Report to the President
on the Use of Technology
to Strengthen K-12 Education in the United States
March 1997
Members
Henry J. Becker, Ph.D.
Professor of Education,
University of California, Irvine
John D. Bransford, Ph.D.
Centennial Professor of Psychology and
Co-Director,
Learning Technology Center,
Vanderbilt University
Jan Davidson, Ph.D.
President, The Davidson Group
Jan Hawkins, Ph.D.
Director, Center for Children and Technology,
Education Development
Center
Shirley Malcom, Ph.D.
Head, Directorate for Education and Human Resources Programs,
American
Association for the
Advancement of Science
Mario Molina, Ph.D.
Lee and Geraldine Martin Professor of Environmental Sciences,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology and
1995 Nobel laureate, Chemistry
Sally K. Ride, Ph.D.
Professor of Physics and Director,
California Space Institute,
University of California, San Diego
Phillip Sharp, Ph.D.
Professor and Head, Department of Biology,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology and 1993
Nobel
laureate, Physiology or Medicine
Robert F. Tinker, Ph.D.
President, The Concord Consortium
Charles Vest, Ph.D.
President, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
John Young
Former President and Chief Executive Officer, Hewlett-Packard Co.
Staff
Richard Allen
Marianne F. Bakia
Rebecca Bryson
C. Samantha Chen
Sandor Lehoczky
Caroline M. Costello
Marjorie R. Dial
Edith M. Kealey
John Young
Former President and Chief Executive Officer,
Hewlett-Packard Co.
Members
Norman R. Augustine
Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Lockheed Martin Corporation
Francisco J. Ayala, Ph.D.
Donald Bren Professor of Biological Sciences and Professor of
Philosophy,
University of California, Irvine
Murray Gell-Mann, Ph.D.
Professor, Santa Fe Institute;
R. A. Millikan Professor Emeritus of Theoretical Physics,
California Institute
of Technology;
and 1969 Nobel laureate, Physics
David A. Hamburg, M.D.
President, Carnegie Corporation of New York
John P. Holdren, Ph.D.
Teresa and John Heinz Professor of Environmental Policy,
John F. Kennedy School of Government,
Harvard University
Diana MacArthur
Chair and Chief Executive Officer,
Dynamac Corporation
Shirley Malcom, Ph.D.
Head, Directorate for Education and Human Resources Programs,
American
Association for the
Advancement of Science
Mario Molina, Ph.D.
Lee and Geraldine Martin Professor of Environmental Sciences,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology and
1995 Nobel laureate, Chemistry
Peter H. Raven, Ph.D.
Director, Missouri Botanical Garden and Engelmann Professor of Botany,
Washington University in St.Louis
Sally K. Ride, Ph.D.
Professor of Physics and Director,
California Space Institute,
University of California, San Diego
Judith Rodin, Ph.D.
President, University of Pennsylvania
Charles A. Sanders, M.D.
Former Chairman, Glaxo-Wellcome Inc.
Phillip Sharp, Ph.D.
Professor and Head, Department of Biology,
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology and 1993 Nobel
laureate, Physiology or Medicine
David E. Shaw, Ph.D.
Chairman, D. E. Shaw & Co., Inc. and
Juno Online Services, L.P.
Charles Vest, Ph.D.
President, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Virginia Weldon, M.D.
Senior Vice President for Public Policy, Monsanto Company
Lilian Shiao-Yen Wu, Ph.D.
Member, Research Staff, Thomas J. Watson Research Center, IBM
Executive Secretary
Angela Phillips Diaz
Table of Contents
Executive Summary
1. Introduction
2. Potential Significance
2.1 Serious Problems
3. Hardware and Infrastructure
2.2 The Role of Technology in Education
2.3 The Promise of Educational Technology
3.1 Computers and Peripherals
4. Software, Content and Pedagogy
3.2 Building Infrastructure
3.3 Local Area Networks
3.4 Wide Area Networks
3.5 Systems Administration and Technical Support
4.1 Computer-Based Tutorial Systems
5. Teachers and Technology
4.2 The Constructivist Model
4.3 Constructivist Applications of Technology
4.4 The Human Element
4.5 How Technology is Currently Used
4.6 The Educational Software Market
5.1 What Teachers Need
6. Economic Considerations
5.2 Potential Modes of Support
5.3 The Problem of Insufficient Teacher Time
5.4 Technology in the Education Schools
6.1 Current Technology Expenditures
7. Equitable Access
6.2 Projected Cost of Educational Technology
6. 3 Educational Productivity and Return on Investment
7.1 Dimensions of Access
8. Research and Evaluation
7.2 Socioeconomic Status
7.3 Race and Ethnicity
7.4 Geographical Factors
7.5 Gender
7.6 Educational Achievement
7.7 Students with Special Needs
8.1 Effectiveness of Traditional Applications of Technology
9. Programs and Policy
8.2 Research on Constructivist Applications of Technology
8.3 Priorities for Future Research
8.4 Research Funding
8.5 Structural and Administrative Considerations
9.1 The President's Educational Technology Initiative
10. Summary of Findings and Recommendations
9.2 Funded Programs
9.3 Leadership and Coordination
10.1 Overview of the Panel's Findings
Acknowledgments
10.2 Principal Recommendations
In an era of increasing international economic competition, the quality of America's elementary and secondary schools could determine whether our children hold highly compensated, high-skill jobs that add significant value within the integrated global economy of the twenty-first century or compete with workers in developing countries for the provision of commodity products and low-value-added services at wage rates comparable to those received by third world laborers. Moreover, it is widely believed that workers in the next century will require not just a larger set of facts or a larger repertoire of specific skills, but the capacity to readily acquire new knowledge, to solve new problems, and to employ creativity and critical thinking in the design of new approaches to existing problems.
While a number of different approaches have been suggested for the improvement of K-12 education in the United States, one common element of many such plans has been the more extensive and more effective utilization of computer, networking, and other technologies in support of a broad program of systemic and curricular reform. During a period in which technology has fundamentally transformed America's offices, factories, and retail establishments, however, its impact within our nation's classrooms has generally been quite modest.
The Panel on Educational Technology was organized in April 1995 under the auspices of the President's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) to provide independent advice to the President on matters related to the application of various technologies (and in particular, interactive computer- and network-based technologies) to K-12 education in the United States. Its findings and recommendations are based on a (non-exhaustive) review of the research literature and on written submissions and private White House briefings from a number of academic and industrial researchers, practicing educators, software developers, governmental agencies, and professional and industry organizations involved in various ways with the application of technology to education. A substantial number of relatively specific recommendations related to various aspects of the use of technology within America's elementary and secondary schools are offered at various points within the body of this report. The list that appears below summarizes those high-level strategic recommendations that the Panel believes to be most important:
While voluntarism and corporate equipment donations may be of both direct and indirect benefit under certain circumstances, White House policy should be based on a realistic assessment of the relatively limited direct economic contribution such efforts can be expected to make overall. The Administration should continue to make the case for educational technology as an unusually high-return investment (in both economic and social terms) in America's future, while seeking to enhance the return on that investment by promoting federally sponsored research aimed at improving the cost-effectiveness of technology use within our nation's elementary and secondary schools.
The Panel strongly recommends that this figure be increased to at least 0.5 percent (or about $1.5 billion annually at current expenditure levels) on an ongoing basis. Because no one state, municipality, or private firm could hope to capture more than a small fraction of the benefits associated with a significant advance in our understanding of how best to educate K-12 students, this funding will have to be provided largely at the federal level in order to avoid a systematic underinvestment (attributable to a classical form of economic externality) relative to the level that would be optimal for the nation as a whole.
To ensure high standards of scientific excellence, intellectual integrity, and independence from political influence, this research program should be planned and overseen by a distinguished independent board of outside experts appointed by the President, and should encompass (a) basic research in various learning-related disciplines and on various educationally relevant technologies; (b) early-stage research aimed at developing new forms of educational software, content, and technology-enabled pedagogy; and (c) rigorous, well-controlled, peer-reviewed, large-scale empirical studies designed to determine which educational approaches are in fact most effective in practice. The Panel does not, however, recommend that the deployment of technology within America's schools be deferred pending the completion of such research.
Finally, it should be noted that the Panel strongly supports the programs encompassed by the President's Educational Technology Initiative, which aim to provide our nation's schools with the modern computer hardware, local- and wide-area network connectivity, high quality educational content, and appropriate teacher preparation that will be necessary if information technologies are to be effectively utilized to enhance learning. In the area of research and evaluation, however, the Panel believes that much remains to be done. While a scientific research program of the sort envisioned by the Panel will require substantial funding on a sustained basis, such a program could well prove critical to the economic security of future generations of Americans, and should thus be assigned a high priority in spite of current budgetary pressures.
While a number of different approaches have been suggested for the improvement of K-12
education in the
United States, one common element of many such plans has been the more extensive and more
effective
utilization of computer, networking, and other technologies in support of a broad program of
systemic and
curricular reform. Such proposals have been motivated in part by specific examples of the
successful
application of technology to education, and in part by the more general observation that, during
a period in
which technology has fundamentally transformed America's offices, factories,
and retail
establishments, its impact within our nation's classrooms has generally been quite modest
The Goals 2000: Educate America Act,
In the context of these various initiatives, the Panel on Educational Technology was organized
in April
1995 under the auspices of the President's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology
(PCAST) to
provide independent advice to the President on matters related to the application of various
technologies
(and in particular, interactive computer-based and digital-network based technologies) to
elementary and
secondary education in the United States.4
The Panel
consists of
seven PCAST members and five outside experts in the field of educational technology, and has
been
assisted in its activities by a small research and operational staff.
In the course of its investigations, the Panel reviewed a substantial body of existing written
material on the
subject of educational technology and solicited additional written input from a number of
academic and
industrial researchers, practicing educators, software developers, governmental agencies, and
professional
and industry organizations involved in various ways with the application of technology to
education. A
smaller group of individuals chosen from each of these categories were invited to meet
personally with the
Panel's members and staff in briefing sessions conducted at the White House in October
1995.5 The Panel's principal findings and
recommendations are
incorporated in this report.
The report begins with a brief discussion of the nature of the problems now facing elementary
and
secondary education in the United States, and of the role technology might play in helping to
solve those
problems. Section 3 surveys the computing and telecommunications hardware (and equally
important, the
associated infrastructure and technical support) now deployed within our nation's schools, and
considers the
ways in which these resources will have to be expanded if educational technology is to be
mobilized on
behalf of all of our K-12 students. In Section 4, we consider the ways in which information
technologies
are actually used within our schools, and identify a number of challenges related to computer
software,
educational content, and pedagogical methods.
We continue in Section 5 with an examination of the role of elementary and secondary school
teachers
within a technology-rich educational environment, and of the professional development,
ongoing support,
and other resources that will prove necessary if teachers are to effectively integrate technology
within their
curricula. Current and projected costs associated with the introduction and continued use of
technology
within all of our nation's schools are estimated in Section 6, and are analyzed in terms of
educational
productivity and expected return on investment. Section 7 examines the issue of equitable
access to
educational technology, reviewing current and anticipated disparities based on socioeconomic
status, race
and ethnicity, geographical factors, gender, educational achievement, and special student needs,
and
considering some of the policy tools that might be used to minimize the extent and impact of
these
disparities.
Section 8 focuses on the need for rigorous scientific research designed to evaluate the
effectiveness and
cost-effectiveness of alternative approaches to the use of technology in education, on the extent
to which
such research should be funded at the federal level, and on the manner in which it might best be
organized
and administered. Current federal programs in the area of educational technology are reviewed
in Section
9, with special attention to the directions in which those efforts might profitably be extended
and expanded.
The Panel's central findings and most important recommendations are summarized in Section
10.
Since the effective utilization of technology within all of America's elementary and secondary
schools will
require a substantial investment of public funds, it seems appropriate to begin our discussion
with a critical
examination of the rationale for such expenditures. While much remains to be learned about
the optimal
use of technology in K-12 education, the Panel believes the case for educational technology to
be a
compelling one in view of certain critical economic and social problems now facing our nation
and the
weight of the available evidence regarding technology's potential contribution to the solution of
these
problems.
Although it seems unlikely that the United States could reverse the secular trend toward global
economic
integration even if it believed this to be in its own interest, there is much we can do to influence
the role that
Americans play within the integrated world economy of the future. In particular, the decisions
we make
today with respect to the education of our children will determine in large part whether they are
prepared to
hold high-wage, high-skill jobs that add significant value within the world marketplace or are
instead forced
to compete with workers in developing countries (where economic output is likely to increase
steadily over
time) for the provision of commodity products and low-value-added services.
The danger of the latter scenario lies not only in its potential effect on our country's aggregate
national
income, but on the potential for unprecedented (at least within the American experience)
disparities in
income and wealth among Americans that could threaten the political stability our nation has
long enjoyed.
Our country's social fabric and democratic form of government have never been put to the test
of
supporting the extreme bimodality of resource allocation that might result (at least in the
absence of
aggressive redistributive intervention) if a relatively small percentage of our population were to
possess the
tools necessary to engage in highly-compensated economic activities, while a substantial
majority were
forced to compete with unskilled and semi-skilled laborers in developing countries who might
well
command (inflation-adjusted) wage rates of less than a dollar per hour.
These observations have implications not only for the extent to which we are able to educate
our citizenry,
but for the way in which we do so. In particular, it is widely believed that a continuing
acceleration in the
pace of technological innovation, among other factors, will result in more frequent changes in
the
knowledge and skills that workers will need if they are to play high-level roles within the global
economy of
the twenty-first century. Our children will thus need to be prepared not just with a larger set of
facts or a
larger repertoire of specific skills, but with the capacity to readily acquire new knowledge, to
solve new
problems, and to employ creativity and critical thinking in the design of new approaches to
existing
problems. In the words of Frank Withrow, the director of learning technologies at the Council
of Chief
State School Officers, "the U.S. work force does not need knowers,' it needs learners.'"
