Everyone who has read my writings knows that I am a proponent of using technology, more specifically, the Internet as a tool to reform education. Despite my protest my critics try to force this idea into a "False Dichotomy". That is to say they want to pick an "Either / Or" argument.
If you are so motivated, you can walk into a library and become an expert in any subject you choose. It is difficult, but doable. I see the internet as no more than a "Library on Steroids".
I went to university in Virginia. I was 100 miles from the District of Columbia and The Library of Congress (TLC). Our college library was good but, TLC is Mecca. At the College library competition for assigned works was fierce and so I took to driving to D.C. and having access to the vast resources of TLC.
My instructors thought I was brilliant and scholarly because I always came up with references that others could not quickly get or find. I kept the secrete of my success from my unsuspecting peers.
Bob Kahn, one of the inventors of TCP/IP and hence the internet as we know it, is currently working on the technology to digitize TLC. At some point in the future the collective wisdom of humanity will be available, ONLINE!
One of the conclusions made by every investigation of the crisis in education is that instructional quality must be raised. To solve this problem there are two possibilities.
The first possibility requires that you recruit academically superior students into schools of education. Then you have to raise the quality of the way teachers are trained and then you send this new cadre into the schools. In addition, you have to enlist the cooperation of existing teachers in the process of retraining them to the new realties of knowledge production and pedagogy. (instructional practice). This option will take decades.
By then, we will be a third world puny power
The second option incorporates solution 1 and the advantages of current technologies. Find the best available transdisplinary teachers, theories, content and practice. Convert them into Internet based resources for teachers, parents and students. Test them empirically. Redefine the role of teachers to be learner centered mentors. Do this in parallel to current systems. Make schools the center of learning communities open to all who seek knowledge.
This would not take decades, because the technologies already exist, but are not organized systemically.
This philosophy is not "No child left behind'?, rather "No stone left unturned."
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How do we meet the needs of educators in the process? Perhaps you have some ideas on how to get the "buy-in" from educators, who, as a group, tend to be resistant to change.
One of the reasons for parallel development is to side-step resistance issues.
If you create excetional content they will buy in.
Your labeling the internet as a library on steroids is a solid example of how internet technology must be taught to teachers using "scaffolding".
IT must be attached (added on) to existing schema in order for teachers to learn just as they are taught to instruct their students. Teachers are students too, and their minds must be allowed the same opportunity to learn and accommodate new schema in similar ways.
Parallel development is also vital. It isn't enough to have teachers jazzed up about using internet technology and resources, they need to find computers with internet access in place when they are handed the keys to their bungalow out on the north 40.
It follows that hardware and software is not enough, teachers need to be trained, see the need, and willing to use the technology.
This notion of "parallel development" recognizes that the American public education system is just that, a system, and that the "trickle-down" theory, characterized Reaganomics in the early 80's, is meaningless when the it is common for students to be teaching their teacher how to turn on their own computer and start a program.
Each new class of teachers is progessively more adept in utilizing technology. It will not take long for progress to move exponentally. However, I'm worried about the here and now.
Another concern is that old paradigms are simply being given a new coat of paint.
Finally, in our county, most of the software that has been adopted are commercial products that lack rigorous testing, evaulation and validation. Most of these are 80% solutions. This is why I am firm on the idea of a Center For Excellence in Curriculum. The danger is that when a software product fails to meet expectations there is a tendencey to reject all technology solutions.
Most of the products I have examined fail the usability test (Mom can do it). The result is that teachers find it adds a layer of complexity, hence a steep learning curve, and challenges what little available time they have.
Until us geeks solve that problem there will be little progress.
Our current educational system is not using the internet as the resource it can be.
Is google.com still compiling university collections for on-line access? I haven't seen anything about this project in the news lately, but haven't really looked. I know there were copyright questions, not to mention that some universities want to control research documents and information, a necessary result of patenting ideas, methods and products and licensing them to the business community.
I would like the use of the internet for education to go much further, now that interactive content is possible, it can.
If every child in California achieved college level SAT scores, there would not be enough colleges and universities for them to attend. This means more than half of the students would have to be left behind.
Several decads ago a book was written about our education system at grade 8 level sorted students into college bound and workplace bound classes. The students and parents were not consulted about this sorting. This sorting now take place at kindergarten level.
I think we are phony when we promote higher education, and at the same time limit the availability.
I don't think we can build and staff enough universities to meet the demand.
Is your goal is limited to having library resources on-line for students who manage to get accepted at a college or university?
