Entrepreneur, it's been a rich year for the medium.

From the habits of self-made billionaires and the world's smartest people, to hot startup scenes and the crazy number of times you sometimes need to try (and fail) before succeeding, these infographics clearly and succinctly walked us through fascinating and often complex topics. Here's a countdown of Entrepreneur.com's most-viewed infographics of 2013.

Image: http://www.entrepreneur.com 

Venture capital is unlike anything else I've seen in American commerce. People are vigorously seeking something that's often unattractive. It's extraordinary because markets are almost always efficient, but this one is not.

In order to back-solve to how we got here, let's start with history. As a professional market segment, the venture capital industry is only about 40 to 50 years old. In its infancy, it was probably a good invention in that it gave entrepreneurs the ability to seek out investors more easily. Before that, it was largely about networking, informal contacts and merchant banking, which meant seeking capital was unorganized. Now, it's organized: We can go to Google and search "venture capital firm in NYC" and instantly get a number to call. From that perspective, venture capital as a model helped because it gave us an identifiable supply of capital and, as such, has provided some value.

Image: FLICKR/PROFESSOR EVIL 

There are bad years, so-so years and then there is 2013…its been a long time coming. In 2013, VCs finally took some pride in the 10-year returns which recovered to 7.8% as of Q2 2013. The battered egos have regained their mojo and the venture “asset” class is starting to look real once again. Even as fund managers (or GPs) whip up their fund raising documents, and get ready to pitch institutional investors (or LPs), a lot of strong foundational under-pinnings are at work.

Image: http://www.forbes.com 

There's a reason why Johns Hopkins University has been named one of the top med schools worldwide and the number one hospital in the U.S. Students at Johns Hopkins are driven and relentless in their pursuit of innovative solutions to every day problems. They tend to be incredibly talented, skilled in their respective fields. Which would explain why the Baltimore school was named one of the top 10 universities with the most creative students by ViewsOnYou this year.

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Since the recent recession, and at least partially sparked by it, I’m seeing a real resurgence of entrepreneurial spirit, and more startup activity than ever before. I believe the days of the “job work” mentality are thankfully waning, with more people looking to get satisfaction by making the world a better place, rather than just tolerating brain-numbing work to fund enjoyment elsewhere.

For most entrepreneurs, their current business is not where they intend to stay until they die. At the right time, they all intend to make a graceful exit, and leave while still perceived to be on top of their game. The challenge is how to know and exit gracefully when the right time has come, without trauma to either the company or themselves.

By now you’ve probably heard that the Oxford Dictionary word of the year for 2013 is “selfie.” What Exactly is a Selfie? A selfie is nothing more than a self-portrait photograph that you share via social media. Of course, the selfie isn’t new.  The black and white photograph above is a selfie of Grand Duchess Anastasia of the Russian Romanovs (yeah, that Anastasia) from 1914.

Image: http://smallbiztrends.com 

A few years ago in the depths of the recession, the idea of being able to sell your business might have provoked rueful laughs from small business owners. Today, however, the outlook is improving and if you’re considering selling or hoping to expand by buying a business. Now could be the time to make your move.

Image: http://smallbiztrends.com 

You'd have a tough time coming up with a more Silicon Valley institution than Y Combinator. The technology business incubator is based in Mountain View, California — about a 25-minute bike ride from Google's headquarters — where hundreds of entrepreneurs apply to get help developing their websites, apps and gadgets. The speakers list looks like a selection of Crunchies award nominees: Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, Marc Benioff, Marissa Mayer.

Image: Photographer: Guy Calaf/Bloomberg 

It’s been a good year for strange animals. Which is something you could probably say about every year ever because animals are strange. So here’s my Top Ten Strangest Animal Moments of 2013, ordered from most strange to slightly less strange. Most lists go the other way and end on a high note, but when you come out the other end of this one thinking, “That’s slightly less strange than those other ones I just read about ten minutes ago,” … who cares, it’s Christmas!

Image: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com 

When Microsoft launched its research labs in 1991, the personal computer was just beginning to blossom into a worldwide phenomenon, thanks in no small part to Windows. The company’s head count had swelled above 8,000 employees, global sales were about $1.8 billion and its biggest battleground was the desktop.

Image: Courtesy of Microsoft 

The iPhone is fantastic, but there’s a future waiting for us beyond touchscreens. It’s a place where bits and bricks combine, where the ethereal digital world becomes corporeal, where we can see and feel information manifested in real mass. These are the themes behind some of the most incredible experiments in user interface of the year. Spend 5 minutes reading about them in the gallery above, and get a sneak peek at the next 5 years--or even decades--of interface.

Image: http://www.fastcodesign.com 

This year was all about turning traditional office models on their head--and occasionally, bringing them back to basics. Chairigami made headlines for its office furniture made completely out of cardboard, no assembly required. Meanwhile, Seattle's Bullitt Center, dubbed the greenest office building the world, finally opened, and an office building in Tokyo began growing 200 species of fruit, rice and vegetables on its roof.

Image: http://www.fastcoexist.com