Guest Commentary: The Viewpoint of a Virtual Teacher

Oregon's Jane Bartosz spent 15 years teaching in a traditional classroom. She wanted a change. So she decided to try teaching online.
She joined Oregon Connections Academy six years ago. As Bartosz puts it, "I made a choice that works for me."
It is also a choice that works for Bartosz's students.
"I'm more able to tailor my teaching to meet the individual needs of students, whether they're struggling to catch up or happen to be in the gifted category. There are weekly live lessons where I connect directly with students, and there's lots of one-on-one time over the phone and email," she writes.
There are many voices heard in the debate over virtual education. Too often, the voices of teachers are not heard.
Bartosz isn't wearing rose-colored glasses when it comes to virtual education. Still, she is positive about its future.
Read her complete post here.

10 Shifts that Change Everything

This I know. Change forces and market drivers are finally bringing the digital revolution to education. Online learning is creating new options for students. Blending online and onsite learning has the potential to improve learning and operating productivity. The digital learning revolution is creating 10 shifts in the way we learn.

Click here to read my complete post.

Guest Commentaray: Baby Ben's Blended New World--A View from a RTTT winner

When it rains, it pours. That old adage is connected to good news, too, at least it is for Bryan Setser, chief executive of the North Carolina Virtual Public School.
On Aug. 21, 2010, Setser and his wife welcomed a new son into the world--Benjamin Marcus Setser.
On Aug. 24, 2010, North Carolina was announced as one of the winners of the Race To The Top competition. The federal dollars will allow North Carolina to expand its online learning opportunities.
Setser is one of the North Carolinians who has his hand on the policy and implementation wheel to make sure the money is used effectively.
In a post from his blog "The Virtual Learning Consultant," Setser talks about welcoming his son into a "blended world," a place where digital natives blend cutting-edge technology with a firm foundation in the virtues of the society they will some day guide.
The new father and school leader says in this world, "Zip codes are not going to be a barrier for the kids of a blended generation. They’ll be able to access not only the highest quality courses and teachers in their state, but they’ll be able to access those same courses for free from places like MIT, as well as instructors from Singapore. Shouldn't we all be able to select the world’s best teachers, in the best courses, providing the best lessons, modules, or mobile apps by the time Baby Ben is in elementary school?"
Read the complete post here.

Guest Commentary: Oregon Shouldn't Limit Access to Virtual Schools

The Portland Oregonian Editorial Board said it bluntly, "A state where a quarter of the students drop out of public schools ought to have better things to do than figuring out ways to limit access" to virtual schools.
The editorial writers also wonder why "once the state is convinced that online students are receiving a quality education, why should it prevent other families from making the same choice?"
Many Oregon parents who want to enrollment their children in virtual course, but cannot because of state-imposed enrollment caps, are asking the same question.

Guest Commentary: Online Learning and the Winners of RTTT, Round 2

The District of Columbia and nine states--Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Maryland, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, and Rhode Island--were named winners of second round of Race to the Top.

The winning states will split $4.35 billion. The amounts for each state will be announced later.

Earlier this year, Tennessee and Delaware won the first round of the competition. They split $600 million.

Click here to read a full report on the round two winners.

Click here for iNACOL's analysis of the online components of RTTP Round 2 finalists applications

Guest Commentary: iNACOL President talks about Utah Visit, Digital Learning Council

Susan Patrick, president and CEO of the International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL) spoke about the benefits of online education before members of the Utah state legislature.
EdReform.com wrote about Patrick's appearance and caught up with after she had given her testimony. In this video interview, Patrick talks about the meeting, the future of virtual education, and the reception she received from the Utah legislators.She also talks about the newly-created Digital Learning Council, a diverse group of more than 50 leaders from education, government, philanthropy, business and technology who plan to develop principles and policies for digital learning. Led by two former governors, Jeb Bush from Florida and Bob Wise
of West Virgina, want to move virtual education to the forefront of the education reform movement.
Patrick, who is among the virtual movement leaders to sign the council's mission statement, said she is thrilled that the Digital Learning Council will address education "policies that need to be changed" for the digital age.

What I'm Reading

Rick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute set a record--three posts this week worth commenting on. He's not always the first, not always popular, but more often than not makes me think.
Two of his posts deal with the virtual education movement.
To read my complete post, and the links to Rick's articles, click here.

The Education Breakthrough Network

In addition to being a contributor to the Liberating Learning Blog, I have been working on an exciting new project, the Education Breakthrough Network.

We want our website to be a place where you can find people like yourself--people engaged in creating excellence in American education.