PS,
I know there are now a few hundred "on-line" universities, and like the old correspondence school clip joints advertise ubiquitously, but is there a list anywhere for accredited, academically excellent "on-line" universities?
Are there on-line universities that the human resources department of a large corporation, Intel for example would accept?
I have put your .org site on my favorites list and will explore it.
There are accredited online Universities. Notably, Walden, Capella, University of Phoenix. They are not diploma mills.
The goal is to have an acredited on K-12 school, that is publically supported and regulated. Families can use it as a resource or their school of choice.
Universities will have to adopt technology based reforms to meet the demand. I see this as more problematic than building a K-12 school. Big Egos
The Binet Intellegence test was created to sort people into the proper career tracks. I know that Australia still gives equal support to workplace and college tracks. The fact is that not all kids need or want to go to college, but we seem to be neurotic about making kids feel bad if they want to be a plumber or a carpenter or other skilled trades.
Yes Google is still working on scholar.google.com as well as other educational programs. Microsoft is heavily invested in educational research.
I fear commercial efforts. Can you imagine a world in which MS owns education the way they own operating systems and software?
Interesting, yes, when even the so called private universities such as Stanford and Harvard could not survive without tax money that the research is sold and licensed to the business community.
Didn't Bill purchase and post the DaVinci works on the internet?
I used to work in the semiconductor industry, not technical, marketing.
I always say the old IBM and ITT makes Bill Gates business style look like kindergarden play.
Now I will run them past some industry human resource people and see how they value the diplomas.
I asked, because sometimes I am asked.
Thanks for publishing this to The Renewed Activist.
This is a great article. I hope that at some point we can all look back and say, "I remember when Reid wrote about that on Gather. Now, it is commonplace."
I say this with regret. And just a small point of current education. Have you noticed that everyone takes pride in not being able to do math? Since when did carpenters stop being able to figure board feet without a cheat sheet...
I can understand how you could come to that sentiment. I certainly know parents that think that way. However, I have a different take on this.
I believe that most parents are ill-informed and fearful for their children. They ask for answers and are left more confused when they get the answers.
The good news is that they see education as the key to the economic welfare. If they are given a way to be involved they will respond.
Have you taken this to National PTA? That might be the best route to get things going, either from a grass roots membership standpoint, or a National PTA/PTSA effort. It seems to be right up their alley.
Like you, I was considered a "brilliant" student because I used a library, and your assertion that the Internet could become a massive learning tool is already under way. My college students--and my college-aged children--are all learning contantly via the Web. However what they're learning on the Web isn't what their teachers assess as knowledge.
All of which is to say: Your proposal harnesses the power of technology for learners. I believe that is already happening. But the Internet has become a bastion for the lowest common denomenator. It is rife with pornography and hidden (often illegal) fetishism. Our students navigate these perilous waters with the skill of seasoned sailors. Or they drown. But they're swimming constantly, and educators have not yet developed the leadership to help them and teach them how to utilize this resource.
But we're learning, and your ideas clearly understand what's at stake (even if I disagree with the repeated capitalist, nationalist fears of Americans "falling behind" or becoming "third world").
Put simply: These kids are learning to use the Internet in ways we don't even realize, and what they know is not yet assessed or valued by schools. In order to harness the leadership of "academically superior students" and recruit them as teachers, we must raise the class status of teachers to that of engineers, corporate leaders, attorneys, or physicians. I don't see that this will happen, but it's required. Leadership and guidance, by the brightest minds, is the only way for students to harness the power of the Internet. As it stands, they are leading *us* and they do so without the wisdom of maturity.
I totally agree that the Internet is, "bastion for the lowest common denomenator". However, I also assert that it is hand inglove with society at large.
It is our job as teachers to give them the tools to citically navigate. It serves no useful purpose to treat the Internet is an attactive hazard.
This circles back to a major theme for literacy. "Critical Thinking" Our schools fail on this point. Partially because of a need for order but more importantly because disagreement is seen as a behavioral issue and social control.
finally I want to know what kids are learning in the ad hoc world of the internet. Like you I presume it is "bad." In honesty I'm not sure.
My youngest son told me just a few days ago that he like to go to Wikipedia and just randomly surf.
Contrast this with a professor at local University telling a student that Wikipedia is a waste of time. Heavens, I use it to start on almost any subject that I have no basic knowledge. By critically reading I am taken elsewhere.
I love the word ignorance! It carries the connotation of willfully choosing to no learn. Ignorance is correctable and to that extent unforgivable.
