Instructify

BY BILL FERRIS

This week’s MBTN looks at inspiring TED videos for educators, how to sabotage your resume, saving for college, and free ebooks on personal finance. More after the jump.

25 Incredible TED Talks for Educators
TED talks bring some of the most fascinating and intelligent people on earth to talk about making the world a better place through technology, design, entertainment, and extraordinary ideas. More than a few talks have had to do with education, featuring speakers like Michelle Obama, Dave Eggers, and Nicholas Negroponte. Learn-gasm presents 25 of the best TED Talks pertinent to education. (Note: two videos not on the list but still worth seeing are talks by Johnny Lee and Malcolm Gladwell).

10 Boilerplate Phrases That Kill Resumes
Job seekers, take note: your resume may be infected with generic, uninspiring verbiage that will make potential employers yawn. Teachers are creative professionals, and Liz Ryan at Yahoo! hotjobs says that including uninspired junk like “team player,” “Cross-functional teams,” or “More than [x] years of progressively responsible experience” will brand you as lacking the creativity you want to inspire in your students. In my opinion, most of the phrases on Ryan’s list should be gimmies — you’re expected to work well with others and have good communication skills in pretty much any job worth having. It’s like bragging that you brush your teeth every day. Hunt down and replace these 10 phrases in your resume with something punchier.

Best 529 College-Savings Plans
Paying for a college education is like buying a new house — it’s really expensive (sorry, I couldn’t think of a better analogy). A 529 can help you save up gradually by using tax-free earnings plus a tax deduction or credit for contributions in many states. Kiplinger.com has some great information on how to get started, including a list of the best plans available, as well as a state-by-state guide to 529s. I’m using one for my kid in the hopes that one day he’ll go to college and learn to come up with better analogies than his daddy.

30 Free eBooks To Learn Everything You Want to Know About Personal Finance
Every citizen needs to know the ins and outs of money management. Mint.com lists 30 ebooks you or your students can use to educate yourselves on sound personal finance. These books are perfect for n00bs who aren’t sure where to begin when it comes to personal finance. The list itself starts you out right, too — all the books listed are free.

Photo credit: Jeremy Brooks on Flickr.