While the introduction of technology will not in itself improve the quality of American
education, there are
several ways in which the Panel believes it can be used as a powerful tool in addressing the
problems
outlined above. One of the earliest insights into the educational applications of technology was
that
interactive computer-based systems admit the possibility of individualizing the educational
process to
accommodate the needs, interests, proclivities, current knowledge, and learning styles of each
particular
student. Even the earliest drill-and-practice based computer-assisted instruction systems, in
which the
student was exposed to successive blocks of textual material and answered a series of questions
posed by
the computer, typically offered the advantages of self-paced instruction. Among other things,
self-pacing
obviates the need for teachers to target their presentations to some hypothetical "typical" pupil,
leaving part
of the class behind while other students become bored, restless and inattentive.
In recent years, however, many researchers have begun to focus on the potential of technology
to support
certain fundamental changes in the pedagogic models underlying our traditional approach to the
educational
enterprise. Within this "constructivist"7
paradigm:
Quite apart from its use by students, technology can serve as a potentially powerful tool for
teachers, who
may use computers and computer networks to:
As noted in Section 4.4, a comprehensive approach to the learning process may also involve the
use of
technology by parents, and by other (physically proximate or geographically remote) community
members.
While the Panel has concerned itself only incidentally with the use of information technology in
school
administration, it should be noted that the effective utilization of technology can yield
significant "back
office" efficiencies for schools, freeing up resources for application to learning-specific
activities.
Although our understanding of the effectiveness of various applications of educational
technology remains
incomplete, such research as is available, combined with anecdotal reports of the positive
experiences of a
number of schools, suggests that technology may indeed have the potential to play a major role
in
transforming elementary and secondary education in the United States. While a critical
discussion of the
existing research literature (and of the need for additional research) will be deferred until
Section 8, a few
of the better-known examples of the successful application of technology to K-12 education
may help to
convey an intuitive feeling for the potential of educational technology:
As a result of the relative scarcity of computer equipment, most schools locate the majority of
their
computers not within the individual classrooms, but in specialized computer labs that are shared
among all
classes.10 If lab use is carefully
scheduled, this
approach can offer
the potential for certain cost efficiencies through higher equipment utilization. On the other
hand, the
sequestration of a school's computers within a computer lab makes it more difficult to use these
tools on an
intermittent basis as an integral part of various elements of the curriculum.
The computer access problem is exacerbated by the fact that most of the computer systems now
in use
within the public schools would be considered obsolete by private sector standards.
One measure that has been proposed to ameliorate or eliminate the shortage of computer
equipment within
the schools is the donation by corporations of used computer equipment at the time it is
replaced with newer
models. While it is possible that such an effort could be beneficial under certain circumstances,
the Panel
believes that this is not likely to have a major effect on the computer hardware problems
now facing
American schools for several reasons. First, such equipment would generally be at least one
generation
behind the then-current state of the art as of the time of donation. Although this might well
represent a
modest improvement over the current situation in many schools, we believe the "obsolescence
gap" between
the computers used in American industry and those used in American education should be more
aggressively attacked in order to end the technical isolation that has thus far drastically limited
the range of
software and functionality available to most schools.
Perhaps less obviously, however, the net effective life-cycle cost of donated equipment may
actually prove
to be higher than would be the case with purchased equipment. Unless a given school
receives a
large number of identical machines, such donations can raise costs substantially by increasing
the number of
different platforms that must be integrated, administered, and maintained by school- and
district-level
personnel. Even in the absence of such considerations, older equipment tends to be more
expensive to
maintain in usable condition than new machines a potentially significant factor, since the
average cost of
administering and maintaining a computer system over the course of its useful life has been
shown to be
surprisingly high relative to the value of the hardware itself (as discussed in Section 3.5).
When these less visible costs are taken into consideration, the net value of a corporate
equipment donation
may in some cases actually be negative particularly after accounting for the loss of public
revenue
attributable to federal and state tax deductions claimed by the donor.
It is also important that educators and policy-makers view the purchase of computer equipment
not as a one-time expenditure, but as an ongoing cost. Although technological change in the
computer industry is
difficult to predict with any certainty, a useful life of between three and five years (which is
longer than the
typical life cycle in industry) may represent a realistic expectation for our schools, assuming
that the criteria
for replacement include not only age-related malfunction, but also obsolescence and the
inability to support
then-current software. In short, it seems inevitable that a significant investment of funds will be
required on
the local, state, and/or federal level to provide and maintain the sort of computer hardware that
our schools
are likely to need to support meaningful educational reform.
The extensive use of computers, particularly where interconnected by a local area network,
imposes
requirements on school buildings that were in many cases not anticipated at the time of their
construction.
"Our building, built in 1948," notes one respondent to a General Accounting Office survey,
"was wired for
a filmstrip projector."16 The satisfaction
of many
(though not all)
of these requirements will require extensive and costly rewiring of several sorts.
First, as computer/student ratios continue to drop, the computers, peripheral devices, and other
technology
installed in each school may draw more current (at least in certain locations) than the AC wiring
of many
schools can support,17 requiring the
retrofitting of
additional
power capacity within existing buildings. In addition, most (though not all) current local area
networks are
based on the use of physical cables for data transmission something very few American schools
were
designed to accommodate.18 Access to
the Internet and
other wide
area networks will also require that schools be wired for one or more external connections,
which may be
provided, for example, over telephone or cable television lines.
The vast majority of all American classrooms, however, are not even wired for telephones,19 much less local area networks and
Internet onramps.
To make
matters worse, many schools have asbestos within their classroom walls, making an already
challenging
wiring and cable-routing task even more expensive. Although volunteer efforts like the NetDay
'96
initiative (which was organized to wire a large number of California schools to the Internet)
have illustrated
the contribution that community members and cooperative unions can make toward outfitting
our schools
with the infrastructure necessary to support modern computer networking, it seems unlikely that
such efforts
can be relied upon as the sole mechanism for providing universal access to technology
throughout our
nation's schools.
Although wiring once may represent an unavoidable expense, conservative advance
planning may at
least obviate the need to wire repeatedly to accommodate future growth and unanticipated
changes in
technology. Although it may be slightly more expensive initially, it is important that resources
be made
available to allow our schools to install the sorts of flexible and capacious conduits, raceways,
and wiring
systems that will support the later installation of future generations of higher-speed
interconnection
technologies (based on fiber optic cable, for example) without the need for extensive surgery on
schoolroom walls. In this regard, we would do well to follow the example of hockey player
Wayne
Gretzky, who has said, "I skate to where I think the puck will be."
It should also be noted that the placement of significant numbers of computers within the same
room can
result in enough additional heat dissipation to require air conditioning in schoolrooms that do
not currently
have such facilities, or to require the provision of additional cooling capacity in those that do.
Moreover,
air conditioning consumes additional electrical power, adding hidden costs to the expense of
installing and
operating such environmental control systems.
In short, providing our schools with an educationally optimal configuration of computer and
networking
equipment will require significant expenditures not only for the purchase and maintenance of
that
equipment, but for the wiring and upgrading of older school buildings to accommodate new
technology.
The panel believes, however, that such expenditures represent an important investment in the
future of the
American public school system that is warranted by the associated economic and social returns
that can
reasonably be expected.
Local area networks (LANs) are important not only to connect computers, printers, and other
devices
together within a given school, facilitating important forms of communication among students,
teachers,
administrators, and support personnel, but also to provide many or all of these computers with
access to
systems at remote locations through the Internet or other wide area networks (WANs). A 1992
study
reported that only about 20 percent of all school computers were connected to a LAN, though
nearly a third
of all elementary schools and one-half of all high schools reported that at least some of their
computers
were interconnected in this manner. 21
It would appear that the use of locally-networked computers by K-12 schools may be growing at
a relatively
rapid pace: A (perhaps not entirely comparable) survey conducted shortly thereafter by a
different
organization found that 44 percent of elementary schools and 66 percent of high schools had
local area
networks.22 The use of LANs for
instructional (as
opposed to
administrative) purposes would also appear to be enjoying a period of unusually rapid increase.
According
to a third source, only 5 percent of all public schools used LANs for instruction during the
1991-92 school
year; three years later, this figure had risen to 33 percent.
While wiring problems remain an obstacle to the provision of more widespread local
connectivity, as noted
in Section 3.2, it is possible that wireless local networking technologies based on the use of
low-power
radio frequency communication may ultimately provide a viable alternative for at least some
older schools
in which physical wiring would be complicated by asbestos or other factors. The trajectory of
future
decreases in the cost of transceivers and interfaces for wireless networks may be among the
determinants of
the more widespread adoption of such technologies.
About half of all public schools had at least one connection to the Internet as of fall 1995, and
another 11
percent to a wide area network that was not connected to the Internet.
While a substantial majority of all schools with Internet connections report that access is
available to
teachers, for example, a survey commissioned by the National Education Association and other
education
groups found that only 16 percent of all teachers actually make use of the Internet or online
services.25 Even among schools having access to a
WAN, 72
percent reported
that teachers either never used this network or used it only "to a small extent."
Internet access is more commonly available in secondary schools than in elementary schools,
and larger
schools are more likely to be connected than smaller ones.
Among the principal determinants of the extent to which American schools are able to make use
of the
Internet and other wide area networks is the availability of reasonably priced
telecommunications services
of adequate bandwidth to support the interactive use of network-based applications (including
those with a
substantial multimedia component). A sustained federal commitment to the maintenance of a
genuinely
competitive telecommunications environment not only within the long distance market, but
among
alternative local carriers as well should play a major role in reducing the cost of access for our
nation's
schools. In addition, however, consideration should be given to measures designed specifically
to promote
affordable Internet access for American schools, with special attention to those in remote rural
areas and to
those facing resource limitations that would otherwise preclude the possibility of securing and
maintaining
such a connection.
It has been estimated that the purchase price of a computer system represents only 20 to 25
percent of the
cost of its operation over the period of its useful life within a typical business; the largest part of
the life
cycle cost of such a system is actually represented by the cost of installation, training, systems
administration, user support, and hardware and software maintenance. While the Panel was
unable to find
reliable data that might shed light on any systematic differences between the operating costs
reported in
industry and those experienced by the typical elementary or secondary school, it seems likely
that the
effective life cycle cost of operating a computer within a school environment is in fact an
integer multiple of
its original acquisition cost, particularly in view of the longer service period typical of
computers used
within the schools.
Portions of this effective expense may in many schools be incurred in the form of staff time
diverted from
other, often unrelated functions. An analysis of the 1992 IEA survey data found that only six
percent of all
elementary schools and three percent of all secondary schools have full-time computer
coordinators.
Indeed, only about 40 percent of all schools have even a single employee who allocates time in
an official
capacity to the operation of computer systems.
Of particular relevance to the schools is the fact that the cost of maintaining a given computer
system tends
to increase over time, especially when measured relative to the functional capacity or market
value of the
underlying hardware. While a portion of this increase is attributable to ordinary component-
and system-level aging, this effect is exacerbated (again, in value-relative terms) by the use of
progressively higher
levels of integration within the semiconductor, digital storage, and computer industries. Older
equipment
uses more integrated circuit chips, more printed circuit boards, and more moving parts (disk
drives, cooling
fans, and print engines, for example) to realize the same amount of processing power, data
storage, and
output capability, and system reliability tends to be inversely correlated with component count
and with the
number of connections between components. This observation has significant implications for
initiatives
based on the donation to schools of equipment retired from service within corporations, as
discussed in
Section 3.1.
"One of the enduring difficulties about technology and education," notes Dr. Martha Stone
Wiske, co-director of the Educational Technology Center at the Harvard Graduate School of
Education, "is that a lot
of people think about the technology first and the education later, if at all."32 If the federal government is to play a meaningful role in applying
technology
effectively within the nation's elementary and secondary schools, the deployment of computers
and their
interconnection within local- and wide-area networks must not be viewed as an end in itself.
Indeed, such
hardware, while important, is in many ways less central to a discussion of the determinants of
favorable
outcomes than the educational content, pedagogic models, and organizational framework that
define the
manner in which it is used.
Among the earliest applications of computer technology within the field of education were
systems designed
to automate certain forms of tutorial learning. Such systems, which were first deployed on an
experimental
basis during the 1960s, are commonly referred to using the (now confusingly general) term
computer-assisted instruction (CAI). In a classical CAI application, short blocks of
instructional material are
presented to an individual student, interspersed with questions designed to test that student's
comprehension
of specific elements of the material. Questions must typically be posed within a multiple-choice
or
"true/false" framework, or in such a way as to admit a simple, concrete answer (such as a
numerical
quantity) that can be interpreted by the system in a straightforward manner.
Feedback is generally provided to the student as to the accuracy of his or her responses to
individual
questions, and often as to the degree of mastery demonstrated within a given content area. As
noted in
Section 2.2, CAI systems typically allow students at least some degree of control over the pace
of
instruction. Such systems generally also support "branched" structures, in which the student's
performance
on one question, or degree of mastery of one content area, determines the sequence, and in some
cases, the
level of difficulty, of the instructional material and questions that follow. Additional time can
then be spent
on material with which the student is having difficulty, while avoiding needless repetition of
subject matter
that has already been mastered.
More "intelligent" CAI systems may be capable of inferring a more detailed picture of what the
student
does and does not yet understand, and of actively helping to diagnose and "debug" the student's
misapprehensions and erroneous conceptual models. If a student is having difficulty learning to
subtract,
for example, the computer may recognize that he or she is systematically failing to "borrow a
one," making
it possible to offer specific coaching rather than a simple repetition of the original instructional
material.
While promising early examples of such systems have already been demonstrated in such
content areas as
mathematics and computer programming, realization of the full potential of this approach will
require
significant research progress in several areas. In the absence of such progress, it is not clear that
highly
intelligent tutorial systems will be available for wide deployment within the schools for some
time.
Although some of the more recent work on computer-based tutorial systems may well prove
useful within a
constructivist framework, conventional CAI systems have historically been employed primarily
for
individual instruction in isolated basic skills, most often in a "drill-and-practice" mode.
Instructional
sessions have generally focused on a single content area rather than on the integration of a wide
range of
skills to solve complex problems, and have been limited in duration to the traditional 50-minute
class
period.
