Michael B. Horn: Bright Spots Shine in Blended, Online Learning (Video)

A month has passed since the first-ever national Digital Learning Day. Given the excitement generated from teachers and others tuning in to the National Town Hall meeting and given today’s National Leadership Summit on Online Learning up on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. that iNACOL sponsored, I thought it was worth noting some great examples that weren’t highlighted during the day’s festivities.
To our friends in the field, these examples are familiar, but they remind us that what is so exciting about technology is the power that it holds to move our education system toward a student-centric model of learning where students can move at their own path and pace to boost student outcomes.
Click here to watch some videos of exceptional online learning programs

Michael B. Horn: Digital Learning Day Cometh

With the arrival on February 1, 2012 of the first-ever national Digital Learning Day, the disruptive innovation of K-12 online learning—from in blended-learning environments to remote ones—seems to be taking yet another step toward the mainstream.
For over a couple decades, supporters of technology in education have talked of its potential benefits in transforming education. But beyond a set of enthusiastic early adopters, the use of technology in formal education remained largely stalled. Its talked-about benefits remained unrealized at best, as the cramming of computers produced few notable results that scaled.
With the rise of online learning, that began to change. Its growth is rapid and undeniable. Increasingly we’re seeing online learning stretch beyond areas of non-consumption—where the alternative is nothing at all and where disruptive innovations first take root.
Click here to learn more about the goals of the first Digital Learning Day.

Michael B. Horn: For Digital Learning, the Devil’s in the Details

With Digital Learning Now providing a "“Roadmap for Reform,” that is a a guide to help states navigate different paths toward changing their online education policies, and non-profits such as the Khan Academy providing digitally-based Open Education Resources to schools, one might assume that moving into the future of online learning will be a straightforward exercise.
It isn't that easy, as I write in the Spring 2012 issue of Education Next.
Crafting a viable funding model for online courses that makes sense for districts and providers alike has not been easy. Even more challenging is helping schools and districts transition to a world in which students still need some of the services they provide but take most of their courses online. How does funding work in this model? How do schools create the flexible schedules and offer the critical services—many of which may be nonacademic—to accommodate students’ varying needs? How do they transition to this service—or community center—model?
Suggesting that a road map document could tackle such complexity isn't fair. But a glimpse into the exciting— and uncertain—future presented by Digital Learning Now! does raise many legitimate questions. That’s no reason to delay implementing its recommendations though; innovation is never perfect right out of the box.
Click here to read my entire article and find out why I believe innovations will clear many of the familiar roadblocks.

Michael B. Horn: School Finance in the Digital-Learning Era: A Review

The Fordham Institute continued its critical series exploring how to create sound policy for digital learning in November with two new papers, “Teachers in the Age of Digital Instruction” by Bryan C. Hassel and Emily Hassel, and “School Finance in the Digital-Learning Era” by Paul T. Hill. And more are on the way soon, including important ones exploring local control in the digital era and the true—and hotly debated—costs of online learning.
Hill’s paper tackles the other side of the coin of the costs of online learning, as he works through the ideal funding system that would promote innovation but strike the right balance with the need for accountability for public funds. The key tenets of his proposed ideal system are that it funds education, not institutions; moves money as students move; pays for unconventional forms of instruction; and withholds funding for ineffective programs without chilling innovation
It’s a good idea, too. But Hill’s changes are unlikely to be so simple to deliver. The reason why lies in his up-front analysis, when he writes about why today’s education system is so flawed: “Our system doesn't fund schools, and certainly doesn't fund students. It funds district-wide programs, staff positions, and so forth.”
Click here to read my complete review of Hill's paper and why I believe education funding needs a serious business model innovation.

Michael B. Horn: California Initiative Brings Breath of Fresh Air

It’s an embarrassment that California, the state that led the technology revolution in America, is, according to Digital Learning Now, last in the nation in using technology to transform its education system from its current factory-model roots into a student-centric one.
California policy has done its best to create a byzantine—some might say bizarre—set of regulations to frustrate the power of online learning to do just that. From geographic barriers that limit the ability of students in certain locales to access online learning to restricting blended learning in some unfortunate ways, California has created a maze to frustrate would-be innovators.
There have been some attempts by legislators over the last couple of years to begin to rectify some of these problems, but they have only stalled. Although some charter school operators, such as Rocketship Education and KIPP Empower, as well as some school districts, like Riverside School District, have created stellar blended-learning models, the most advanced school districts in California in online and blended learning have seen their efforts frustrated and curtailed. Even the exciting emerging blended-learning models appearing throughout California in response to tight budgets are limited in how innovative they could be by California’s regulatory landscape.
Against this backdrop, a group called Education Forward has introduced “The California Student Bill of Rights Act”—a proposed ballot initiative that would unlock some of the most onerous barriers to online and blended learning in California. But it would do so in an indirect way.
Click here to read more of my thoughts on "The California Student Bill of Rights Act."