We are people of all political parties, all cultures and social backgrounds, all faiths, and all ethnicities. What binds us together is our belief in the

power of education.

Here is a brief video of an interview I did in which I talk about the Education Breakthrough Network. Take a look and please take a look at the website.

My Virtual Schools Op-ed that was Banned in Boston

A few weeks ago, the Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education established a series of restrictions that are sure to slow the growth of any virtual schools that open in that state.
The board voted to cap enrollment of online schools at 500 students. It also requires that 25 percent of the online school's students live in the district operating the school.
I wrote an op-ed about this misguided decision and submitted it to the Boston Globe and the Boston Herald. Neither paper chose to publish it.
Here is a link to the article. Read it and tell me what you think. Let me know why you think the Globe and the Herald were afraid to publish this.

Guest Commentary: Race to the Top & Online Learning

Presentations from the 19 finalists in the Race to the Top competition started this week.
If you use the first round as a gauge, Round 2 winners should be announced on Aug. 23. This is a guess.
The International Association for K-12 Learning (iNACOL) has done a great service by compiling the online learning initiatives proposed by each of the finalists. Here is a link to the iNACOL look at online learning in the applications

Guest Commentary: Bugets crises, tech could put an end to the 'Little Red Schoolhouse'

Susan Colby and Caitrin Moran Wright of Bridgespan Group, a non-profit strategy consulting firm, wrote a smart blog post for Edutopia.
In their article, Colby and Wright say the technology-led teaching and learning innovations may be inside the silver lining in the budget reductions so many school districts are facing because of the economic downturn.
Schools may be forced to turn to virtual classes that foster personalized learning because district can no longer afford "the solitary school marm" who stands in front of a classroom "filled with 25 to 30 students." Click here to read complete post.

Will Oregon's Virtual Charter Schools Survive?

This is a good question that Oregonians need to think about and answer.

For more than a year, Oregon's virtual charter schools have been under attack. The state's largest teachers union, the Oregon Education Association, supported a legislative bill with restrictions so tough, that if fully adopted, the state's virtual charters could have been put out of business.

The legislature did approve restrictions, including enrollment caps, but did not go as far as the teachers union wanted. Still, the future for the virtual charters is uncertain.

I take a detailed look at what is going on in Oregon, including the OEA's list of suggested regulations for virtual charters it recently submitted to the Oregon State Board of Education.

Guest Commentary: Indiana Teachers Says 'Let's Embrace Online Education'

Teacher Andrea O'Neal is blunt. She's "not crazy about online schools."
But she gets it.
Instead of being afraid of change, O'Neal tells fellow educators they should embrace change.
"Our schools don't always work as they should and for a variety of reasons students don't always have access to a classroom," O'Neal writes. "Online education should be embraced as one more option for families on a menu of choices."
Read all of Andrea O'Neal's article here.

Guest Commentary: Putting Virtue into Virtual School

Jim Stergios blogs on all things education for Boston.com in the "Rocking the Schoolhouse" blog.
Right now he's on the frontlines watching Massachusetts grapple with finding ways to fully fund what may be the state's first state-led virtual school, the Massachusetts Virtual Academy at Greenfield. The school is scheduled to open this fall.
He also has some strong words about restrictions a state education board placed on the virtual school's enrollment.
Stergios believes the Massachusetts bureaucracy needs to "stop protecting the status quo" and start seeing the virtue in virtual schools. Click here to read his post.

Guest Commentary: The Coming Debate Over K-12 Virtual Charter Schools

June Anh, writing for the June 16, 2010 Teacher's College Record, has a strong piece that looks at virtual charter schools and some of the issues that may surround the future of these schools.
Contrary to wildly-held beliefs, Anh says, students who attend virtual charters are not chained in front of computers all day. Many participate in a blended form of education, participating in face-to-face instruction and distance instruction.
Anh adds that today virtual charters exist in a wild west atmosphere. This will rapidly change as this form of online education continues to expand. Few states have "explicit policies to govern cyber charters, and those states that allow (cyber charter schools) ... numerous policy concerns remain under-developed." Anh provides a list of issues that virtual charters well may have to face in the future--and also provides a road map on actions to take so the virtual charter movement continues to expand.
Anh's commentary is well-worth reading.

Learning online: Two views

I recently wrote two articles for EdReform.com about online learning.

The first discusses the difficult in providing facts and figures about how many students are involved in online learning.

The second article calls on interest groups to take a step back and let change happen.

Two articles that share an author, and a bottom line: change is coming.