The conventional approach to CAI is often embodied in network-based systems known as
integrated
learning systems (ILSs), which have typically incorporated computing and networking
hardware,
systems software, tutorial content, and student record management programs, all provided by
the same
vendor. As of 1990, approximately 10,000 such systems had been installed in the United
States,33 and
penetration is currently estimated at some 30
percent of all
American schools. ILS facilities have seen particularly heavy use in remedial instruction, and in
the context
of programs for the educationally disadvantaged;
The tutorial applications discussed in the previous subsection are for the most part compatible
with the
pedagogic models traditionally employed within our nation's schools. In recent years, however,
many have
argued that the use of new technologies to improve the efficiency of traditional instructional
methods will
result in limited progress at best.35 This
view holds
that the real
promise of technology in education lies in its potential to facilitate fundamental, qualitative
changes in the
nature of teaching and learning.
While the educational research community has by no means reached consensus on the best way
to educate
our children, a large part of that community has in recent years converged on a core set of
pedagogic
principles that form the basis of the constructivist paradigm (introduced briefly in Section 2.2).
By contrast
with the more traditional view of instruction as a process involving the transmission of facts
from an active
teacher to a passive student, constructivists believe that learning occurs through a process in
which the
student plays an active role in constructing the set of conceptual structures that constitute his or
her own
knowledge base.
Although the intellectual roots of constructivism considerably predate the current educational
reform
movement, contemporary constructivist thought has been strongly influenced by models of the
learning
process that have evolved over the past few decades within the cognitive science research
community, and
which differ in significant ways from those which arose within the theoretical framework of
behaviorism.
Constructivist theory has given rise to an approach to educational practice that places the locus
of initiative
and control largely within the student, who typically undertakes substantial, "authentic" tasks,
presented in a
realistic context, that require the self-directed application of various sorts of knowledge and
skills for their
successful execution. Such activities often involve student-initiated inquiries driven at least in
part by the
student's own curiosity,36 and are
designed to
motivate students
in a more immediate way than is typical of traditional curricula based largely on the
transmission of isolated
facts.
Constructivist curricula often emphasize group activities designed in part to facilitate the
acquisition of
collaborative skills of the sort that are often required within contemporary work environments.
Such group
activities may offer students of varying ages and ability levels, and having different interests
and prior
experience, the opportunity to teach each other a mode of interaction that has been found to
offer
significant benefits to both tutor and tutee. Explicit attention is also given to the cultivation of
higher-order
thinking skills, including "meta-level" learning the acquisition of knowledge about how to
learn, and how
to recognize and "debug" faulty mental models.
It would be misleading to suggest that the educational research community is unanimous and
unambivalent
in endorsing the principles and practice of constructivism without qualification. Some
However compelling we may believe the argument in favor of constructivist practice to be, and
however
plausible we may find its theoretical underpinnings, the proposition that constructivist
techniques, as
currently understood, will in fact result in more favorable (in some sense) educational outcomes
must still
be regarded as largely (though not entirely) a collection of exciting and promising hypotheses
that have yet
to be rigorously confirmed through extensive, long-term, large-scale, carefully controlled
experimentation
involving representative student populations within actual schools.39 While the foundations of constructivism provide a rich source of
plausible and
theoretically compelling hypotheses, the fact remains that the question of how best to teach our
children
remains an empirical question that has not yet been fully answered.
While the Panel is thus unable to make a confident and definitive statement regarding the
superiority of the
constructivist approach,40 it believes
there to be a
high likelihood
that many or all of the essential elements of this approach could play a major role in improving
the quality
of our nation's elementary and secondary schools. Although technology is likely to find use
within a
number of more traditional instructional roles as well, it seems likely (though not yet certain)
that the
student-centered constructivist paradigm may ultimately offer the most fertile ground for the
application of
technology to education.
In order to optimally cultivate this ground, schools will need to make changes that extend far
beyond the
mere installation of a network of computers. While some benefits may be obtained by using
information
technologies to pursue existing curricular objectives or by adding new material to an existing
course, the
richest harvest is likely to accrue from a fundamental restructuring at least at the level of the
individual
course, and ideally, across disciplinary boundaries as well. Such fundamental restructuring,
however, is
likely to prove complex, difficult, expensive, and time-consuming, and may encounter
resistance from
parents, educators, and the general public, particularly to the extent that such changes conflict
with
commonly held beliefs about the nature of knowledge and learning.
Within the constructivist paradigm, information technology is not typically used to orchestrate
the
instructional process in a strictly "top-down" manner, but rather serves largely to facilitate
student-initiated
and mixed-initiative projects, inquiries, explorations, and problem-solving activities. By way of
example
(and without any attempt at comprehensiveness), computers and networks might be used within
a
constructivist framework to implement:
If computers are destined to play an increasingly important role in education over the next 20
years, it is
natural to ask what roles will be played by human beings. Although it seems clear that the
expanded use of
technology in education will have significant implications for teachers, students, parents, and
community
members, there is reason to believe that interpersonal interactions among all these groups will
be at least as
important to the educational process of 2017 as they are in 1997. Indeed, the changing nature of
these
interactions is probably as central to the promise of new educational technologies as the
hardware, software,
and curricular elements outlined above.
The use of technology within the framework of the constructivist paradigm is likely to have
important
implications for the day-to-day role of the teacher. When a high school student using the
Internet to
complete a self-directed project is able to quickly gain greater familiarity with the particular
subject area in
question than her teacher, for example, the teacher's traditional role as a font of knowledge is
likely to
become less relevant. Because different students may be conducting different inquiries at any
given point in
time, this traditional role may be supplanted in part by one in which the teacher spends a
considerable
amount of time monitoring the activities of individual students (in part by wandering around the
classroom
and looking at their computer screens), helping them to "debug" their emerging "mental
models," and
providing encouragement, direction and assistance as needed.
And what about the students? Will their increasing use of educational technologies deprive
them of the
opportunity to develop important interpersonal and social skills? Available evidence suggests
that this
should probably not be a source of concern. First, it seems unlikely at this point that the
students in a well-designed technology-rich school environment will spend most of their time
sitting in front of their
computers. When one research group provided essentially unlimited computer access to each
student in a
number of experimental classrooms, for example, it found that students spent an average of
approximately
30 percent of their time at the computer.
Moreover, this research group observed a significant increase in the degree of interpersonal
interaction
when technology was introduced into the classroom, reporting that the computers typically
served as the
focal point for extensive collaborative activities, and that students frequently approached each
other to
exchange ideas, and called each other over to show off what they had done and explain how
they had done
it.42 Software can also be specifically
designed to
teach
collaborative and cooperative skills, and to support group projects and learning exercises. In
short, any
fears we might have that the increasing use of computers in education will produce a generation
of isolated
nerds would seem to be unsupported by currently available evidence.
In considering the human side of educational technology, it is also worth noting that elementary
and
secondary education takes place within a context that includes not only the student and teacher,
but also the
parents and other members of the surrounding community. Substantial evidence now exists
suggesting that
parental and community involvement in the educational process has a significant positive effect
on
educational outcomes.43 If at least basic
computing
resources
(perhaps based on television set-top boxes or a new generation of "network computers") and
Internet
connectivity could be made available within the homes of those with K-12 aged children,
parents would be
able to receive school announcements from teachers and administrators, to communicate more
easily and
frequently with teachers, and to otherwise involve themselves more actively in the education of
their
children. The cultivation of such parental involvement may be particularly important for those
students
whose economic or environmental circumstances would otherwise place them at increased risk
of
educational failure.
There is also a growing consensus that technology should be applied in such a way as to foster
broader
community-wide involvement in the educational process. The linking of elementary and
secondary schools
with research universities, public libraries, and private companies, for example, could make
valuable
educational resources available to both students and teachers while simultaneously building
awareness
within each community of the needs of its local schools. "Real-world" projects initiated by
outside
organizations often generate considerable enthusiasm among students, and frequently prove
unusually
effective from an educational perspective.
Some educators have even discussed the possibility of instituting "tele-apprenticeship" or
"tele-mentoring"
programs involving brief, but relatively frequent interactions between students and other
community
members that would be impractical in the absence of networking technologies due to travel time
considerations. Conversely, high-tech schools could serve the broader community by making
their
computing and networking facilities available to local residents outside of school hours, or by
offering state-of-the-art job training or lifelong learning programs tailored to community
members, thus amortizing
infrastructure costs over a larger effective user base while helping to foster intrinsically valuable
community
integration.
In examining the ways in which information technology is currently used within the schools, it
is useful to
distinguish between efforts that attempt to teach students about computers and those that use
computers to
teach things that may or may not have any relation to technology. While basic "computer
literacy" will
indeed be important for twenty-first-century Americans, and while computer science, computer
engineering,
computer programming, and computer networking are all important areas of study, the Panel
has concerned
itself only incidentally with issues related to teaching about information technology. Rather, the
focus of
the Panel's investigations has been on the ways in which interactive computing and networking
can be used
at the K-12 level to facilitate learning in general.
It should be noted, however, that "computer education" currently accounts for a substantial
fraction of the
current use of information technologies by elementary and secondary schools. A 1992 IEA
survey of
school computer coordinators, for example, found that some 41 percent of the use of computers
by
American K-12 students involved the acquisition of keyboarding skills; instruction in the use of
word
processing, database management, spreadsheet, and other software tools; and the study of
computer
programming. Academic subjects (defined to exclude vocational instruction) accounted for 54
percent of
all usage at the elementary school level, but only 31 percent within the nation's high schools.44
At the elementary school level, computers are often employed for teaching isolated basic skills
and for
playing educational games. Word processing is used to a significant extent at all levels, but in
most cases as
part of an effort to teach computer skills, and not as a tool for writing in connection with
English, social
studies, or other academic classes.45
The situation
would appear to
be similar in the case of spreadsheet use, which is generally treated as an aspect of computer
literacy, and
less commonly integrated into, for example, the math or science curriculum.46 It should be noted that some schools have, in fact, integrated
computers
extensively and effectively within many aspects of the learning process, in many cases relying
on
information technology as an essential element of educational reform. Such schools, however,
would thus
far appear to represent a very small fraction of our nation's K-12 institutions.
Although less is known about the precise ways in which wide area networks are currently being
used within
"ordinary" American schools (as distinguished from the handful of technology leaders that have
received
special attention within the educational technology community, and in some cases, in the
general media),
the 1995 NCES survey provides some interesting indications. Among schools with access to
the Internet
(about half of all public schools as of fall 1995), the most popular application is electronic mail,
which is
available in 93 percent of all such schools. While e-mail is generally available to administrators
and (to a
somewhat lesser extent) teachers, however, the majority of all schools with Internet e-mail
capabilities do
not make this facility available to students.
A majority of such schools also have access to Internet news groups, resource location
applications (such as
Gopher, Archie, and Veronica), and World Wide Web browsers (such as Mosaic, Netscape
Navigator, or
Microsoft's Internet Explorer). Once again, however, such applications are more commonly
accessible to
teachers and administrators than to students.
There is widespread agreement that one of the principal factors now limiting the extensive and
effective use
of technology within American schools is the relative dearth of high-quality computer software
and digital
content designed specifically for that purpose. While this problem is encountered by educators
at all K-12
levels, it would appear to be particularly severe within our nation's secondary schools, which
typically
demand a broader diversity of instructional content.
Growth in the traditional ILS market, which has historically been quite robust, has recently
begun to level
off, leading to cutbacks in internal research and development spending by the manufacturers of
such
systems. Unfortunately, these cutbacks are occurring at a time when changing educational goals
and a
reformist emphasis on higher-order thinking skills are posing new challenges for educational
software
manufacturers that will be difficult to meet without such R&D expenditures. A number of
major ILS
vendors have been unable to justify such expenditures in light of various problems (discussed
below) that
they perceive within the market.49
The commercial availability of software and information resources designed to support
student-centered,
constructivist approaches to education is even more limited, and there is little evidence to date
of large-scale, well-funded efforts by either traditional educational software vendors, multimedia
developers, or
textbook publishers to develop such content.
A rather long and superficially disparate list of factors has been advanced to account for the
current
problems within the K-12 educational software market. The Panel believes, however, that most
of these
problems may be best regarded as arising largely from one or more of the following five
underlying factors:
Among teachers who report having one or more computer systems readily available at school,
only 62
percent use a computer regularly for instruction.
When teachers do receive instruction on the use of new technology, the form and content of the
courses
leave much to be desired. According to one survey, 46 percent of all educational technology
courses are
given as half-day workshops, and 79 percent of these courses focus on hardware, Internet usage,
or a
specific piece of software.60 Teachers
often have a
negative
reaction to the narrowly technical orientation of most technology-related courses, which show
them how to
operate a computer, but not how to use computers to enhance their teaching.61 Returning to the classroom from what are typically semi-annual
encounters with
such courses, they are generally unprepared to handle the diverse logistical and curricular
challenges they
encounter within a technology-rich environment.
In the Panel's view, what teachers actually need is in-depth, sustained assistance as they work to
integrate
computer use into the curriculum and confront the tension between traditional methods of
instruction and
new pedagogic methods that make extensive use of technology. Such assistance should include
not only
purely technical support, but pedagogic support as well, ideally including observation within the
classrooms
of successful technology-using teachers, periodic consultation with more experienced mentors,
and ongoing
communication with other teachers grappling with similar challenges.
One particularly important resource for the development of teacher expertise in the use of
educational
technologies is on-site assistance from a full-time computer coordinator. Less than five percent
of all
schools, however, have such a full-time professional on staff.
If a school cannot afford to hire a full-time technology coordinator to assist its teachers, it may
be possible
to provide adequate (though perhaps suboptimal) technical and pedagogic support at the district
level. The
153 schools in Jefferson County, Kentucky, for example, are served by a Computer Education
Support Unit
staffed by 22 professionals who maintain a technical support hotline and work directly with
teachers to
encourage and improve the use of technology in the classroom.
Cause for optimism, however, may be found in certain contributions that technology itself may
ultimately
make to the development of expertise in the educational applications of computers and
networks. First, the
Panel expects that over time, educational software will evolve in such a way as to make less
extensive
demands on the teacher. In this regard, it is worth noting that the dissemination of computer
usage through
progressively broader segments of the population has historically been less a function of
increasing
technical expertise within the general population than of the development of software that
requires less
technical expertise. Ongoing improvements in processing speed, memory capacity, user
interface design,
and educational applications can be expected to result in software that both teachers and
students can use
with less training, and more extensive support for curricular integration is likely to be provided
within the
application package itself.
