Sliced Bread

Pleased to read in todays ZDNet feed that Federal Ministers Stephen Conroy and Lindsay Tanner have dipped their toes into the blogosphere. Not all are happy however and their first somewhat awkward blog does reek of ‘try hardness’.

If I was more optimistic about their efforts, I would say it is heartening indeed that ‘good cop’ Tanner’s welcome post says;

instead of simply copying overseas models we are keen to gather as much evidence as we possibly can about how Australians want to engage online.

Gathering evidence is one thing but listening and learning from the feedback will be a whole new government ballpark.

Lets hope governments aren’t dishing up ’same old same old’ rhetoric in slightly new clothes, the voices are strong, and on the clean feed issue, universally opposed.

We are also genuine about wanting to use online consultation to improve government-citizen relationships around public policy. We want real outcomes from online consultation…

The potential “new openess” and permanent digital record of online democracy will be interesting to watch unfold. A pity the government currently has a heavy handed approach, draconian springs readily to mind.

In its first 3 days Tanner’s welcome post garnered 289 comments, the vast majority, if not all, strongly opposed the clean feed proposal.

Please add your voice or sign GetUp’s petition below if this issue also concerns you.

Bring on the Julia Gillard Education blog and I’m sure the informed edublogosphere will welcome the ripple effect with their constructive feedback. 

Learners and systems starting from flat fields, often LDC’s, are not hindered by centuries of factory education models, many did not have one.  These systems are not burdened by the baggage of history or “thats how we always did it” attitudes or meaningless “one size little boxes tests scores are king” mantras to hold them back. They do not have to have the seemingly circuitous arguments many more developed systems are still currently wasting time on. It really is well past the time to dive in the deep end.

As ubiquitious technology ‘allows the fish to not see the water’ emerging education systems or those able to address the new dynamic will exponentially prosper and eliminate existing achievement gaps, maybe not in a the immediate short term but certainly more rapidly than at any other stage in history.

Conversely, where entrenched opinions of supposed best edupractice are rife, misguided or antiquated we face stagnation and unacceptable lag times. Who’ll be catching up? we all know the answer. Thats why governments and educational deliverers, particularly large public systems at all levels, must get with it, and do so far more rapidly. I’m optimistic Kev07 federalism has a handle on this, but do other stakeholders?

Openness, no excessive clean feeds, no DET portals or walled gardens, no us and them, no impediments to learning, ubiquitious technology, genuine world wide conversational blogging, here’s hoping it happens before I retire.

I’m not holding my breathe after this first clumsy blog attempt, but hey it’s a baby step start and that’s always encouraging.

photo credit: NSP at flickr cc license

After last weekends Federal COAG ICT largesse, its reassuring embattled Premier Rees has wasted no time in calling for new DET NSW technology supply tenders.

As part of the Federal edrev, DET NSW have on their wish list the lure of a sub $500 “compact learning devices (CLD’s)” for all 197,000 Year 9 to 12 students and more importantly wireless connectivity for 571 DET schools to be installed by February 2010. Tick, good. Very.

Guess the other 1500 DET sites, mainly primary schools, with students K to 8 don’t yet qualify for CLD’s or wireless connectivity and will fall further behind other systems, for a while longer. Cross, very. Maybe DET Primary Schools should just apply for an XO ala OLPC. Seems about how valued they are by DET NSW, currently.

The $1245 per student increase is also welcome news and may indicate Rudd is genuine in his bid for transparency in his new style of federalism. Lets hope so because Australians were promised a new approach to the passe blame game during the last election campaign.

Hopefully this rapid tender announcement reflects a state government committed to delivering the long promised technology improvements for Public Education students in NSW. I agree with Simon Job who also hopes Netbook specs don’t fill the tender, but Alex Serpo over at ZDNet believes the new CLD’s will be linux OS on netbooks to meet the $500 tender. (edit 12/12/08 or have a look here for yet more opinions)

Maybe we’d just be better off with these, or similiar. 

Celebratory restraint me thinks, until we see the actual laptop specs and roll out begin, the wireless functionality and most importantly the vital TPL to support teachers. Will teachers as learners receive one? I wonder?

Almost makes me want to celebrate and yell “Yippee-kay-yea”, almost. But Hans has still not left the building. John McClane has work to do yet.

picture credit: DoctorWho’s at flickr

Poppy Masselos of Courier Mail Education summarises the Joel Klein story with comprehensive links highlighting his opacity. Klein is the controversial NY Schools Chancellor who has already angered countless Big Apple “education consumers” and Rudd/Gillard seem fixated on emulating his errors. Catch Klein’s National Press Club talk today on ABC TV and make up your own mind.

Chris Bonner’s, author of The Stupid Country  and Future Education Forum, discusses these issues further and with far greater clarity than I am able to elicit whilst I guffaw at Gillard’s naive pandering to failing OS eduexperiments (and ex Australians, which, when he’s finished Boyering us to tears, I’ll comment further)

Australians can and should be leading the educational world and learning from the countries that are setting the pace. In no way are Australian schools in dire straights, as some schools of our two closest allies, Septopia and MC, are. So why import when we should be exporting? Why pander when we can lead? Why be colonial when we could be unique?

Why is Gillard strongly advocating the NYC model without fully considering others ? Easy to see why Klein’s domestic opponents ask reasonable questions that so far remain unanswered. Locally SOS continues the theme by asking “where is the verified, independent, educational improvement evidence, other than Klein’s questionable and abundant own?”

Easy, cheap and lazy springs to mind, all great qualities of those who fundamentally just don’t get it, 21st century education that is. Play catch up if you must Julia, but the NY model is last centuries solution for this centuries learners. The world has moved on, rapidly, and governments just don’t seem to want to know if it costs more than the cheapest solution. (edit5/12: NMC ANZ Horizon Report just released, 198 dowloads as of 5th Dec, get amongst it, good future stuff here, will post more later)

Little boxes, raw stats and testing to the test are so passe, not to mention damaging to learning, I hope the coal facers stop laughing long enough to get to work today.

picture: Rubenstein at flickr