These schools are leveraging E-Rate for a complete digital transformation

Textbooks and blackboards have become a thing of the past in K-12 schools as educators collaborate with IT teams to shape a full digital core curriculum as part of their educational strategy for 2017 and beyond. In a 2016 survey conducted by the Consortium for School Networking (COSN), 90 percent of IT administrators at K-12 schools expect that curricula will be at least 50 percent digital over the next three years.

As the world undergoes a digital transformation—with connectivity and access to computers and mobile devices playing an increasingly prominent role in everyone’s lives—elementary schools know they need to incorporate technology in the educational process to prepare their students for future success. To support these initiatives, the Federal Communications Commission’s E-rate program has recently been expanded to provide schools nationwide with subsidies for high-speed broadband and gigabit wireless networks.

According to the “2016 Digital Curriculum Strategy Survey Report” sponsored by Ruckus Wireless, hardware and network spend is estimated at $16.2 billion in 2017. Whereas currently 78 percent of students have device and network access for almost a full day, the expectation for this year is that schools will have close to one-to-one access, or one device per student.…Read More

Infographic: Why mobile technology is hurting some students

[Editor’s Note: Read “Infographic: The edtech challenges faced by immigrant students” here.]

Although most children in families earning below the median U.S. household income have internet access and devices that connect to it, they struggle with being “under-connected.”

Ninety-four percent of families surveyed by the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop, have some kind of internet access and most have at least one device connecting to the internet, but the quality or consistency of their internet access is lower than they would like it to be.…Read More

This is what Gen Z-designed curriculum looks like for the future

[Editor’s Note: This story is Part 3 of our month-long series on “What it means to teach Gen Z.” Click here to read Part 1 on Gen Z and parents, and click here to read Part 2 on Gen Z and librarians. Check back every Monday in April to read the next installment!]

The generation in school now is the first generation raised entirely in the Age of Technology. They are digital natives, many of them using computers, smartphones, and other digital tools nearly from birth. As technology continues to grow and expand, so too will the ways we use it. This growth and expansion will impact the types of jobs that will be available in the next 10–20 years. So how do we as educators prepare Gen Z for jobs that may not even exist yet?

Go Cross-Curricular…Read More

Why education needs strong advocates now more than ever

Spring time is invigorating, especially in my home town of Gastonia, North Carolina. Gastonia is very southern; its roots are in the textile business, and in many ways, it is a very conservative traditional southern town. After a particularly hard Winter that included almost three inches of snow and several days with highs only in the 40s, the town is in full bloom. The flowers. The trees. The birds. Everything comes alive here in the Spring, and it reminds me that anything is possible.

For those of you in the North, you are probably laughing at my description of our hard Winter. My friend Larry Jacobs, who is the host of Education Talk Radio, lives in Maine. When we talked last week, he was still getting snow. Maybe Winter is relative. If you don’t know Larry, he is one of the many strong voices in the education space. From his home studio, Larry interviews many of the most interesting people in education. His show has really caught on, and gets more than 50,000 downloads a month, mostly from superintendents, CAOs, principals and other admin types in the education biz. I’ve known Larry for years now, and have appeared on his show many times. He is a genuine character, and about as northern as I am southern. It’s pretty amusing when I am on his show. My southern draw is so thick and I speak so slowly that it is all Larry can do to let me speak. His “northernosity” gets the best of him and he jumps in.

Prisons, Schools and VR for Inmates…Read More

Greatest lesson: Teacher buy-in is overrated

One of the greatest lessons my 30 years of experience in education has taught me is that teacher buy-in is, sometimes, overrated.

There, I said it.

Now, before you stop reading, note my use of the word “sometimes.”  As a former school administrator, I realize there is a time and place for buy-in.  However, as one of my mentors, a seasoned middle school principal once explained to me, while consensus and collaborative decision-making is important, it can also be paralyzing to innovation.  Understanding the balance between growing buy-in and launching innovation has never been more important than in today’s era.…Read More

5 tips for new, easy and affordable school edtech upgrades

Waiting on a slow computer to load or update wastes valuable time and can detract from lessons and class time. However, shrinking budgets make it hard for schools to offer reliable computers and technology to students and teachers. Many school administrators think buying new devices is the only way to provide computers that will help students and teachers succeed. Rather than allocating budget toward expensive new computers, schools can easily improve system performance, save money and extend the life of existing systems.

The importance of memory and storage is often unknown until something goes wrong with a computer. Upgrading a computer’s memory or storage can help students and teachers be more productive, use classroom apps, and find new ways to engage via technology.

Here are 5 things you can do with upgraded systems that you may not have been able to do before:…Read More

Frontier Internet Cyber Safety Grant

The internet provides students a vast resource for research and learning. Yet, navigating the beneficial and dangerous places online has been an ever-evolving battle. What have you as a teacher and your classes learned when it comes to cyber safety? Tell us, and you could win a $1,000 grant to buy technological equipment or supplies for your room.

 

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Chipotle Reading Rewards

Chipotle Reading Rewards are free kid’s meal cards that can be used as incentives for your school or library’s reading program. Here’s how it works: Apply for Chipotle Reading Rewards, kick off your reading program, and reward your readers with free Chipotle.

 

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New Trump laws will support women in STEM fields

President Donald Trump has signed two bills aimed at increasing the number of women who pursue entrepreneurial endeavors and space-related STEM careers.

“Currently, only 1 in every 4 women who gets a STEM degree is working in a STEM job, which is not fair and it’s not even smart for the people that aren’t taking advantage of it,” Trump said in remarks during the signing. “It’s unacceptable that we have so many American women who have these degrees but yet are not being employed in these fields. So I think that’s going to change. That’s going to change very rapidly.”

The Promoting Women in Entrepreneurship Act authorizes the National Science Foundation “to encourage its entrepreneurial programs to recruit and support women to extend their focus beyond the laboratory and into the commercial world.”…Read More

Warning: These fraud attacks are wreaking havoc on education

On March 14, it was reported in CSO (a leading cybersecurity outlet) that 110 organizations experiences successful phishing attacks targeting their W-2 records. This put more than 120,000 taxpayers at risk for identity fraud.  Despite warnings from the IRS in early February, employees continue to fall victim to the bad guys’ ploys.

This wildly successful phishing scheme works like this: malicious actors spoof (or pretend to be) the CEO or President of a company and email a CFO or similarly positioned employee to request copies of all employees’ W-2 forms. The employee falls victim to the fake email, shares confidential information and the damage is immediately done.

W-2 Fraud attacks are particularly dangerous because of the ongoing fall out. In fact, IRS Commissioner, John Koskinen wrote in a statement, “This is one of the most dangerous email phishing scams we’ve seen in a long time. It can result in the large-scale theft of sensitive data that criminals can use to commit various crimes, including filing fraudulent tax returns.”…Read More

11 online tools & apps for dyslexic students

In the past, dyslexia was rarely recognized, and when it was, very little was put in place for the student. It was assumed that students were being lazy, not paying attention, or being disruptive because they were badly behaved, not because they were infuriated.

Nowadays, however, so much has changed, and students with dyslexia are able to thrive in the classroom. The following teaching tools and apps can make learning a lot more enjoyable for dyslexic students.

Shakespeare In Bits…Read More