Information technology may also help teachers to recover at least some of the time they have
invested in
deploying technology on behalf of their students. Some (though certainly not all) types of
educational
software, for example, may ultimately enable students to spend part of the school day learning
with less
continuous attention from a teacher.65
Computing
and
networking technologies also have the potential to streamline many aspects of a teacher's daily
responsibilities, facilitating the development of instructional materials, the recording and
assessment of
student progress, and access to various forms of information resources.66
In addition, technology may ultimately play a direct role in supporting the professional
development
functions discussed in this section. It has been estimated, for example, that online seminars
conducted over
the Internet might prepare teachers to use technology at roughly half the cost of conventional
courses for
which the teachers must be physically present,
If teachers were given adequate instruction in the art of computer-enhanced pedagogy and had
access to on-site assistance as needed, they would be in a better position to reap the benefits of
educational technology,
but one major obstacle would remain: a lack of sufficient time in their schedules to become
familiar with
available hardware, software, and content; to prepare technology-related material for use in the
classroom;
and to share ideas on technology use with other teachers.
On average, teachers have only ten minutes of scheduled preparation time for each hour they
teach.70 Since this is generally insufficient to
adequately
prepare for their
classroom responsibilities, they typically spend additional hours outside the school day
preparing lessons
and grading student work, resulting in an average of 47 hours of work per week.
The problem of insufficient teacher time encompasses both a logistical question (how to
restructure the
school day to give teachers time to develop technology-related teaching skills) and an economic
question
(how to pay for the additional time associated with technology-related professional
development and class
preparation). To illustrate the magnitude of the latter challenge, if all of our nation's public
K-12 schools
were to set aside two hours per week for technology-related curriculum design, as is the case in
Arizona's
Agua Fria Union High School,74
technology-related
educational
expenditures would increase by about $9 billion per year more than tripling by comparison with
current
spending levels.75 Although
technology itself may
help to
mitigate these problems, the (direct and/or opportunity) cost of the time that will be required for
teachers to
incorporate technology effectively within the curriculum will present a significant challenge
particularly
during an initial transition period to the effective utilization of educational technologies.
Over 200,000 new teachers enter the profession each year, and there is a 50 percent turnover in
the teaching
force approximately every 15 years.76
While advances
in
underlying technologies, educational software, and pedagogic methods will result in an ongoing
need for in-service training, colleges of education have a valuable opportunity to introduce future
teachers to the use of
educational technology before the demands of an actual teaching position begin to impinge on
the time
available for such training.
Judging solely from teacher certification requirements in the various states, it would at first
appear that
education students receive more technology-related instruction than do active teachers:
Eighteen states
require pre-service technology training, while only two require in-service technology training.77 Pre-service requirements, however, can
typically be
satisfied by
completing a course on how to operate a computer, or by taking a "methods" course in which
educational
technology is discussed, but never actually used by either the professor or the students. As a
result, even in
states with a technology-related certification requirement, new teachers typically graduate with
no
experience in using computers to teach, and little knowledge of available software and content.
The Office
of Technology Assessment summarized the current situation concisely: "Overall, teacher
education
programs in the United States do not prepare graduates to use technology as a teaching tool."78
Colleges of education fail to instruct their students in the use of educational technology for
reasons that
mirror some of the major obstacles to the spread of technology at the K-12 level, including the
inadequate
allocation of funds for hardware and software, minimal technology-related professional
development for the
education school faculty, and a lack of time for professors of education to restructure their
courses.
Education schools generally have the advantage of better technical support (often provided
through the
campus computer center) than elementary and secondary schools, but research, publishing, and
other
academic responsibilities place additional demands on the faculty, thus slowing the process of
curricular
reform.79
The Panel believes that the principal focus of an education school's technology program should
be the ways
in which elementary and secondary school teachers can use information technologies to
facilitate thinking
and learning by K-12 students. Nonetheless, given that K-12 teachers will find it difficult to
help their
students make effective use of computing and networking technologies if they have gained little
experience
doing so themselves, any element of the education school curriculum that affords prospective
teachers the
experience of making profitable use of information systems is likely to increase the probability
of effective
later use within a professional context. Colleges of education should be encouraged to find
ways to reward
faculty members who include new technologies in the methods or content of their courses.
Specialized
degree programs in educational technology should also be encouraged, both to address the need
for
computer coordinators capable of providing teachers with more than purely technical support
and to foster
the development of a nucleus of technological expertise within the education faculty.
Funding decisions at the federal level could have a significant impact on the degree to which
America's
education schools are capable of producing teachers who are able to make effective use of
educational
technology. In the past, federal funding has not been available for pre-service teacher
development at levels
comparable to those associated with in-service training, and Federal support for
technology-related teacher
development in general has been described as "highly variable from year to year, piecemeal in
nature, and
lacking in clear strategy or consistent policy."
In this section, we compare estimates of current technology spending for K-12 education with
projections of
the expenditures that will likely be required in order to capture substantial benefits. We then
briefly
consider the potential role and likely limitations of technology in improving the productivity of
the
educational enterprise, and end with a brief discussion of the analysis of federal education
expenditures in
terms of return on investment.
While the estimation of current annual spending on educational technology is complicated by
differences in
the types of expenditures included within this category by different observers, the available data
suggests
that public elementary and secondary schools in the United States spent somewhere between
$3.5 and $4
billion on computing and networking hardware, wiring and infrastructural enhancements,
software and
information resources, systems support, and technology-related professional development
during the 1995-96 school year.
A study conducted by McKinsey & Company for the National Information Infrastructure
Advisory
Council83 put the corresponding figure
at
approximately $3.3
billion during the 1994-95 school year, including expenditures of about $1.4 billion for
hardware,84 $800 million for software and other
content,
The McKinsey estimate of $3.3 billion in technology-related expenditures during the 1994-95
school year
represents only 1.3 percent of the roughly $248 billion
Estimates of the cost of introducing information technology into U.S. classrooms and
effectively using such
technology to improve the quality of American education vary widely, in large part as a result of
differences
in assumptions regarding the level and nature of technology usage and the provisions made for
technology-related professional development. After adjustment for these factors, however, the
projections of most
observers are reasonably consistent, and provide a basis for assessing the magnitude of the
funding that
would be required to have a meaningful impact on our nation's schools.
In the McKinsey/NIIAC study, cost projections were formulated for models based on four
different levels
of technology usage. The lowest level, which assumed an average of 25 computers per school,
all deployed
within a single Internet-connected computer lab or multimedia room, was estimated to involve
an initial
acquisition cost of $11 billion nationwide, with an additional $4 billion per year required for
operation and
maintenance. Adding a computer and modem for every teacher was projected to double the
initial
deployment cost and increase ongoing operating expenses to $7 billion. A model in which
networked
computers are installed in half of all classrooms (at a density of one computer for every five
students), and
the central lab is eliminated, was estimated to entail $29 billion in initial costs and $8 billion per
year for
operation and maintenance. A similar model in which computers are deployed in all classrooms
(at the
same one-to-five ratio) was estimated to require $47 billion initially and annual operating
expenses of $14
billion.95 A percentage breakdown of
McKinsey's
projected costs
by category is shown in Table 6.1 for the lowest ("Laboratory") and highest ("Classroom")
levels of
technology use.
A 1995 study conducted by the RAND Corporation examined six "technology leader" schools
(including
three of those profiled in Section 2.3) and attempted to estimate the cost of providing similar
capabilities
within a typical American school. Hardware and software investments were amortized over a
five-year
period to obtain annualized expenditure projections; equipment costs were based not on the
historical cost
of each school's actual inventory, but on the prices of roughly equivalent hardware as of the
time of the
study. Infrastructure costs were amortized over a ten-year period, while staff costs, professional
development, materials and supplies were treated as ordinary (non-capitalized) expenses.
Hardware and
personnel costs were found to dominate other technology-related expenditures, and to account
for much of
the variation among the six model schools, whose replication costs ranged from a low of $142
to a high of
$415 per student-year.97
To facilitate the identification of an approximate consensus range for the projected cost of
introducing
technology into American elementary and secondary schools, we have (somewhat arbitrarily,
and at the
expense of a rather Procrustean assault on some of the original data) converted the above
projections, along
with those of several other authors, into annualized cost figures based on the amortization of
capital
acquisition and other startup costs over a five-year period. The resulting figures are presented
in Table 6.2.
It is worth noting that none of these spending projections were prepared with an eye toward
estimating the
cost of deploying and using technology in a manner that would be optimal in the absence of
budgetary
constraints. Henry Becker105 has
attempted to
realistically
assess the cost of applying technology in ways that are believed by many to offer the greatest
potential for
truly significant improvements in educational effectiveness. Central to his analysis is an
examination of
"the kinds of expenditures that permit average teachers to become exemplary users" of
educational
technology, including a reduction in average student/teacher ratios from 25 to 20 and the
allocation of
sufficient resources and teacher time to allow teachers to use technology in their own
professional lives. He
also assumes the availability of one computer for every two students (phased in over a four-year
period) a
significantly greater density than is assumed in most other models.
By way of contrast with the projections cited earlier, the ambitious undertaking outlined by
Becker would
entail an estimated annual cost of $1,375 per student in personnel costs, along with $556 per
student-year
for hardware, software, and maintenance. Although the implementation of such a model would
increase
average school expenditures by more than a third, he points out that such an increase would be
no greater
than that associated with many other proposals for fundamental educational reform, and argues
that even an
investment of this magnitude may be justified by the potential returns.
It should be noted that in the absence of a substantial advance in productivity of the sort
discussed in
Section 6.3, even the more moderate spending projections summarized in Table 6.2 will require
an increase
in the fraction of the nation's education budget that is allocated to technology-related
expenditures from the
current level of approximately 1.3 percent to somewhere between 2.4 and 11.3 percent.
Moreover, the
acquisition of computing and networking hardware often the principal focus of efforts to bring
technology
into the schools will in fact account for only a minority of the expense incurred over time.
While special
bond issues, private capital campaigns, and other one-time funding mechanisms may all have
their place in
helping schools to defray the costs of acquiring hardware, it is important that educators and
policy-makers
have realistic expectations regarding the ongoing operating expenditures that will be necessary
if this
hardware is in fact to be effectively used, and that they not base their planning on capital
budgeting models
of the sort used to analyze, for example, the acquisition of new school buildings.
In the absence of realistic budgetary planning, schools and school districts are prone to
overspending on the
initial acquisition of hardware, and may find themselves with inadequate funding for upgrading
and
replacement, software and content, hardware and software maintenance,106 professional development for teachers, and the hiring and retention of
necessary
technical support personnel. If we do not wish to turn our schools into junkyards for expensive,
but unused
computer equipment a scenario that is, unfortunately, far from uncommon at present it is
important that
budgetary constraints and wishful thinking not lead us to buy the educational equivalent of a
fancy
automobile without allocating funds for gasoline, repairs, or a driver education class.
Although the expected tradeoff between spending and outcome renders meaningless the notion
of a single
"optimal" level of expenditure, the Panel recommends (based on the limited data thus far
available) that at
least five percent of all educational spending in the United States, or approximately $13 billion
annually
(measured in constant 1996 dollars), be earmarked for technology-related expenditures on an
ongoing basis.
It should be noted that this recommended expenditure level represents nearly a fourfold increase
in the
fraction of our nation's education budget that is now allocated for such purposes. If the promise
of
educational technology is to be realized, educators and policy-makers will thus unavoidably be
faced with
difficult decisions as they attempt to either control or justify a secular trend of increasing
(inflation-adjusted) per capita educational spending within the constraints imposed by a number
of well-entrenched
claimants on current financial resources.
While the projections summarized above provide a starting point for analyzing the likely
economic
implications of the widespread introduction of technology within our nation's classrooms, these
estimates
should be considered in the context of an important caveat: Our experience with educational
technology
(and in particular, with approaches to its utilization based on the constructivist pedagogic
models discussed
in Sections 4.2 and 4.3) is still quite limited, raising the possibility of a significant
technology-related
upward shift in what economists refer to as the education production function a curve
expressing some
measure of educational outcomes as a function of educational expenditures over time. Indeed,
the
adoption of new technologies within other industries has frequently been accompanied by an
initial decrease
in productivity, with benefits accruing only after the technology in question has been effectively
assimilated a process that often involves the introduction of significant structural changes
within the
adopting organization.
As we begin to ascend what is likely to be a relatively steep learning curve, however, the extent
to which we
are able to benefit from our experience in order to realize substantial savings in achieving a
given set of
educational objectives (or alternatively, to improve educational outcomes for a given spending
level) is
likely to depend critically on the execution of rigorous, large-scale programs of research and
evaluation
aimed at assessing the efficacy and cost-effectiveness of various approaches to the use of
technology in
actual K-12 classrooms, as discussed in Section 8 below. While the results of such research are
intrinsically
difficult to predict, the extremely low level of current investment in such research relative to the
enormity of
our nation's investment in elementary and secondary education leads the Panel to believe that
we are far
below the point at which the incremental cost of further research would exceed the economic
benefit to
which it is likely to lead.107
Because personnel-related costs account for the largest share of our nation's educational
spending, and
because the substantial increase in (inflation-adjusted) spending per student over the past
several decades
has been attributed in large part to a steady increase in the ratio of staff size to school
enrollment, some
have asked whether technology might be used to improve the economic productivity of those
employed
within the American educational system, as has been the case within various other sectors of the
U.S.
economy. In principle, such improvements might arise from a decrease in per-pupil costs
attributable to the
more effective "leveraging" of educators and support personnel, from the realization of
improved
educational outcomes for a given level of personnel-related and other expenditures, or from a
combination
of these and/or other factors.
In considering the potential role of technology in increasing educational productivity, it is worth
noting that
teachers are likely to play a critically important role within the sort of future classroom
envisioned by most
current researchers in the field of educational technology, as discussed in Section 4.4. While
this may be a
comfort to fearful teachers (and in some cases, parents), it may also be a disappointment to
those who have
looked to technology for a simplistic automation of the instructional function, accompanied by a
wholesale
reduction in our nation's aggregate expenditures on teacher compensation. Based on the models
provided
by other information-based industries, however, it seems quite likely that continued
experimentation with
technology will ultimately yield a wide range of alternatives, falling at different points along the
production
function curve, for the improvement of educational productivity.
