eLearning Tipping Point

Eb51203eLearningTippingPoint

The transformation of K-12 eLearning by the innovation of eLearning will happen. The only issue is who will be the “pioneers” (who are the arrow catchers) and the “sod-busters” (who profit from the pioneer do-daring). I recently met and chatted with an eLearning pioneer. Her name is Barbara Bartlett. But first let me set the stage.

At the our Arizona Business Leaders dinner meeting last Thursday our speaker with was Bryan Bartlett, retired Chief Engineer of Saudi Aramco after 23 years. Saudi Aramco is tasked with managing the oil assets of Saudi Arabia – over 25% of the world’s oil reserves. He had more computing power at his command than NASA, Sandia and Los Alamos labs combined. I believe him when he said that with present consumption levels, oil will be all used up in 35 years and natural gas in 50 years.

But to our point, Barbara was an eLearning teacher in the rich Saudi Arabian schools. Her story was identical to most eLearning pioneers. Kids were shuffled in and out of her computer lab whose software did not teach, and computers and systems were continually failing. Technical support was little and late. When the computers went into the classrooms with little or no teacher professional development or instructional curriculum they had little effect. When she left they had been moved back to the computer labs.

Over the past decade we “sod-busters” have learned a lot from these pioneers. We have learned that we must focus and fund teacher education and professional development, digital curriculum and technical support each at the same level as computers and connectivity. We have also learned that eLearning must be designed within the teacher-student nexus to serve the specific learning needs. This knowledge is now showing up in state initiatives.

In 2005 Texas House Bill 4 allocated $400 million for this type of eLearning program for K-12 students. It initial success but when bundled with other education bills it was lost when the package was defeated.

Our Arizona SB1181 which led with $150 million to launch the eSATS system design did not make it out of the Senate in 2005.

North Carolina is working to launch small (400 students) New Technology High Schools, one for each county. They are very interested in eSATS and we expect to visit them in January.

Singapore’s Master Plan II (mp2) has shifted from Information Technology in schools (mp1) to “a systemic and holistic approach in which all the key pieces – curriculum, assessment, instruction and professional development, pupil learning and culture of the school are integrated and addressed.”
Are we at the tipping point for K-12 eLearning? I think we are. With the year a state of significant size will fully commit to implement a holistic eLearning system for all its children. Arizona must be that state. Even with it others launch in parallel, we will have a better design and support from our unique Arizona cluster of eLearning enterprises.