Yet his ability to teach himself whatever he wants to learn requires, I believe, a highly sophisticated order of "critical thinking." This critical thinking, however, is precisely where you say our schools fail.
I disagree; rather I contend that "critical thinking" is engaged from the first day of class: they are critically thinking about our clothing, our class requirements, our voices, our postures--every aspect of our person is under the critical gaze of our students from day one.
And this "critical thinking" doesn't stop. The first critical thinking that usually occurs often happens when they first enter the school building, where they are told to sit still and listen. They are usually critical of this, and where they aren't you'll find the Honors Students.
However I must agree with you on one score: the "critical thinking" that challenges the curriculum, the course, the syllabus, the instructor--this "thinking" is held in abeyance if it isn't stopped immediately with a detention or an invitation to drop the course.
To the extent that we are required to teach a mass audience of individuals who, given the option, would rather be checking their MySpace blog, we must necessarily pull teeth in order to engage their minds away from other concerns.
No one enjoys dental work. But every human being has the capacity--perhaps the urge--to learn. Our challenge is to engage them while we understand what's important to them--even as we demand that they challenge not just my flared jeans, but they must critically think about and challenge what they value, too. It happens.
That's the crux of the problem. Diane is correct: people do not "seek knowledge". They seek high-paying jobs. Those of us who surf Wikipedia (and who read dictionaries and encyclopedias for pleasure, in the days before the 'Net) are and will likely remain, rare.
That is not true of children, however -- any three-year-old has such an excitement about learning that it can barely be contained! Again, it is up to the parents to nurture this spark and allow it to grow into a consuming flame of passion for information and connection.
You, and all educators, can only hope that at least some parents are doing their job.
I can make an argument that blames each stakeholder for the problem. (parents, teachers, students, schools of education, politicians etc.)
The fact is all have their role in this problem. My proposal is simple. Take education online. Set the goals high. Make it accredited, engaging, releveant, and challenging. Provide immediate feedback for all stateholders. Make it flexible to include all levels of ability and interests.
No one has tried this kind of systemic approach. Why?
The children who will benefit from your proposal, that educators "take [all?] education online," are already those who benefit from well-subsidized education in classrooms. If your call is one for reform of public (tax-funded) education, it will be a hard-sell.
Web courses ain't cheap, Reid, as I'm sure you know. If every child were to receive Internet schooling, each child would need, at least:
1. A decent home with a waterproof roof over his/her head, in order to protect:
2. A dependable source of electricity, which will power:
3. A good computer, which is hooked up to:
4. An Internet connection (dial-up? DSL?);
all of which will be paid for by those who actually care.
For such funding to happen in this country, there would have to be a sea-change in the ways that an increasingly aging (and childless) population views the function of public schooling. They would have to invest heavily from their (meager) retirement savings to fund schooling for children who aren't their own, and who often frighten them (for reasons they believe are unrelated to underfunded public education).
What's missing in your proposal is the persuasive message, which will necessarily speak directly to the population who sees nothing in it for them, i.e., the same population that felt ignored by liberal, high-falutin intellectual politicians and their plea to end the private school vouchers that leach needed resources away from reforms for everyone.
No one has tried this systemic approach because many of these tax-paying folks simply don't believe it's worth paying for. The question, then, is this: How do you convince folks that an Internet education should be funded with at least as much tax money as we set aside for foreign invasions or prisons?
The Eric database is extensive.
What is missing the the organizational framework to integrate it all.
I have done the economics and the cost per child is far less than the ppr per child.
Also, I'm not talking about shutting down schools for online education. I am talking about leveraging the assests we already have to improve the classroom by empirically assessing what works and doesn't work. I am talking about the same kind of efficiencies that industry has gone through over the last 3 decades.
Teachers should be mentors not bosses.
I choose to not involve myself with the rhetoric and to propose a common sense solution. but as Mark Twain said, "common sense is not so common."
Please read our paper at : http://tcfir.org/whitepapers/Connected%20Learning%20Framework.pdf
But I am "the converted" for whom preaching is unecessary. We'll have to gird our loins for the debates over anything that costs money where money's been lacking, and where "average folks" don't read white papers. We will necessarily engage "the rhetoric" to create a persuasive argument that reaches folks who believe that "common sense" is what education reformers ignore in favor of budget increases.
So far, the most hopeful and persuasive argument for your plan lies in the simple statement above that your plan "costs less." I'll let you know what the penny-pinching, childless retirees of Florida say when I mention your reforms at the grocery checkout.