Michael B. Horn: Is Mandating Online Learning Good Policy?

I’ve never been bullish on mandates. As a general rule, they tend to distort markets and sectors, have unintended consequences down the line at best and immediately at worst, and lock in ways of doing things at the expense of innovation.
That said, an increasing number of advocates for online learning have come out in favor of mandating that states require students take at least one college- or career-prep course online to earn a high school diploma. Digital Learning Now!, a national campaign chaired by former Govs. Jeb Bush and Bob Wise to advance policies to create a high quality digital learning environment for each student–and where I serve as a “Digital Luminary,” is on board as well.
States are taking notice. Michigan jumped in first with an online-learning requirement for graduation five years ago, and Alabama quickly followed suit. In the last year, Florida and Idaho have jumped on board as well, and districts, such as Tennessee’s Putnam County schools, have adopted an online-learning graduation requirement, too.
But is an online-learning requirement a good idea?
Click here to read more about my thoughts.

Michael B, Horn: What We Can Learn About Learning

Bror Saxberg, the chief learning officer of Kaplan, Inc., is a man for whom I have great respect. Whenever I have a question about the science behind learning, he is the first person I turn to. He verses himself in the latest in cognitive and neuroscience research and applies his multiple degrees to great use.
When he forwarded me his recent blog titled “What to learn from a learning grant process,” I dove in with some excitement as he talked about his work helping review science and math grant applications for the Institute of Education Sciences within the Department of Education and posed some bigger questions and comparisons with health care. It’s worth the read.
Given that he knows so much more than I do about these topics—this is not my area of expertise even though I read about and am fascinated by the science behind learning—it is with some trepidation that I therefore am wading in to respond to his blog. I’m not sure he’ll disagree with anything I say here, but I figure that I should tread carefully. Click here to read more.

Michael B. Horn: Colorado's Crummy Policies Lead to Crummy Virtual Schools

An investigation of Colorado’s full-time virtual schools has revealed some dubious results and practices, which led the state’s Senate President to call for an emergency audit of all of Colorado’s virtual schools.
But the state shouldn’t be shocked by the report. As the truism goes, you get what you pay for.
Colorado’s policy environment incentivizes exactly what it’s getting from its full-time virtual schools—and arguably not just its virtual schools, but all of its schools statewide.
The biggest problem is this: It pays a school all of its funds on a “count day” on October 1 based on the number of students enrolled on that day. If students leave afterward, the original school keeps the funds. If students enroll elsewhere, the new school receives no funds.
This incentivizes providers to enroll students, but there are few incentives in place to focus on what happens after that. As a result, a significant number of online providers seem to have followed these incentives and done exactly what Colorado paid them to do. The end result isn’t pretty for students, as a great number of them allegedly leave soon after the count day and enroll back in district schools if they enroll elsewhere at all.
Some are using this to bash all online learning, as well as for-profit providers that are seizing this revenue-making opportunity (as many such providers did in higher education), but in so doing, these critics are missing the point.
As I’ve written numerous times, studying whether online learning is more or less effective than traditional learning is invariably asking the wrong question. Online and blended learning have the potential to dramatically transform our education system by being able to individualize for each student’s distinct learning needs, but whether it does so will have a lot to do with policy—whether we change the incentives and focus not on merely serving students and micro-managing the inputs, but instead focusing on the student outcomes and leaving behind an antiquated factory-model system for a student-centric one.
Click here to read my complete post on this. And you know what the biggest shame in all of this? By focusing on the wrong part of the story, it may set back our opportunity to leverage the rise of digital learning to transform our system into the student-centric one that each student deserves