To the extent that such productivity increases are captured in the form of increased learning
(according to
some suitable metric) per student hour, and not by a reduction in total expenditures per student
hour, the
attendant benefits are best analyzed not in terms of cost alone, but in terms of expected return
on
investment. The empirical validation of such an analysis is complicated by the fact that the
return on an
educational investment is determined in large part by such factors as lifetime earnings (which
will generally
not be known for many decades after the investment in question is made), along with a number
of non-pecuniary factors even less amenable to straightforward quantification. It seems quite
possible, however,
that in the presence of formidable global economic competition, a substantial nationwide
investment in
educational technology could be justified even if no value were placed on the direct (economic
and non-economic) benefits accruing to the American people, using return calculations based
solely on the
additional tax revenues associated with an increase in their expected lifetime taxable earnings.
This section begins with a discussion of the various dimensions along which the accessibility of
various
technologies both at school and within the student's home can be usefully measured. The
current
accessibility of computing and networking technologies to various segments of the American
student
population is then reviewed, with special attention to differences associated with socioeconomic
status, race
and ethnicity, geographical factors, gender, and various types of special student needs.
Throughout this
section, consideration is given to the appropriate role of the federal government in insuring
equitable (and
ultimately, universal) access to educational technologies.
One metric that has been used to evaluate the extent to which educational technology is
accessible to
various groups is the density of computers installed within the schools attended by members of
those
groups. Schools with higher computer densities typically provide greater access to other forms
of
educational technology (including local- and wide-area networks and peripherals supporting
multimedia
applications) as well, making computer density a useful (albeit imperfect) proxy for the level of
overall
technology deployment. While the ratio of computers to students varies widely from school to
school,108 and while much of this variation is
accounted for by
other
factors,109 our principal concern in
the current
context will be
with the density of computers in schools whose student bodies differ systematically along
socioeconomic,
racial, ethnic and geographic lines.
Equitable access, of course, depends not only on the number of computers available within a
given school,
but on the extent to which those computers (along with other educational technologies) are
actually used by
various groups and the modes of usage associated with each group. Although number of hours
of student
computer use particularly within subject-matter (as opposed to computer education) classes is
strongly
correlated with computer density,110
socioeconomic
and other
factors have been found to have independent predictive value, as discussed below. Such
variables are also
predictive of the manner in which computers are used in school, with certain groups
participating in
constructivist applications of the sort described in Section 4.3 or in other "higher-order"
learning and
problem-solving activities while others use technology primarily for routine drill-and-practice
exercises. To
the extent that the former category of usage is believed to have special value in meeting the
objectives of
contemporary educational reform, systematic differences in the character of technology usage
may be as
problematic as lack of access to computing and networking hardware.
While we have thus far considered the accessibility of educational technology only within the
school,
systematic disparities in the availability of computers and modems within the home may
represent an even
greater problem from the viewpoint of equitable access. At present, computers are found in
approximately
half of all American households with children,
Specifically targeted federal programs have in recent years helped to substantially mitigate some
of the
disparities in access to educational technology that had earlier been associated with
socioeconomic
variables. Income-related differences in computer density, for example, have been reduced to a
relatively
modest (though still not insignificant) level: During the 1994-95 school year, the poorest
schools (defined
as those schools in which more than 80 percent of all students were eligible for funds under
Title I of the
Elementary and Secondary Education Act) had one computer for every 11 students, while each
computer in
the richest schools (those having less than a 20 percent Title I enrollment) was shared by 9.5
students.116 By way of contrast, in 1983,
microcomputers were
found in
four times as many of the 12,000 wealthiest schools as in the 12,000 poorest schools.
While this progress is certainly encouraging, there are several reasons for continued concern.
First, there is
considerable direct and indirect evidence that the shrinkage of the gap in computer density
between rich and
poor schools is attributable largely to the Title I program itself, which provided roughly $2
billion in
funding over the past ten years for the introduction of educational technology within schools
having a
substantial low-income enrollment, but which has recently been under considerable budgetary
pressure.118 Second, the relatively modest gap
between the
computer
densities measured at richer and poorer schools belies significant disparities in the way
computers are
actually used in school by more and less affluent students, and in the availability of computers
within their
homes.
Students from families classified as low in socioeconomic status (SES) report 14 percent less
usage of
computers in school than do students from high-SES families.
Among the factors that may be contributing to the disadvantages experienced by low-SES
students in both
the amount and nature of computer use are (putative) differences in the degree to which teachers
in wealthy
and impoverished schools have acquired the knowledge and skills necessary to use technology
effectively in
their teaching. While the Panel is aware of no research that explicitly compares the
technology-related
preparation of and ongoing support available to teachers in schools of different socioeconomic
composition,
anecdotal evidence suggests that significant differences may in fact prevail across
socioeconomic lines.125 Wealthy school districts may be able
to recruit
teachers with
greater expertise in the use of educational technologies by offering above-average salaries, or to
offer their
existing teachers more technology-related training and technical support. Poorer schools, on the
other hand,
may have fewer teachers capable of making effective use of educational technologies, thus
limiting both the
quality and quantity of computer use by their students.
The most significant disparities in SES-related access to technology, however, are currently
found not in the
schools, but in the homes of their students. As of June 1995, computers were present in only 14
percent of
all households headed by adults who had completed no more than a high-school education, and
in which
annual household income was less than $30,000; the comparable figure for households headed
by college-educated adults having a combined income of more than $50,000 per year was more
than five times greater,
at 73 percent.126 By contrast with the
schools,
however, there
are presently no federal programs designed to facilitate the placement of computers within the
homes of
disadvantaged students.
As interactive information technologies come to be used increasingly for school work and other
forms of
learning, SES-linked differences in the ownership of home computer systems threatens not only
to
perpetuate existing familial patterns of socioeconomic disadvantage, but to widen the gap
between the most
and least affluent Americans. At a time when U.S. income inequality has reached its highest
level since
1947 (when the Census Bureau began monitoring the relevant index),127 the educational implications of SES-related disparities in home
computer
ownership should be regarded as a source of serious concern from a public policy viewpoint.
While it will be difficult to eliminate all SES-based inequities in the accessibility of educational
technology
within the context of current efforts to restrain federal spending, a number of possible federal
actions are
worthy of consideration. First, the Panel believes that the potential contributions of information
technologies to elementary and secondary education are so substantial that minimum standards
should be
formulated and maintained for the use of technology within all of the nation's schools,
regardless of the
socioeconomic status of their student populations. Title I spending for technology-related
investments on
behalf of economically disadvantaged students (including hardware and software,
telecommunications and
networking services, professional development for teachers, and ongoing technical and
pedagogical
support) should be maintained at no less than its current level, with ongoing adjustments for
inflation and
for projected increases in both nationwide school enrollment and nationwide educational
technology
spending.
The Federal Communications Commission should fully exploit the powers granted to it under
the
Telecommunications Act of 1996 (discussed in Section 9.2), among others, to ensure that
economically
disadvantaged schools are provided with affordable telecommunications services and wide area
network
connectivity through preferential rates from telecommunications carriers, various forms of
cross-subsidies,
and/or the allocation of portions of the radio frequency spectrum for
educational networking.128 Consideration should also be given to
the provision
of various
forms of private sector incentives for the expeditious wiring of impoverished rural and inner
city schools to
support local- and wide-area networking. Existing federal programs serving low-income
students should be
reviewed with an eye toward exploiting the opportunities provided by computing and
networking
technologies, while public policy related to the ownership and disposition of various forms of
intellectual
property should be examined with the aim of providing affordable (and in many cases, free)
access to a rich
body of digital content (including digitized versions of certain material now owned or
controlled by the
federal government itself) that might not otherwise be accessible to less affluent schools.
The substantially lower prevalence of computers within the homes of low-SES students may be
among the
most difficult forms of inequity to remedy. At the same time, it may prove difficult to provide
the sort of
educational (and indirectly, economic and social) opportunity that our nation has striven to offer
each
American without addressing this disparity. The provision of modern computer systems and
Internet
connectivity in libraries, community centers, and other public institutions and spaces could
represent an
important first step in affording access to those students whose families are unable to provide
such facilities
at home, as would the provision of extended after-school and weekend access to technology
within the
schools themselves. Even if the amount of equipment available in such public locations were
increased
sufficiently to allow ongoing, regular use by a substantial number of students, however, the
flexibility and
convenience of home access would continue to confer a relative advantage on families able to
afford to
purchase computer equipment and online access.
Mindful of the significance of home access, several experimental pilot
programs129 have made it possible for students to borrow laptop computers from
the school in
much the same way as schools have traditionally loaned out musical instruments, thus providing
full-time
computer access to students both at school and at home. While the cost of such programs
remains
substantial within the limitations imposed by current technology, the results have been quite
promising, and
it seems possible that new system architectures (perhaps based on the use of television sets as
monitors)
could decrease the associated costs to the point where universal home access might be
contemplated as a
realistic policy goal. There may also be opportunities to integrate the goal of universal home
access within
various existing federal programs requiring, for example, the installation within all newly
constructed
federal housing projects of conduit or raceways capable of supporting future networking needs
in a cost-effective manner.
While Title I funding has in recent years helped to significantly improve the density of
computers in those
schools attended by most minority students,
As in the case of socioeconomic status, racial and ethnic disparities in the accessibility of
technology within
the home constitute an even greater source of concern than within the school. In 1993, for
example,
African-Americans were 57 percent less likely to have a computer at home, and Hispanics 59
percent less
likely, than non-Hispanic whites. Even after adjusting for household income, educational
attainment, age,
gender, and location of residence (urban or rural), home computer ownership was 36 percent
and 39 percent
less common among African-Americans and Hispanics, respectively, than among non-Hispanic
whites. 133 This gap
in ownership is reflected in the usage of
home
computers by children: In a 1995 survey, for example, children were found to use computers
within 38
percent of all white households, but only 17 percent of all black homes.134 Even ordinary telephone service, which will be important for the
support of
home/school communications and for access to the many resources available over the Internet,
is not
available equally to all racial or ethnic groups, with Native Americans, Hispanics, and African
Americans in
particular reporting less access than average, especially in rural areas.135
Because a large part of the racial and ethnic imbalance in access to educational technology is
attributable to
socioeconomic factors, interventions of the sorts discussed in Section 7.2 should help to
equalize the
opportunities available to students of different races and ethnic origin as well. Since race and
ethnicity are
also associated with access inequalities that are not fully explained by socioeconomic status,
however,
government policy should be informed as well by an independent concern for racial and ethnic
fairness.
Equitable access to information technologies should be among the explicit objectives of
programs for the
education of bilingual and migrant students, for the setting of educational standards, for the
reform of
assessment protocols, and for the accreditation of teachers and of education schools. Racial,
ethnic, and
cultural diversity should also be taken into consideration when designing educational software
and when
prioritizing the digitization of educational content, supported by federally supported
ethnographic research
and by higher educational and apprenticeship programs designed to enhance diversity within the
professional community that develops such programs and content.
When the United States is divided into four regions West, Midwest, Northeast, and South for
comparative purposes, students in these regions are found to encounter an in-school computer
density that
differs by no more than ten percent from the national average.
Certain forms of access inequities are not evident when schools are coarsely categorized by
region and
urbanicity, but become apparent when other, finer-grained classificatory schemes are used to
identify
geographical groupings characterized by common (actual or potential) problems. Inner city
students, for
example, are clearly immersed in an environment that differs markedly from that of a wealthy
urban
neighborhood or a middle-class "edge city," and are likely to suffer special disadvantages, and
to have
special needs, that do not surface in surveys that treat all three as members of the single
category "urban."142 Such studies may also miss the
problems faced by
certain rural
schools located in areas lacking the local "points of presence" or affordable high-bandwidth
telecommunication links that are typically required to provide cost-effective access to online
services and
Internet service providers. Schools located within geographic areas in which there is little
technology-oriented business activity may also be disadvantaged relative to those in high-tech
areas.143 While individual states and school
districts may
well be in the
best position to solve some of these problems, the Panel believes that the federal government
has an
important role to play in monitoring the use of educational technology throughout the country
with an eye
toward minimizing the extent to which the educational opportunities available to our children
are
constrained by geographical happenstance.
On average, girls and boys differ only slightly in their use of computers at school. The 1992
IEA data set
yields results that are typical of studies in this area, indicating that boys make three percent
greater use of
school computers than girls.144
Another survey,
however,
suggests that boys and girls differ significantly in the ways in which they use computers at
school. Although
high school girls made 50 percent greater use of the computer for word processing than their
male
classmates, for example, they accounted for only 26 percent of all elective computer use before
and after
school, and for only 20 percent of all in-school computer-based game-playing activities.145
As in the school, overall gender differences in computer use within the home are small. In a
1994 survey,
for example, 53 percent of all parents reporting use of a home computer by one or more children
indicated
that the most frequent user was a boy, while 47 percent said that a girl made heaviest use of the
computer.
Again, however, the nature of that use differed: Girls were more likely to use a home computer
for school
work and for word processing,146
while boys were
nearly twice
as likely to play (non-educational) computer-based games.
A modest amount of research has attempted to identify factors that might account for
gender-specific
differences in the appeal and effectiveness of certain types of programs and of various
environments and
contexts for computer use.148 The
differential use of
word
processing software may well be related to other gender-specific differences in linguistic
behavior, and
gender-related social factors (aggressive contention for computer resources by boys in certain
school
environments, for example, which may intimidate their female classmates) may account for the
lesser
participation of girls in certain forms of unstructured, elective
computer-based activities.149 There is also some evidence that girls
and boys
engaging in
computer-related learning activities may differ in their relative responses to cooperative,
competitive, or
individualistic reward structures.150
Much remains to be learned, however, about the technology-related proclivities and usage
patterns of male
and female students of various ages. Although neither boys nor girls would appear to suffer a
clear
disadvantage in the overall use of computers, the differential usage patterns observed both at
school and
within the home raise the question of whether further research might lead to software, content,
and user
environments that more effectively serve the needs of both.
Available evidence suggests that educational technologies may be even more valuable to
low-achieving
students than to their higher-achieving peers.
