By Amber Hines. This column first appeared on EducationNC. As soon as students enter my classroom for a small-group session, I know what question is coming: “Are we going to record?” Elementary school students love using technology. But teachers must use students’ valuable learning time wisely: Technology should be meaningful, data-driven, and help meet our […]
VCS Teacher Joins Pilot Program Aimed at Benefiting Rural Districts
The Daily Dispatch, January 28, 2019, by Miles Bates
Stanford Wickham, a Vance County High School math teacher who also teaches Advanced Placement calculus to seniors, is part of a team of teachers that Maria Hernandez of the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics is leading in a pilot program aimed at furthering access to excellent teaching across the state.
North Pitt Benefits from Effort to Boost Math Instruction
The Daily Reflector, January 28, 2019
A public-private educational partnership will augment mathematics instruction at North Pitt High School this semester as part of a project to partner remote expertise with teachers on site at schools statewide.
College Board, NC School of Science & Math, Public Impact Join Forces for Rural Schools
Public Impact is excited to announce that our Opportunity Culture initiative is partnering with the College Board and the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics (NCSSM) to reach rural school districts with excellent NCSSM teachers. In the first phase of this pilot, an excellent NCSSM teacher will become an Opportunity Culture multi-classroom leader for a […]
The Risks and Rewards of Using Blended Learning to Reach More Students
By Elizabeth Annette Bartlett. This column first appeared on EducationNC. If, as a teacher who sees success with one class of students, I could reach twice as many students per class, why shouldn’t I try? That’s the question I asked myself in trying to solve a dilemma my middle school science students faced. In the […]
Personalizing Learning with Innovative Staffing + Blended Learning: 4 New School Profiles
As part of a deep look at how schools rethink how they are organized to address each student’s needs, Public Impact and the Clayton Christensen Institute today released the second set of profiles of schools and teachers using innovative staffing with blended learning. These profiles, many with accompanying videos, set the stage for an upcoming white paper […]
How 2 Pioneering Blended-Learning Teachers Extended Their Reach
What makes blended learning different in an Opportunity Culture? As two pioneering high school teachers in North Carolina show in new vignettes, blended learning gives them a tool to reach 40 to 100 percent more students per class period with great teaching. Students alternated days between classroom instruction with their blended-learning teacher and working from […]
New Models Combine Teacher Leadership, Digital Learning
Teachers using blended learning need guidance to help students achieve high-growth learning consistently. Teacher-leaders and their teams need time to collaborate and learn together on the job. Students need access to personalized instruction that catalyzes consistently high growth and expands their thinking. How can schools achieve all of these goals? Combine blended learning with teacher […]
New Models Combine Teacher Leadership, Digital Learning
Teachers using blended learning need guidance to help students achieve high-growth learning consistently. Teacher-leaders and their teams need time to collaborate and learn together on the job. Students need access to personalized instruction that catalyzes consistently high growth and expands their thinking. How can schools achieve all of these goals? Combine blended learning with teacher […]
Put Technology to Work in Rural Schools
Technology makes it possible for each of us to do more, learn more and be more connected.
Need to pay your bills and register your kid for swim lessons while locating a recipe for dinner? Jump online. Want to learn more about something you just overheard while in line at the grocery store? Type it into a search engine. Wonder what your former Little League teammates are up to? Check your Facebook newsfeed.
Imagine what we could do for education if we maximized the potential of technology for teachers and students. Technology’s potential seems particularly compelling for rural schools, which struggle to offer an array of learning opportunities, to transport students to a central facility and to get the best combination of teachers from small candidate pools.
Technology in education sounds terrific: It can bring the world to a classroom. It can give students access to courses and resources they might not otherwise get. It can inject engaging fun into the classroom, as students learn through games and create in a digital medium.
Technology seems like a shiny tool that will build a bridge across the achievement gap. But technology’s power, like any tool, depends on how it is used. If a builder buys a new skill saw and wants to get the full value from his investment, he will place it in the hands of his best carpenter and will charge that leader with training the other carpenters to use it effectively. Likewise, efforts to use digital tools in education gain new potential when paired with efforts to give more students access to the best teachers.
Schools in several states are doing just that by developing new staffing models that break out of the traditional one-teacher-per-classroom model. They extend the reach of their top teachers using technology and team leadership. These teacher-leaders help their peers orchestrate in-person and online activities to maximize student learning. They use flexible student groupings and scheduling to meet each student’s needs while coaching teams of teachers toward excellent instruction.
Most rural schools, including districts participating in the Idaho Leads initiative, the Idaho P-TECH network, Khan Academy in Idaho and other efforts, are already forging ahead with integrating technology into their work. But to tap the full potential of technology, students, communities, educators and policymakers will also need to re-envision the traditional paradigm: particularly the notion of education delivered within classrooms of 20 to 30 students led by a single teacher.
In Technology and Rural Education, a paper funded by the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Foundation and developed with the Rural Opportunities Consortium of Idaho, we offer a set of recommendations to overcome challenges and capitalize on the potential of technology to serve students, particularly Idaho’s rural students, including:
Technology and Rural Education
Report offers policymakers and philanthropic leaders recommendations to capitalize on the potential of technology to serve student in rural areas.
Breakthroughs in Time, Talent, and Technology: Next Generation Learning Models in Public Charter Schools
Brief studies four ‘next generation’ learning models breaking with tradition to deliver a more personalized experience to students.