Michael B. Horn: Beyond Good and Evil

The role of for-profit companies in public education–education financed by the government–has attracted increased scrutiny over the past few years. Though for-profit entities such as textbook companies have had contracts with public school districts for decades, recent controversy over what government officials and others perceive as low graduation rates and questionable marketing practices within the for-profit higher-education space has drawn significant negative attention. As this controversy heats up, it is prompting a wider debate about the role of for-profit companies in education–a debate too often characterized by faulty assumptions and misunderstandings on both sides.
Many in public education assume the worst about for-profit corporations, arguing that they are money-grabbing entities that will shortchange the public good if it means increased profits. Critics see no place for for-profit providers in American education. Supporters view for-profits as a force for good that can harness the profit motive to attract top talent and scale quality in public education. The government often perpetuates these divides by drawing lines in the sand of what activities companies can and cannot do based on their corporate structures. Despite these views on for-profits, however, the reality is different. Policymakers, officials, providers, and other members of the debate would do well to keep three key points in mind:
--Firs, for-profit companies are not inherently good or evil
--Second, there are far fewer inherent and predetermined differences between for-profit companies and their nonprofit counterparts than many assume.
--Third, the biggest inherent differences between for-profits and nonprofits stem from their fundamental corporate structures, which determine what they do with their profits–and thus affect their ability to attract capital and scale–as well as what opportunities look attractive.
Click here to read more of my thoughts on for-profits and the role they should--and can--play in education. You will also find a link to my paper"Understanding the Role of For-Profits in Education Through the Theories of Disruptive Innovation," published by the American Enterprise Institute. There is also a link to AEI's "Private Enterprise in American Education Series."

Michael B. Horn: The Rise of Online Education

Clayton Christensen, my co-author on "Disrupting Innovation" teamed up again to write an article for the Washington Post.We take a look at the Los Altos School District and how it is disrupting methods for teaching math with a blended learning approach.
"Powered in part by the Khan Academy—a non-profit that offers free educational resources such as online lessons and online assessments—the school district is expanding the 'blended-learning' pilot it ran last year," we wrote.
"The district’s fifth, sixth and seventh graders learn online for a significant portion of their in-class math periods at the path and pace that fit their individual needs. Meanwhile, teachers will coach the students to keep up with their math goals and help them apply the math concepts in small-group and class-wide projects."
Lectures online and on video. Teachers coaching homework assignments and providing guidance to the students in groups and on projects.
Click here and read why we believe for the first time in roughly a century a dramatic change in the basic way we structure our educational system is afoot.

Michael B. Horn: Pearson Goes Bold, Acquires Connections Education

The announcement that Pearson is acquiring Connections Education in a move that should reverberate across the field of online learning and the education world more broadly.
My fellow Liberarting Learning blog contributor Tom Vander Ark wrote an insightful post about the acquisition today that I recommend highly.
In short, I agree with Tom on several parts of this, and, in what shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who reads our work, agree with him that the shift to digital learning is happening much faster than most realize—and that this transaction should raise that profile.
Click here to read my post and learn why I believe this move should open up more room for education entrepreneurs

Guest Commentary: How Digital Learning Can (and must) Help Excellent Teachers Reach More Children

The beginning of an essay written Bryan Hassel and Emily Ayscue Hassel, co-directors of Public Impact, a Chapel Hill, N.C. -based national education policy and management consulting firm, starts with a thank you to Liberating Learning blog contributor Michael B. Horn.

"We want to second his point (in his essay 'Why Digital Learning Will Liberate Teachers') and add another: schools--and nations--that excel in the digital age will be those that use digital tools both to make teaching more manageable for the average teacher, and to give massively more students access to excellent teachers," they wrote.
"And not just in the obvious ways. Yes, directly through digital instruction. But also by freeing excellent teachers to reach more students in-person," they added.
The Hassels continue by describing how digital learning can help to close the achievement gap. Click here to read their entire essay.

Michael B. Horn: Edtech Market is Growing--If You're Disruptive

An article by Katie Ash in Education Week about a new report by the investment bank, Berkery Noyes, caught my eye recently because of its analysis about the education technology market. According to the piece, “companies focused on technology-based instruction and tools for data collection and analysis are thriving in the K-12 market.”
But beneath this, there are some important layers of nuance that seems to clarify what many education technology companies are seeing on the ground.
On the one hand, a whole series of education technology companies say the current budget crises are hurting their businesses. According to the article, if you are in the business of providing such things as supplemental content, then that is indeed the likely reality of your world.
On the other hand, several digital learning companies report to me that the budget crises seem to have driven an up-tick in their businesses.
Click here to read the complete article I posted on the Education Next website. And take time to read Rocketship Education's John Danner's comment on my article. He says the era of accountability is coming to online learning.