Another way in which underperforming students may be disadvantaged with respect to their
higher-achieving classmates is in the different types of computer-based learning activities to
which they are
exposed. While high achievers may be allowed to use computers in the performance of
relatively complex,
"authentic" tasks involving the acquisition and integration of a wide range of factual and
procedural
knowledge, low-achieving students are more likely to be assigned extensive drill and practice
on isolated
basic skills presumably on the assumption that remediation in these areas is a prerequisite to
activities
requiring higher-level thinking and problem-solving skills. Many researchers now feel,
however, that such
sequencing, however intuitively plausible, is in fact ill-conceived, and should be abandoned in
favor of a
unified approach in which both high- and low-achieving students acquire basic skills in the
course of
undertaking substantial, "real world" tasks of the sorts discussed in Section 4.3.
Technology may present special challenges to students with learning disabilities, behavioral
disorders,
emotional problems, or physical disabilities, but may also provide them with unique
opportunities for more
effective learning. In the case of such students, equal access may not imply equitable access;
special
measures must sometimes be taken to ensure that they are afforded the maximum possible
benefit from the
use of educational technology. Fortunately, technology itself may often prove instrumental in
providing
such special assistance.155
Children with certain mobility or sensory impairments, for example, may be able to use
single-finger
devices, joysticks, mouthsticks, or other specialized hardware to provide input to the computer.
Students
unable to enter data on a conventional keyboard may be able to achieve the same effect through
the use of
"eye gaze" technology, or by using a "single switch" device together with special keyboard
scanning
software to select first a row, then a column, from a "virtual keyboard" depicted on the monitor.
Those who
are unable to use a mouse may be able to employ an alternative device together with a
specialized screen
display to emulate conventional point-and-click operations. Shorthand (based on either the
standard Gregg
system or the expansion of user-defined abbreviations) or interactive word prediction software
may be used
to reduce the number of keystrokes required for keyboard input. Alternatively, Morse code
interpretation
software can be used to support the input of arbitrary characters using a single-switch device, or
speech
recognition algorithms may be used to provide voice recognition capabilities within certain
educational
applications.
Assistive output technologies for students with disabilities include magnification programs for
low-vision
students and systems that use voice synthesis technology to read out screen information or the
contents of
printed documents to blind students. The latter technology may also be incorporated in
"augmentative
communication systems" that allow non-speaking students to converse using digitally
synthesized speech.
Both local- and wide-area networks may be used to permit students with various forms of
mobility
limitations or communication impairments to access and exchange information, making
available valuable
learning resources that might otherwise be inaccessible. Technology also has the potential to
significantly
expand the educational opportunities available to children with learning disabilities currently
the largest
category of students with special needs and may prove valuable for children with emotional
problems or
behavioral disorders as well, though further research will be necessary to characterize the ways
in which
technology might best be deployed on behalf of such students.
The essential role of the federal government in insuring access to educational technologies for
students with
special needs arises in part from the fact that, within a typical school district, the number of
students with a
given disability is likely to be too small to adequately amortize the cost of researching,
developing, and
effectively deploying the assistive technologies that would provide appropriate educational
support for
those students. In the case of less common disabilities, even the typical state is unlikely to have
the
resources that would be necessary to independently provide the necessary support. Federal
funding should
thus be provided for research on the use of technology to support learning by students with
various forms of
disabilities, for the development of assistive hardware and software for use in the school, and
for
professional training in the use of such technologies.
We begin this section with a brief overview of what is currently known and equally important,
what
remains to be learned about the effectiveness of various traditional and constructivist
approaches to the
use of educational technologies. This is followed by a discussion of certain issues related to the
measurement of educational outcomes, and to the implications of these issues for the
comparison of
alternative approaches to the use of technology. Questions related to the funding and
administration of
educational technology research are considered in the following subsection, and are followed by
the Panel's
general assessment of current research priorities. The final subsection examines the case for
federally
sponsored research in educational technology from both a theoretical and a practical viewpoint,
and
concludes with what is probably the most significant recommendation of this report: that the
federal
government dramatically increase its investment in research aimed at discovering what actually
works, not
only with respect to the application of educational technology, but in the field of elementary and
secondary
education in general.
A substantial number of studies have been conducted over the past several decades with the aim
of
assessing the effectiveness of traditional, tutorial-based CAI applications of the sort discussed in
Section
4.1. While the experiments reported in the literature were performed on various student
populations, using
various instructional approaches, within various natural and laboratory environments, and
employing
various experimental paradigms, a number of researchers have used
meta-analytic techniques156 to aggregate the results of these
studies in an
attempt to arrive at
a quantitative assessment of the utility of computer systems within the field of education.
The findings of four such meta-analyses, each based on data gathered from dozens of separate
studies on the
effects of "traditional" computer-based instruction
While the preponderance of evidence would seem to argue for the efficacy of traditional
computer-assisted
instruction, some researchers have raised questions related to the methodology employed in
these studies, or
to the interpretation or import of the results they yielded. In particular, issues have been raised
regarding
the size and experimental designs of many of the underlying studies, the amenability of these
studies (which
often differ significantly in multiple dimensions) to meta-analytic aggregation, the robustness
(after
controlling for various contextual factors) and temporal persistence of the measured effects, the
independence of those responsible for evaluating efficacy, and the possibility of systematic bias
against the
publication of negative results.166
Given adequate funding, all of the above questions could be addressed through a well-designed
program of
rigorous, carefully controlled, independently replicated research conducted over a reasonable
period of
time. Such a program, however, would still not address what may well be the most important
issue
associated with the evaluation of traditional applications of educational technology using
traditional
measures of educational achievement: whether the variables being measured are in fact well
correlated with
the forms of learning we wish to facilitate.
In view of the emphasis placed by current educational reform efforts on higher-order thinking
and problem-solving activities and on learning models based on the active construction by each
student of his or her own
knowledge and skills, it is natural to ask what is currently known and what remains to be
learned about
the extent to which widely usable constructivist applications of computing and networking
technologies (as
discussion in Section 4.3) in fact achieve desirable educational outcomes in a cost-effective
manner. A
review of the relevant research literature, however, suggests that although a substantial amount
of very
interesting and potentially significant work has already been done, we are not yet able to answer
this
question (nor, indeed, even to define it precisely) with the degree of certainty that would be
desirable from a
public policy viewpoint.
Although a limited number of (often quite promising) empirical studies have already been
published, much
of the research literature dealing with constructivist applications of technology consists of
theoretical and
critical analysis, reports of informal observations, and well-articulated but high-inference
reasoning based
on research conducted over the past two decades in cognitive, developmental and social
psychology, and in
such areas as artificial intelligence, adolescent motivation, and even international economics
and human
resource management. Although this progenitive research is itself often quite sound, the
specific
pedagogical applications to which such theory has given rise in the field of educational
technology have
thus far been subjected to only limited (though by no means negligible) rigorous experimental
testing.
Research in the interdisciplinary field of cognitive science, for example, has in recent years
provided
convincing evidence that the human processing of visual, linguistic and other data entails the
active fitting
of such input into a rich internal framework of "real world" knowledge and expectations, and
not simply the
passive assembly of a mass of external data into an emergent whole. Our understanding of
human learning
has similarly evolved (based on a wealth of evidence collected over a wide range of different
domains and
media) from a process based on the passive assimilation of isolated facts to one in which the
learner actively
formulates and tests hypotheses about the world, adapting, elaborating, and refining internal
models that are
often highly procedural in nature.167
There is little question that such research provides fertile ground for the formulation of
compelling
hypotheses regarding the ways in which traditional pedagogical methods might be modified to
take
advantage of these advances in our understanding of the nature of perception, cognition, and
learning. It is
well to remember, however, that the history of science (and more specifically, of educational
research and
practice) is replete with examples of compelling application-specific hypotheses that seem to
arise
"naturally" from well-founded theory, but which are ultimately refuted by either rigorous
empirical testing
or manifest practical failure.168
Knowledge of the
nature of
learning and thought is closely related to, but nonetheless distinct from, knowledge of the best
ways to
cause such learning to take place. While the former may well prove to be of immeasurable
assistance in the
course of acquiring the latter, it is important that a confounding of the two not lead us to
underestimate the
importance of empirical research aimed at validating our hypotheses concerning the efficacy
and cost-effectiveness of specific constructivist applications of technology.
These observations are by no means intended as a criticism of educational technology research
based on
constructivist principles; rather, they reflect the fact that such research is still at a relatively
early stage of
development. Much of the research currently being conducted on constructivist applications of
technology
is formative in nature intended more as a preliminary exploration of new intellectual territory
than a
definitive evaluation of any one possible solution. Such research is often (and in the case of
many
constructivist applications, necessarily) characterized by the simultaneous manipulation of a
number of
different variables, and should ultimately be followed by subsequent (and often
time-consuming)
experiments designed to tease out the underlying sources of any positive effects. Formative
research on
constructivist applications of technology also tends to be more difficult to generalize to other
educational
contexts than is the case for traditional computer-assisted instruction. Additional research may
be required,
for example, to determine the extent to which positive effects persist in the hands of less
capable or less
motivated teachers, within different sorts of student populations, or in the absence of
comparable financial
resources.
In fairness, it should be noted that some useful empirical work has already been done to validate
the
efficacy of educational approaches based in various ways on a constructivist pedagogical model.
Moreover,
such results as have been reported thus far have generally been both interesting and
encouraging. One
example is provided by The Adventures of Jasper Woodbury, a series of extended, open-ended,
videodisc-based problem-solving exercises developed by the Cognition and Technology Group at
Vanderbilt
University. While students participating in the Jasper program acquired basic mathematical
concepts at
about the same rate as matched controls,
Overall, however, considerably less empirical research has been done on the effectiveness of
constructivist
applications of technology than on traditional, tutorial-based applications. This disparity is
attributable to
several factors. The first arises from the relative lack of well-defined, well-accepted metrics for
the
comparative evaluation of educational outcomes within a constructivist context. Conventional,
standardized
multiple-choice tests offer the advantages of widespread availability, straightforward
administration and
scoring, and familiarity to and credibility with the public at large. Such tests, however, tend to
place greater
emphasis on the accumulation of isolated facts and basic skills, and less on the acquisition of
higher-order
thinking and problem-solving skills, than would be desirable for the measurement of those
forms of
educational attainment that are central to current educational reform efforts.
If the goals of the educational reform movement are to be reached, it is essential that care be
taken to
establish what Hawkins refers to as "a system in which the pedagogy is not in tacit conflict with
the
accounting."174 Since researchers,
educators and
software
developers can be expected to develop content and techniques that optimize student
performance with
respect to whatever criteria are employed to measure educational attainment, progress will
depend critically
on the development of metrics capable of serving as appropriate and reliable proxies for desired
educational
outcomes, and enjoying reasonably widespread acceptance by researchers, educators, parents,
and
legislators.175
While empirical research on constructivist applications of technology has been complicated by
questions
related to the manner in which "favorable" educational outcomes should be defined and
measured for
purposes of evaluating the relative effectiveness of alternative approaches, progress has also
been impeded
by a critical lack of funding, as discussed in Section 8.4. Even in the absence of such factors,
the
development of a rich evaluative literature is an intrinsically time-consuming process. It would
be
unrealistic to expect the literature to be as broad and mature in the case of educational
technology based on
constructivist principles as the body of primary research and meta-analysis that has been
developed over a
period of several decades for traditional computer-based tutorial applications. Although time
and resources
will be required to develop a firm, scientific understanding of the strengths and limitations of
the
constructivist approach and (perhaps more importantly) of the specific techniques that are likely
to prove
most effective and cost-effective in practice, the Panel believes such research to be critically
important and
worthy of substantial and sustained federal support.
While research in a wide range of areas could directly or indirectly facilitate the effective
utilization of
educational technology within our nation's K-12 schools,
Among the underlying research areas encompassed by the first category are various aspects of
cognitive and
developmental psychology, neuroscience, artificial intelligence, and the interdisciplinary field of
cognitive
science, which have already shed substantial light on the nature of learning, reasoning, memory,
and
perception. In addition, several areas of research within the field of computer science have the
potential to
play important roles in the development of enabling technologies for educational applications.
The
potential value of continued progress on both the scientific and engineering fronts argues for the
continued
federal funding of both categories of research, which could ultimately provide significant
returns not only in
the area of educational technology, but in other areas of significance from a public policy
viewpoint as well.
The second category of research that the Panel believes should be supported at the federal level
includes
exploratory work focusing on the development and preliminary testing of innovative new
approaches to the
application of technology in education which are unlikely to originate from within the private
sector. While
the later stages of research, development, and product engineering are likely to be driven largely
by
industrial efforts, there are both theoretical and empirical reasons to believe that only the federal
government can be expected to provide an appropriate level of funding for much of the
early-stage research
that the Panel believes should now be conducted in the field of educational technology.
This situation arises from a particular form of economic externality related to the lack of
appropriability of
certain forms of intellectual property. Suppose, for example, that a particular private company
(referred to
below as Company A) were to expend significant resources on research aimed at the discovery
of powerful
new techniques for the application of technology to education. While Company A might well
find it
possible to commercially exploit any successful results that might be discovered in the course of
its
research through the sale of a proprietary software product to schools, for example it would
generally be
unable to prevent other companies from analyzing this product and using the benefits of this
analysis to
design a competing product, thus appropriating for themselves a portion of the returns accruing
from the
results of Company A's research, and consequently reducing Company A's profitability.
Anticipating its inability to capture the full benefit of its investment in research, Company A
(and all of its
competitors, since each would be faced with the same dilemma) may be expected to
systematically invest
less (and in many realistic cases, dramatically less) on research and development than would be
optimal
both from the economic viewpoint of Company A and its competitors in the aggregate, and
from the
viewpoint of students, schools, and society as a whole. Such "free-rider" problems are
classically resolved
through the use of pooled funding at the highest possible level of taxing authority in this case,
through
investment at the federal level. (State or local funding would result in another free-rider
problem, with each
state or locality having an incentive to systematically underinvest in research funding in order to
"ride in the
tailwind" of the others.)
In the Panel's view, such economic externalities, combined with the potential "multiplier effect"
that can be
realized when carefully targeted early-stage government research funds are use to seed
later-stage private
sector R&D, provide a strong case for the federal funding of early-stage research aimed at
developing new
forms of educational software, content, and technology-enabled pedagogy. To date, the level of
federal
support for such research has been quite low relative to the associated potential returns, and
such funding as
has been available has been concentrated largely in the areas of mathematics and science
education (where
grants from the National Science Foundation have made a significant impact). While math and
science will
indeed play a critical role in preparing our children for the demands of the twenty-first century,
the Panel
believes that the level of federal funding for early-stage research on innovative applications of
educational
technology should be increased in many areas, including the language arts, social studies, and
creative arts.
