Digital Directions - Winter 2013 - (Page 31)
approved a $230 million ed-tech bond, in a
collaboration to emphasize the use of digital
tools for learning.
Crandall, a Republican who is chairman of
the House education committee, views
himself as a connector in Arizona’s ed-tech
arena, highlighting projects that are working,
building coalitions, and linking up those
passionate about using technology in
schools. “That connectivity, those
relationships are huge,” he says.
State and federal policymakers can play a
crucial role in bolstering or hindering a culture
of digital innovation. But it’s not always about
passing legislation or relaxing outdated
policies, and there can be hurdles to this
leadership. That’s why some advocates in the
field say there are fewer ed-tech leaders at the
state and national levels than there should be.
Policymakers at all levels need to get out of
“compliance mode,” says Ken Kay, the chief
executive officer of EdLeader21, a subscriptionbased professional learning community for
educators, based in Tucson, Ariz. States “look
at federal requirements or create state
requirements and then tell schools to do it,” he
says. “That’s not modeling creativity and
innovation.”
Legislative Failure, Success
But lobbying for innovation in schools can be
fraught with disappointments and political peril.
Crandall, for one, championed a digital
learning bill last year that would have provided
stricter state oversight of the online courses
that have proliferated in Arizona schools.
Though it passed both the House and the
Senate, the measure drew a veto from gop
Gov. Jan Brewer, who voiced concerns about
a state entity’s authority to approve courses.
Idaho Superintendent of Public Instruction
Tom Luna experienced a much bigger setback.
After state lawmakers in 2011 passed his
education improvement legislation, which
included several ed-tech measures, such as
requiring online courses for high school
graduation, Idaho voters scrapped the initiative
in November by ballot measure.
Luna “went way out on a limb, and he just got
whacked and lost everything he had passed,”
says Tom Vander Ark, a partner at Getting
Smart, an ed-tech advocacy organization, and
LearnCapital a San Mateo, Calif.-based venture
capital firm. He says lawmakers in other states
noticed: “This will give others pause.” (Vander
Ark is the author of Vander Ark on Innovation,
an opinion blog hosted on edweek.org.)
But when ed-tech measures succeed, it’s
critical, experts say, to be persistent in
shoring them up, maintaining their presence,
and expanding them—even to other states.
Maine’s Learning Technology Initiative brought
laptop computers to all 7th and 8th graders in
the state in 2002, and has now expanded to the
high school level. But keeping the program
funded and in a state of continuous
improvement takes a huge commitment to
regular professional development and
highlighting best practices, says Jeff Mao, the
state’s learning technology policy director.
Mao says he is often contacted by other
state officials and district administrators
wanting to replicate Maine’s program and
he’s free with his advice. Too often, though,
he has watched those efforts “crash and
burn,” he says.
One of the common problems, he says, is in
district or state requests for proposals, or
RFPs, that show education officials simply
don’t know what to ask for.
Maine, by contrast, has Apple Inc. officials
working in the state full time on professional
development for the Maine 1-to-1 program. And
Mao’s latest RFP, unveiled around Thanksgiving,
calls for permitting other states to join in.
To date, Mao has had commitments from
Hawaii and Vermont, and interest from several
other states, including Montana and South
Carolina. The move benefits both Maine and
other states interested in 1-to-1 programs.
“We want to take a leadership stance,” Mao
says. “We’re trying to build a bigger market
and spread the MLTI way.”
The goal is to create a market for the kinds
of cutting-edge technology that Maine is
looking for, and to help other states avoid
mistakes, Mao says.
But John Bailey, the executive director of
Digital Learning Now!, an educational
technology advocacy group based in
Tallahassee, Fla., says ed-tech leaders need to
focus on more than just devices and wiring.
“You can end up with a lot of infrastructure,
but no change or improvement,” he says. “It
doesn’t necessarily lead to transformation in
the classroom.”
National Leadership
What could lead to transformation in the
classroom from the state and federal
perspectives is modeling how to integrate
technology into nearly every type of
educational discussion, instead of putting
educational technology in a separate silo or
department, says Bailey, who was the director
of the office of educational technology during
the administration of President George W.
Bush. Government officials at both levels can
make sure to build in effective use of
technology as a criterion when making
competitive grants to “incentivize not just the
acquisition, but the use of it,” he says.
That’s in part what the federal Investing in
Innovation, or i3, grants have done, by
making technology a key criterion for
approval. In 2010, the U.S. Department of
Education awarded 49 grants, ranging from
$3 million to $50 million, to districts and
organizations to scale up education
programs with proven outcomes or spur the
development of new ones.
Secretary of Education Arne Duncan also
has used his bully pulpit to emphasize
technology in education, championing
innovations like e-textbooks and the
expansion of broadband, and the Race to
the Top grant program has built in
technical assistance associated with
continuous improvement and flexibility.
That emphasis on innovation is what
Kentucky is trying to encourage with its new
“Districts of Innovation” legislation, which
will allow some school districts to begin
operating with more flexibility starting in
the 2013-14 school year, says David N. Cook,
the director of innovation and partner
engagement at the Kentucky Department
of Education.
The legislation, enacted in 2012, was
designed to give regular public schools
some of the same flexibility charter schools
have. For educational technology, that may
mean districts get to spend money on
technology that might be designated for
something else. Or they’ll be able to opt out
of traditional seat-time requirements for
class credit that may hinder districts from
using more online courses, Cook says.
Cook says he sees his job as part
cheerleader and part brainstormer. He says
states should take a lead role in spreading
effective ed-tech practices across districts.
“My job is to take these incubation sites
and figure out how to challenge other
districts to do the same thing,” he says. “I’m a
connector.” n
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Digital Directions - Winter 2013
Digital Directions - Winter 2013
Contents
Editor’s Note
DD Site Visit
Bits & Bytes
Digital Storytelling
Online Courses Turn on Gaming
Reading in the Age of Digital Devices
Movers & Shakers
State, Federal Leadership Seen as Key to Innovation
Open-Source Opportunities
BYOD Boundaries
E-Cloud Forecast
Digital Shift
Security
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