Michael B. Horn: Why Digital Learning Will Liberate Teachers

I spend a lot of time writing about how digital learning can transform our education system into a student-centric one. In my last blog, I wrote about why parents—of all stripes—matter for digital learning and make it fundamentally different from past “reform” movements. Digital learning should similarly be a game changer for teachers.
Teachers will be critical to our nation’s future in a world of digital learning. Of course, teachers’ jobs will also be quite different from the way they look today—and if we do this right, they should not just be different, but they should also be a whole lot better, as it liberates them in many exciting ways.
Basically, as software increasingly handles direct instruction, this will create big opportunities for teachers to facilitate rich and rewarding project-based learning experiences for their students to apply their learning into different contexts and gain meaningful work in the so-called 21st-century skills. And as software increasingly simplifies administrative tasks and eliminates a significant need for lesson planning and delivering one-size-fits-none lessons, there will be significantly more time for teachers to work in the ways that motivated many of them to enter teaching originally—to work one-on-one and in small groups with students on the problems where they are in fact struggling.
Click here to read more on why I believe digital learning will liberate teachers.

Michael B. Horn: Why Public Schools Need Less Regulation

Rep. John Kline (R-MN) recently introduced an act that would change a piece of that. The State and Local Funding Flexibility Act would give states and districts much more flexibility in how they spend federal education dollars -- in effect, trusting local educators to make the best decisions for their students. But Kline's measure created a firestorm when he introduced it shortly after July 4. Opponents fired back that it would unravel much of what the Department of Education has accomplished over the last half century and undermine students' civil rights.
As always with proposals of this nature, the devil is in the details, but there is a strong logic to Kline's basic premise. Over the past couple of decades policymakers have begun focusing on student outcomes -- and taken to demanding accountability for them. But they haven't loosened their controlling grip on the inputs -- the resources and processes schools can use to deliver those outcomes.
Click here to read the entire article I wrote for The Atlantic and learn why I believe Kline's bill could have a positive impact on the move toward digital learning.

Michael B. Horn: Why Soccer Moms Matter for Digital Learning

It’s always been a hope of many in the education reform community that parents would rise up and demand choice, which would be a big catalyst for transformation in the inner cities and elsewhere. But if those reformers are being honest, they’d have to agree that it hasn’t really played out that way despite the hype of Waiting for Superman and other flashpoints.
As I was reminded though at a recent event where I spoke, the parental support for digital learning is fundamentally different.
First and foremost, digital learning is for everyone, everywhere. It’s not something designed for “those children” or one specific slice of the population. It’s not something that a group of parents support in theory but for whom in practicality it doesn’t matter. It’s not just for charters or districts. And even more fundamentally, it’s not just for private schools or for public schools. It cuts across all of these categories.
Click here to find out why I believe digital learning is the 'killer app" for education reform.

Michael B. Horn: The Future of Education Policy--Moving from Inputs to Outputs to Outcomes

My colleague, Katherine Mackey, and I have written a new report that should really push the envelope.
Our conclusion is that the majority of education policy continues to focus on rewarding systems that meet certain input measures that are, for the most part, inappropriate for judging online learning.
Focusing on inputs has the effect of locking a system into a set way of doing things and inhibiting innovation; focusing on outcomes, on the other hand, encourages continuous improvement against a set of overall goals, and in this case, can unlock a path toward the creation of a high-quality student-centric education system.
This report is certain to raise some hackles. It already has. In a post on the Education Week's Digital Education blog, a writer spotlighted one policy recommendation, the elimination of teacher-certification requirements, as something she hadn't "heard a lot of talk about."
"Would such a step help ensure quality by forcing educators to focus on outcomes, as Horn and Mackey argue? Or would it potentially undermine the quality of online learning available for those students?" the writer asks.
Well, no one is advocating having unqualified people teach our children. What we are saying in report, Moving from Inputs to Outputs to Outomes is that policymakers need to move beyond input-focused policies that regulate seat time, attendance, student-teacher rations, teacher certification, and enrollment caps--factors that may or may not have to do with learning--and instead move toward outcomes-based policies. Technology can, and will lead the way.
Click here to read the complete study.