In order to maximize the likelihood of discovering intellectually divergent, but highly effective
approaches,
support should initially be provided for a substantial number of independent,
investigator-initiated, early-stage research projects based on a wide range of alternative
approaches. Research in this second category,
however, will be preliminary and formative in character, and cannot be expected to yield
definitive, reliable,
broadly generalizable results that provide a clear indication as to which approaches to the use of
educational
technology are in fact likely to prove most effective in practice. The derivation of such
empirical results is
among the principal goals of the research described in the last of the three categories identified
above.
In the Panel's judgment, the principal goal of such empirical work should not be to answer the
question of
whether computers can be effectively used within the school. The probability that elementary
and
secondary education will prove to be the one information-based industry in which computer
technology
does not have a natural role would at this point appear to be so low as to render unconscionably
wasteful
any research that might be designed to answer this question alone.
Even if it were deemed to be desirable to gather evidence for the overall effectiveness of
technology in
education, current educational trends would make the interpretation of such research more
difficult than was
the case in the early days of computer-assisted instruction. Technology has in recent years been
increasingly seen not as an isolated addition to the conventional K-12 curriculum, but as one of
a number of
tools that might be used to support a process of comprehensive curricular (and in some cases,
systemic)
reform. In such an environment, attempts to isolate the effects of technology as a distinct
independent
variable may be both difficult and unproductive. The Panel believes the kinds of findings that
might
actually prove useful in practice are more likely to arise from research aimed at assessing the
effectiveness
and cost-effectiveness of specific educational approaches and techniques that make use of
technology.
In view of the enormous investment our country makes in education each year and the high
stakes
associated with the quality of the education our children receive, it is essential that such
research be
conducted in a manner and on a scale that are capable of providing educators, policy-makers,
parents, and
the general public with well-grounded, scientifically credible results that can be applied with
confidence in
the context of actual educational decision-making. Early-stage, exploratory research of the sort
described in
the second category outlined above should be used to formulate well-explicated, falsifiable
hypotheses
suitable for rigorous empirical testing. These hypotheses should then be subjected to potential
refutation
through the execution of well-designed, carefully controlled experiments having sufficient
statistical power
to distinguish genuine effects of relatively modest size from differences that can easily be
explained as
chance occurrences.
One of the most obviously salient dimensions in the design of such experiments is size: once
formative
research has yielded hypotheses that are deemed sufficiently promising to warrant further
evaluation, a
number of independently conducted, large-scale empirical studies, each following a substantial
number of
students over a significant period of time, will be necessary to obtain statistically significant
results
involving a non-trivial number of dependent and independent variables. Since different
approaches may
prove optimal in different subject areas, at different grade and ability levels, with different sorts
of teachers,
and for students with different needs, interests, backgrounds, current knowledge, and learning
styles, the
systematic investigation of how technology might best be used to improve K-12 education in
the United
States is likely to involve hundreds of thousands of student-years of experimental research.
Another important consideration is the extent to which the results of a given empirical study can
be
generalized to other educational settings. While experimentation within an unusually enriched
laboratory
environment may well be productive under certain circumstances, it is important that a
substantial amount
of research also be conducted under conditions more typical of actual classrooms, using
ordinary teachers
(and not, for example, only those who are unusually well educated or highly motivated), and
without access
to unusual financial or other resources, for example, or to special outside support from
university
researchers. If our goal is to understand how technology can best be used within real schools, it
is essential
that, at some point, large-scale experiments actually be conducted within such schools.
Finally, it is important that the results of such research whether positive or negative be widely
disseminated within the education and educational research communities. High standards of
peer review
should be encouraged within the scholarly journals that publish papers dealing with educational
technology,
and federal support should be provided for conferences and workshops designed to bring
researchers
together for regular, informal interaction as well as the timely presentation of new research
results.
Substantial federal funding should also be provided for high-quality doctoral research on the use
of
technology in education; apart from the direct contribution that such research can make to the
state of
knowledge within the field, federal support should help to increase the output of Ph.D.s capable
of
conducting further research in this area and/or preparing teachers to use technology effectively
within their
classrooms.
In the long run, the Panel believes that much of the promise of educational technology is likely
to remain
unfulfilled in the absence of a significant increase in the level of funding available for research
in this area.
This danger, however, is probably best understood as a special case of a broader problem: the
dramatic
underfunding (relative to overall educational expenditure levels) of education research in
general.177
The magnitude of the problem is illustrated by a (somewhat oversimplified) comparison
between the
American education system and the American pharmaceutical industry. In 1995, the United
States spent
about $70 billion on prescription and non-prescription medications, and invested about 23
percent of this
amount on drug development and testing. By way of contrast, our nation spent about $300
billion on public
K-12 education in 1995, but invested less than 0.1 percent of that amount to determine what
educational
techniques actually work, and to find ways to improve them.
Moreover, while pharmaceutical research expenditures have increased significantly over the
past few
decades as new technologies opened new avenues for medicinal innovation, research funded
through the
National Institute of Education178
dropped by a
factor of five (in
constant dollars) between 1973 and 1986.
In fairness, it should be noted that not all educational research is funded by the Department of
Education.
Funds are also allocated by the Defense Department, the National Science Foundation, the
National
Institutes of Health, and the National Institute for Mental Health for various forms of
education-related
research and evaluation. While some of these expenditures (NSF funding for research related to
the
teaching of science and mathematics at the elementary and secondary school levels, for
example) are
directed toward K-12 education, however, much of the mission-oriented research conducted in
these other
agencies is less directly relevant.
State, local, and industrial support for research-related activities has for the most part been
limited to
functions that are unlikely to significantly advance the general state of knowledge within the
field of
education, including the collection of statistical data for administrative and planning purposes
and for
compliance with various statutory requirements, and support for local or statewide policy
formulation. This
phenomenon is easily accounted for by economic externalities analogous to those discussed in
Section 8.3:
Because no one state, municipality, or private firm could hope to capture more than a small
fraction of the
benefits associated with a fundamental advance in our understanding of the best way to educate
elementary
and secondary students in general, it would be unrealistic to expect such entities to conduct
meaningful
programs of basic research in education. While geographic decentralization may well be a
useful heuristic
in "reengineering" government for the more efficient execution of many public functions, the
Panel believes
this strategy to be generally inappropriate for the funding of research in either education in
general or
educational technology in particular.
Although modest funding for education research has historically been available through private
foundations
and corporate philanthropic programs, such institutions have in recent years tended to favor
"action-oriented" programs over research and evaluation. In a 1991 report summarizing the
findings of its Project
on Funding Priorities for Educational Research, the National Academy of Education reported
that "there is
concern in the research community that numerous foundations are abandoning research in favor
of
demonstration projects with no research components whatsoever."180
In view of both the importance of elementary and secondary education to America's future and
the
enormous investment our nation makes in such education each year, the Panel recommends that
after a brief
transitional period involving substantial yearly increases, a steady-state allocation of no less
than 0.5
percent of our nation's aggregate K-12 educational spending (or approximately $1.5 billion per
year at
present expenditure levels) be made to federally sponsored research aimed specifically at
improving the
efficacy and cost-effectiveness of K-12 education in the United States.
While this sum may seem quite large in absolute terms, when expressed as a fraction of total
educational
expenditures, it is some ten to twenty times lower than the comparable ratio in most
knowledge-based
industries. More importantly, because even a modest improvement in the cost-effectiveness of
the
educational process would result in an enormous reduction in the public expenditures required
to achieve a
given level of educational outcomes, the Panel believes that such an investment could result in
substantial
savings over time. Even these savings, however, would likely pale by comparison with the
long-term dollar
impact that a significantly improved K-12 educational system could be expected to have on our
nation's
economic competitiveness throughout the early decades of the twenty-first century.
Since technology is likely to be inextricably integrated throughout the new curricula arising
from such
investigations, it may be counterproductive to sequester all funds for educational technology
research within
a separate category, divorced from other aspects of educational research. Rather than propose a
specific
value for the technological component of such research, the Panel would thus offer only the
qualitative
recommendation that the use of computing and networking technologies be considered and,
where
appropriate, investigated whenever they might seem to be potentially useful in achieving the
higher-level
educational goals that motivate the educational research program proposed in this subsection.
It should be noted that substantial federal funding is a necessary, but not a sufficient
precondition for
progress in understanding the ways in which technology might best be used to support K-12
education; also
important is the manner in which the federal government structures and administers the research
programs
that are organized to effect such progress. As noted in Section 8.3, the Panel believes that such
a research
effort should include federal support for a relatively large number of small- and
intermediate-scale projects
managed independently by individual investigators and small teams. Such projects should be
particularly
valuable over the next few years, when early-stage, exploratory research is being conducted to
generate
hypotheses for rigorous empirical testing. While some degree of programmatic coordination
may be useful
to ensure adequate coverage of all relevant areas, the principal focus of such an early-stage
program should
be on extramural, investigator-initiated research, with grants and contracts awarded largely
through a
process of peer review by outside experts.
The Panel's emphasis on the importance of numerous independently conceived and executed
research
projects of relatively limited scale is not intended to discourage the provision of large-scale,
sustained
federal funding directed toward "centers of excellence" or other larger-scale programs; indeed,
the "critical
mass" associated with such centers and programs could well play an important role in catalyzing
research
progress in the field of educational technology. Such concentrated research efforts might be
domiciled
within academic institutions, research institutes, federal laboratories, or industrial sites, and
might in some
cases be distributed among a number of different geographic locations. Particular attention
should be given
to collaborative efforts that bring together universities and K-12 schools for experimental
research situated
within real classrooms a type of project for which it is currently relatively difficult to secure
funding.
Large-scale, coordinated projects will be particularly important in the later stages of research on
the use of
technology to support the objectives of educational reform, when hypotheses formulated during
the early,
exploratory phase are ready for rigorous, empirical evaluation. In order to draw reliable
conclusions that
can be used with confidence by educators and policy-makers, it will be necessary to
systematically gather
data from a large number of schools. To be maximally useful, such data should be collected in
a well-coordinated, standardized manner (or at very least, should be sufficiently comparable to
support meaningful
meta-analyses based on all relevant studies). This will require the cooperation of a number of
researchers
and practitioners, and could be facilitated in important ways by programmatic coordination at
the federal
level. In the long term, important results should also be independently replicated under
different conditions
and by independent teams of investigators, adding further to the scope and scale of such an
undertaking, and
to the amount of data that will need to be collected within authentic classroom environments.
While the magnitude of these data requirements may appear to be quite formidable in absolute
terms, it is
actually very small relative to the enormity of America's K-12 student population. While some
may object
on principle to the use of our children as "guinea pigs," the reality is that such research could
easily be
organized in such a way as to involve only a small fraction of our nation's students, and to have
a minimal
impact on any single such student. Indeed, given the importance of elementary and secondary
education,
the substantial percentage of all public expenditures that are allocated to its support, and the
widespread
application of scientific methods to most other enterprises of comparable import, it is the lack
of such
experimentation that should perhaps be most alarming from a public policy viewpoint.
To pursue our earlier comparison along a different dimension, although some hundreds of
thousands of
Americans have been enrolled in FDA-approved trials designed to gather data on the safety and
efficacy of
new drugs, we have never undertaken an even remotely comparable effort to systematically
collect the sort
of data that might help us to evaluate the effectiveness of the educational techniques we are
currently using
to teach America's 51 million K-12 students. With suitable ethical controls
Although quantitative considerations of the sort discussed above will play an important role in
the
formulation of federal policy for large-scale empirical research on educational technology,
research quality
will be equally important. A concrete demonstration of what is attainable when the highest
scientific
standards are brought to bear on federally funded research in the area of educational technology
is provided
by the National Science Foundation, which is highly regarded both for the quality of the
research it has
supported in the field of educational technology (and in other, related areas) and for the manner
in which
funding decisions have been reached. While supporting a substantial increase in
NSF-sponsored research
on the use of technology in education,
To avoid the politicization and other problems which, in the past, have compromised the quality
of research
conducted under the auspices of OERI and its institutional predecessors,184 concrete structural measures should be adopted to ensure the
excellence,
independence, and scientific integrity of all federally sponsored research on educational
technology in
particular and education in general. Specifically, the Panel recommends that the President
appoint a board
of distinguished outside experts to formulate an agenda for a coordinated, inter-agency program
of rigorous
scientific research in the field of education, and to oversee the execution of this program on an
ongoing
basis. The membership of such an oversight board should include not only educational
researchers, but also
leading researchers in other disciplines that might be relevant in terms of either content or
methodology.
More generally, the Panel believes that substantially greater progress is likely to be made in
expanding the
current state of knowledge within the field of both education in general and educational
technology in
particular if research in these areas is conducted not only by investigators who are already
working in the
field of education, but also by highly qualified individuals trained in any of a wide range of
other scientific,
mathematical, or engineering disciplines. While it will be necessary for such individuals to
acquire certain
education-specific knowledge and skills, many of the research methodologies, conceptual
frameworks, and
technical skills associated with such disciplines are likely to prove transferable to the
development and
rigorous evaluation of innovative pedagogical methods. Moreover, the participation of
substantial numbers
of such individuals would seem likely to result in the infusion of new ideas into the educational
research
community and the promotion of high standards of methodological rigor within the field.
As it happens, American universities are currently producing more Ph.D.s in certain scientific,
mathematical, and engineering disciplines than can be readily absorbed within the occupations
for which
they were trained, while many of our national laboratories are searching for new ways to
productively
deploy their respective pools of research talent. At such a time, the prospect of mobilizing a
substantial
corps of researchers trained in other fields to work with educators and educational researchers
toward the
systematic improvement of America's primary and secondary schools seems no less compelling
than such
multidisciplinary historical antecedents as the Manhattan Project or the space program. Federal
support for
such research efforts, and for graduate and postdoctoral training aimed at preparing individuals
trained in
other disciplines to conduct research applicable to K-12 education, could thus play an important
role in
achieving the research objectives outlined in this report.
