7/6- Ed Tech in the News

Middle Schools Focus on MCAS Tests and Technology

Two Massachusetts middle schools in Walpole "will focus considerable attention on boosting MCAS scores, increasing the use of technology in the classroom and promoting Internet safety for students."

Bird Middle School "hopes adopting a new math book in grade 6 and analyzing how math students are grouped will help improve MCAS scores. The school also plans to offer additional math and English blocks to provide more review time to students who struggle in these areas. "

Johnson Middle School continues "its admittedly "slow" progress in upgrading technology." It will "pilot the Web hosting service Edline next year and fully implement it by 2006-2007. With additional PAC money, the school will increase funding for its technology program. Johnson will also consider applying for grants to lower the computer-to-student ratio. The school's long-term goal is to have at least four computers in every classroom."

"Under curriculum, Bird's goals next year include increasing the use of technology in student instruction and reviewing the technology curriculum in general. "
(Mosher, Daily News Transcript)

Department of Education RESEARCH PRIORITIES

The Department's Institute of Education Sciences (IES) is inviting comments on developed priorities. The priorities were devised by Russ Whitehurst, the director of IES, and must be approved by the 15-member National Board for Education Sciences. Still, before proposing the priorities to the board, he is seeking public input.

The long-term goals associated with IES' priorities are three-fold: first, to develop or identify a substantial number of programs, practices, policies, and approaches that are effective in enhancing academic achievement and that are widely deployed and implemented; second, to identify what does not work and what is problematic, and thereby encourage innovating and further research; and third, to develop dissemination strategies and sources of information on the results of education research that are routinely used by educators, policymakers, and the general public when making education decisions.

IES' "over-arching priority" is research that contributes to improved academic achievement for all students.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE GO TO http://www.ed.gov/legislation/FedRegister/proprule/2005-2/061605a.html. (Comments must be received on or before August 16.)

7/5-Ed Tech in the News

E-Rate
Texas Schools Benefit From E-Rate
"Six area school districts will share in $91,771 of almost $800,000 allocated to South Texas to help smaller districts that may not have the funds necessary for Internet access and phone services. Seven other entities in Ruben Hinojosa's congressional district will receive the remaining $691,945 of the $783,716 in funding. The funding comes in the form of discounts ranging between 20 and 90 percent for technology such as Internet services, telecommunications and internal connections needed to bring information straight to schools and libraries, according to a news release from Hinojosa's office." The program, "called E-Rate Funding, has also provided equipment to the district in the past so that each of the 20 classrooms is computer equipped." District technology director Kyle Gleghorn said, "Without this money, it would be very difficult to do all that we're mandated to do by the No Child Left Behind Act."
(Popplewell, Victoria Advocate)

High School Reform
NY to Model New School on High Tech High School
"Microsoft founder Bill Gates says one student at High Tech High School in San Diego told him it's the first high school he'd gone to "where being smart was cool." That is the attitude that boosters of Tech Valley High School, patterned after High Tech High and other mathematics-, science- and technology-oriented schools, want to foster in the Capital Region."

"Plans call for Tech Valley High to be up to a full contingent of 400 students in grades 9 through 12 within about five years. Organizers are scouting out sites near high-tech business complexes in East Greenbush or North Greenbush for a $30 million campus for the new school. The school is likely to begin operations from space provided by the MapInfo Corp. in North Greenbush. "
(Stashenko, The Business Review(Albany))

Testing
Test to Measure Students' Internet Intelligence
"Students apply to college online, e-mail their papers to their professors and, when they want to be cheeky, pass notes in class by text-messaging. But that doesn't necessarily mean they have a high Internet IQ." "That's why Cal State and a number of other colleges are working with ETS to create a test to evaluate Internet intelligence, measuring whether students can locate and verify reliable online information and whether they know how to properly use and credit the material.

"This test measures a skill as important as having mathematics and English skills when you come to the university," says Roth. "If you don't come to the university with it, you need to know that you are lacking some skills that educated people are expected to have." A preliminary version of the new test, the Information and Communication Technology Literacy Assessment, was given to 3,300 Cal State students this spring to see how well it works, i.e. testing the test. Individual scores aren't being tallied but campuses will be getting aggregate reports. Next year, the test is expected to be available for students to take on a voluntary basis."
(Djansezian, USA Today)

Curriculum
States' Computer Science Standards Seen as Lacking
"Even in a nation where most every school has Internet access and computer use often starts by nursery school, teachers of technology see a warning message flashing. For students in elementary and secondary schools, states have few developed standards or required courses in computer science - a field that goes beyond basic literacy to encompass hardware and software design, real-world applications and computers' effect on society. Somehow, teachers contend, states must embrace the idea of training sophisticated computer users at a younger age.The same students who can customize their cell phones expertly need to see how computer science benefits them, he said: "If you can show them that, then they're going to jump on it."

Yet computer science teachers say they're facing a perception that careers in the field are harder to come by since the dot.com collapse a few years ago. Federal job forecasts contradict that notion, and careers from criminology to biology often demand advanced computer training.In the United States, the number of bachelor's degrees in computer and information sciences soared 91 percent from 1997 to 2002, during the tech boom. Recently, however, the popularity of computer science as a major for incoming freshmen has plummeted, falling more than 60 percent between 2000 and 2004, according to the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA. Meanwhile, technology executives have told Congress they are increasingly relying on employees from overseas and clamoring for more U.S. graduates with stronger science skills."
(Feller, The News & Observer)