Michael B. Horn: Ignoring Bad Incentives

My colleague, Katherine Mackey, and I had the opportunity to visit Covington Elementary School in Los Alto, Calif. recently, where teacher Rich Julian's 5th-grade math class has thrown out the typical math curriculum and instead given every child their own laptop, adopted the online Khan Academy math curriculum and assessments, and allowed the students to proceed at their own pace through any part of the 5th-grade curriculum.
The results are stunning. Katherine blogged about one aspect of how much the children work with each other. There are many other fascinating aspects, too, not the least of which was that every single student was on task the whole time we were there (I've visited the school twice, and it has been the same each time).
An obvious question that emerges is why don’t we see more of this happening? This happened in Los Altos because there was great leadership throughout the district. The school board, superintendent, principals, and the select teachers running the pilot all saw the potential, were willing to throw out everything they knew about how schooling worked, and make the leap.
But the reality is there are many disincentives in place for this to happen. Click here to read more of my post and find out why I believe one way to unlock innovation in our school system and help it transform into a student-centric one is to get out of our own way and eliminate these disincentives

Michael B. Horn: The rise of K-12 Blended Learning--Profiles of Emerging Models

Across America, a skyrocketing number of K-12 students are receiving their education in a “blended-learning” environment, through programs that mix online learning into brick-and-mortar schools. Today, more than 4 million students are participating in some kind of formal online-learning program, often blended into the traditional schoolhouse.
But how is the emerging blended-learning market taking shape? What models are becoming the most popular, and how are organizations implementing them? What new technologies are gaining market share?A new 178-page study by Innosight Institute and the Charter School Growth Fund reveals a broader picture of the emerging blended-learning market. In The Rise of K-12 Blended Learning: Profiles of emerging models, we highlight 40 influential blended-learning organizations across the country, categorize them by model, and document their effectiveness in reducing costs and improving academic performance. We discuss emerging technology trends, and then conclude with advice for policymakers, school leaders, and entrepreneurs about how to shape the playing field to optimize results.The study begins to reveal what makes blended-learning programs successful in delivering cost-effective, high-quality, personalized instruction to all students, thereby transforming America’s outdated education system.
To learn more about blended learning and support innovation in education, click here for the full report and join Innosight Institute's “I’m Disruptive” campaign on Twitter and Facebook.

Michael B. Horn: Beyond Good and Evil: Understanding the Role of For-Profits in Education through the Theories of Disruptive Innovation

It is an argument that virtual education advocates hear over and over again: Applying open marketplace principals to K-12 education won't work because private corporations will put profits over the best interest of kids.
I hope my new report, written for the American Enterprise Institute, Beyond Good and Evil: Understanding the Role of For-Profits in Education through the Theories of Disruptive Innovation will put this misguided concept to rest.
Many in public education assume the worst about for-profit corporations, arguing that they are money-grabbing entities that will shortchange the public good if it means increased profits. Critics see no place for for-profit providers in American education. Supporters view for-profits as a force for good that can harness the profit motive to attract top talent and scale quality in public education. The government often perpetuates these divides by drawing lines in the sand of what activities companies can and cannot do based on their corporate structures. Despite these views on for-profits, however, the reality is different. Policymakers, officials, providers, and other members of the debate would do well to keep three key points in mind:

• First, for-profit companies are not inherently good or evil. Rather, these companies do what their customers offer incentives to do--not much more or less.



• Second, there are far fewer inherent and predetermined differences between for-profit companies and their nonprofit counterparts than many assume. Both for-profits and nonprofits have business models, and there are many examples of corrupt nonprofits.



• Third, the biggest inherent differences between for-profits and nonprofits stem from their fundamental corporate structures, which determine what they do with their profits--and thus affect their ability to attract capital and scale--as well as what opportunities look attractive.

Online learning advocates regularly have to wade through the misconceptions about for-profit education companies. But the K–12 online learning world presents have prime examples of what works. Two of the more successful companies, K12 Inc. and Connections Academy, are highly motivated to do the jobs that their customers pay them to do and deliver a quality education.
Click here to read more about my report, and for a link to a pdf of the complete report.