Another important public policy question related to research on educational technologies is
whether the
deployment of computers and digital networks within our nation's schools should be delayed
pending the
availability of better data on the ways in which such technologies might be most effectively
used. The
Panel feels strongly that it would be a serious mistake to follow this course of action, however
tempting that
might appear from a fiscal perspective. While one might wish that an ambitious program of
research on
educational technologies had been launched several years ago, limitations in our current
knowledge must
not be used as an excuse to allow our schools to fall further behind other information-based
institutions in
their use of computing and networking technologies. In the words of Professor Chris Dede, "the
most
dangerous experiment we can conduct with our children is to keep schooling them the same at a
time when
every other aspect of our society is dramatically changing."
In his State of the Union address on January 23, 1996, President Clinton announced the
President's
Educational Technology Initiative, which was formulated with the aim of ultimately achieving
four top-level goals:
While the current report is organized somewhat differently for expository purposes, it will be
noted that
most of the areas the Panel has identified as critical to the successful deployment of educational
technology
are encompassed by the President's initiative. Moreover, the Panel's review of various
documents
generated by the White House, the Department of Education, the Committee on Education and
Training of
the National Science and Technology Council, the Office of Science and Technology Policy,
and other
sources within the executive branch suggests that the directions currently being pursued by the
Administration are for the most part consistent with those the Panel believes to be most
important. This
impression has been reinforced in the course of formal briefings by and informal discussions
with both
federal officials and members of the educational technology community.
The most important respect in which the Panel believes the President's initiative should be
fundamentally
broadened and strengthened, however, relates to the pressing need for large-scale, federally
sponsored
research and evaluation, as discussed in Section 8. More generally, the Panel believes that it
will be
difficult for our nation to realize the full potential of educational technology in the absence of
strong and
substantive action at the federal level, the locus of which must necessarily extend far beyond the
bully
pulpit. Although certain activities may well be appropriate for execution at lower levels of
government (as
contemplated by several of the proposals discussed below), it is important that responsibilities
not devolve
to the states and municipalities that cannot, in fact, be efficiently or effectively discharged at
those levels.
One program that has successfully leveraged a relatively small federal investment to provide
substantial
benefit within a number of communities is the Technology Learning Challenge, which provides
funding to
support the application of technology within American schools. The program awards five-year
grants
averaging $1 million each to local consortia headed by a board of education or other local
education
agency, but including other partners as well.
The program places a strong emphasis on content and curricula, professional development, and
the
evaluation of educational effectiveness. As described in the program announcement,
"Challenge Grants for
Technology in Education are not about technology. Challenge Grants are about how to use
technology to
improve learning." Special preference is given to applications that "serve areas with a high
number or
percentage of disadvantaged students or other areas with the greatest need for educational
technology,"
addressing some of the concerns expressed in Section 7. The program was inaugurated in 1995
with the
award of 19 grants, selected (based on the recommendation of an external panel of experts)
from among the
proposals of some 530 applicants. The Panel strongly supports the continuation of the
Technology
Learning Challenge, and believes that it should be funded at a significantly higher level.189
Among the programs that together comprise the President's Educational Technology Initiative,
the most
ambitious in financial terms is the Technology Literacy Challenge, which was proposed by
President
Clinton on February 15, 1996. The focal point of this program is a proposed $2 billion
Technology
Literacy Fund that would be used to "catalyze and leverage state, local, and private sector
efforts"190 to meet the four goals outlined in
Section 9.1.
Funds would be
allocated to each state based on student enrollment, but would be subject to a one-to-one private
sector
matching requirement, which could take the form of volunteer time or discounted products and
services as
an alternative to cash contributions.191
Each state
would be
given considerable flexibility in deciding how to achieve the goals of the President's
Educational
Technology Initiative. Provisions are also included for funding educational technology projects
initiated by
local communities or by consortia of private companies and local communities.
Though the Panel does not believe that either the Technology Challenge Grants or the
Technology Literacy
Challenge will in themselves be sufficient to realize the full promise of educational technology,
it is
nonetheless supportive of both of these programs, which it believes could play a particularly
important role
over the next few years a period during which wide-ranging, exploratory experimentation with a
number
of different technological and pedagogic approaches is likely to prove most productive. As
examples of
apparently successful (or at least promising) applications of educational technology begin to
emerge,
however, it will become increasingly important to follow up on such anecdotal results with
rigorous,
systematic, large-scale experimentation to determine which approaches are in fact most
effective and cost-effective.
While some states have in recent years been wary of nearly all forms of federal involvement in
the
education of their students, the Panel believes that the future welfare of all of our nation's
students will be
compromised if provisions are not made to ensure that individual states, localities, school
districts, and
schools cooperate in collecting the invaluable and irreplaceable data that is likely to be
generated as a result
of federally sponsored educational technology programs. Once sufficient data has been
collected, funding
will also be required for research aimed at analyzing and interpreting this data. Because no one
state will be
able to capture all of the benefits accruing from such studies, it is important that research funds
be
appropriated at the federal (and not the state or local) level in order to avoid a systematic
underinvestment
relative to the economically optimal spending level, as discussed in Section 8.
The effort to incorporate technology within America's K-12 schools has also been directly or
indirectly
advanced by a number of other programs that have been initiated, supported, or promoted by the
White
House. The Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program, for
example, which
was created in 1994 within the Commerce Department's National Telecommunications and
Information
Administration, has provided federal matching funds (in partnership with state, local, and
private sector
sources) for local efforts to develop the information infrastructure available to schools and other
public
institutions. The Panel believes, however, that this program should be funded at a level
sufficient to
provide support for a larger percentage of those consortia whose applications are deemed
meritorious.
From the viewpoint of educational technology, one of the most important pieces of recently
enacted federal
legislation is the Telecommunications Act of 1996,
Other existing federal programs address certain of the teacher-related needs identified in Section
5. The
Department of Education's Regional Technology Consortia Program, for example, was designed
to help
educators (among others) to utilize technology through various forms of professional
development,
technical assistance, and information dissemination. The Educational Resources Information
Clearing
House (ERIC) service provides sample lesson plans, information related to educational reform,
and answers
to questions posed by teachers via electronic mail; while this program encompasses a number of
other
aspects of education as well, ERIC could potentially be of considerable value in helping
educators to
integrate technology into the curriculum.
In the present environment of fiscal austerity, tools available to the President for effecting
change with little
or no budgetary impact have assumed special importance. The Administration has thus far
made
considerable use of such tools, relying on the purposeful coordination of already-funded
programs, the
encouragement of extra-governmental efforts based largely on voluntarism, and the personal
persuasive
powers of the President and Vice President to leverage those aspects of the President's
Educational
Technology Initiative that will require the appropriation or redeployment of federal funding.
While such
activities should not be regarded as a substitute for funded initiatives, the Panel believes these
efforts should
be continued.
One example in the first category is provided by the Committee on Education and Training
(CET) of the
National Science and Technology Council, which was established in part to promote the use of
technology
for education and training, and to coordinate the programs of the various federal agencies that
currently
engage in education-related research and development. The CET Subcommittee on Research
and
Development in Education and Training has identified four "focus areas" to be pursued on a
coordinated
cross-agency basis: the demonstration of innovative educational technology and networking
applications;
the formulation of new models for evaluating learning and learning productivity; the
development of high-quality, affordable technology-based learning tools and environments; and
research on learning and
cognitive processes, with special emphasis on the ways in which technology might be used to
best support
the learning process.
Having reviewed the specific program elements defined within each of these areas and a few
early examples
of inter-agency cooperation in the development and application of educational technologies, the
Panel is
supportive of the CET Subcommittee's efforts. It is important, however, to recognize the
limitations of an
effort whose impact will be dependent in part on the sustained cooperation of a diverse group of
mission-oriented agencies, and not to rely on such a working group as a substitute for a unified,
large-scale, well-funded program in the area of educational technology R&D. While
coordinative efforts of this sort can help
to avoid the needless duplication of previously independent efforts and to facilitate the sharing
of research
tools and results, it would be unrealistic to expect such an effort to achieve by itself the
objectives outlined
in Section 8 of this report.
Another feature of the President's Educational Technology Initiative is its extensive reliance on
both private
firms and nonprofit organizations to help our nation's schools make effective use of computer
and
networking technologies. The White House has thrown its support, for example, behind a
private sector
organization called the Tech Corps, which was organized to coordinate the provision of
technical assistance
to the nation's schools by a network of volunteers in various communities throughout the
country.197 The President and Vice President have
also met
with a number
of business leaders to enlist their support for the Administration's educational technology
efforts, and both
participated personally in NetDay96, a "high-tech barn-raising" event in which some 200
private companies
and thousands of individual volunteers helped to wire a significant fraction of California's
elementary and
secondary schools to the Internet.198
The Panel believes that volunteer-based organizations and events of this sort can play an
important role in
introducing technology into our nation's classrooms not only by contributing directly to the
creation of
essential infrastructure, but by calling public attention to the pressing technological (and other)
needs of our
nation's K-12 schools. It is again important, however, that important policy decisions not be
made on the
assumption that such voluntary efforts will greatly reduce the magnitude of the undertaking that
will be
required to effectively utilize computing and networking technologies within America's
elementary and
secondary schools on an ongoing basis. Although volunteers may well be able to assist in
installing
equipment on a one-time or short-term basis, securing the long-term commitments required to
maintain and
administer such systems may be more difficult, since interest in such purely voluntary efforts
often wanes
over time particularly in the case of exciting, timely, event-oriented projects, which may
generate a degree
of initial enthusiasm that is difficult to sustain over a protracted period.
Even in the absence of such attrition, programs based on voluntarism can be expected to address
only a
subset of the human resource needs identified by the Panel in this report. While a not
insignificant segment
of the American workforce has acquired the sorts of technical skills that might be useful in the
course of
installing and operating a computer system, a much smaller number also possess the pedagogic
expertise
and the knowledge of available educational software that would be necessary to help a teacher
learn to use
such hardware effectively within a K-12 classroom environment. Excessive reliance on
voluntary efforts
may also exacerbate some of the problems of equitable access discussed in Section 7; a rural
school in a
largely agricultural region, for example, may find it far more difficult to attract a large number
of volunteers
with the requisite knowledge of computer and networking technologies than one located in
California's
Silicon Valley or in the Route 128 area in Massachusetts. Notwithstanding these caveats, it
seems clear that
White House support has been helpful in mobilizing volunteers and other private sector
resources to
advance the cause of educational technology, and the Panel would encourage the continuation
of such
efforts as a complementary adjunct to funded programs.
Both the President and Vice President have assumed visible roles in promoting the use of the
Internet by
educational institutions, calling for the connection of all American classrooms to the Internet by
the year
2000. More immediately, Vice President Gore has launched an initiative whose goal is the
provision of
Internet connections to all schools in the nation's Empowerment Zones fifteen distressed
communities in
various urban and rural areas across the nation thus addressing some of the most serious
concerns
expressed in Section 7. The Vice President also initiated the GLOBE program, which uses the
Internet as a
vehicle for involving students, teachers, and scientists around the world in the collaborative
collection,
exchange, and analysis of environmental data.
The President and Vice President have also used their respective offices to acknowledge (and
thus direct
attention toward) the efforts of those who have made particularly effective use of educational
technology an inexpensive policy tool which the Panel believes should continue to be exploited.
Visits to
"success story" schools like those identified in Section 2.3, along with physical (albeit largely
symbolic)
participation in voluntary projects, result in media coverage that helps to focus national
attention on the
potential significance of technology within an educational context. A similar effect obtains
when the
presidential imprimatur is conferred upon an organization like the American Technology Honor
Society,
which was created by the National Association of Secondary School Principals and the
Technology Student
Association to recognize and encourage the (sometimes surprisingly substantial) contributions
of students
themselves toward the incorporation of technology within their schools.
While information technologies have had an enormous impact within America's offices,
factories and stores
over the past several decades, our country's K-12 educational system has thus far been only
minimally
affected by the information revolution. Although it is not yet possible to fully characterize the
optimal ways
in which computing and networking technologies might be used, the Panel believes that such
technologies
have the potential to transform our schools in important ways, and finds ample (albeit partially
anecdotal)
justification for the immediate and widespread incorporation of such technologies within all of
our nation's
elementary and secondary schools.
The Panel's assessment of current technology usage within America's elementary and secondary
schools is
outlined below, along with a discussion of some of the most formidable challenges that will
have to be met
if the promise of educational technology is to be realized.
Hardware and Infrastructure
Significant investments will be necessary in hardware and infrastructure if educational
technology is to be
effectively utilized on a nationwide basis. American schools are now purchasing hardware at a
relatively
rapid rate, but the ratio of computers to students remains suboptimal from an educational
viewpoint, and
those machines which are available are often obsolete, and thus incapable of executing
contemporary
applications software. In addition, the computers in many schools are centralized within a
single laboratory
rather than distributed among the various classrooms, making it difficult for teachers to
integrate technology
within the curriculum.
Used equipment donated by corporations may be of value under certain circumstances, and may
have
collateral benefit to the extent such involvement helps to draw the private sector into closer
contact with our
schools. It should be noted, however, that the value of such donations (particularly when
measured net of
public revenue reductions associated with the corresponding federal and state tax deductions)
may in other
cases be offset by the increased maintenance costs and decreased utility typically associated
with older
machines, and by the need to integrate and support multiple platforms. Hardware donations are
thus
unlikely to obviate the need for a significant federal, state, and/or local investment in new
equipment, and in
the personnel-related expenditures (for installation, training, systems administration, user
support, and
hardware and software maintenance) that in fact account for the majority of the life-cycle cost
of a computer
system.
The inadequate physical and telecommunications infrastructure of our nation's schools poses
another
challenge for the effective exploitation of educational technologies. The optimal use of such
technologies
will require that computers be distributed throughout each school and interconnected through
both local-
and wide-area networks. The wiring systems in many school buildings, however, are incapable
of
supporting the electric power and data communications requirements of a modern networked
computing
environment. In some cases, the cost of retrofitting our schools for technology will be further
increased by
a lack of adequate air conditioning, by the presence of asbestos, and by various other factors.
Wiring
efforts based on the conscription of volunteers may be productive under certain circumstances
within
certain geographic areas, but cannot realistically be expected to make more than a relatively
modest overall
contribution toward solving the infrastructure and networking problems of America's schools.
Software, Content and Pedagogy
While a significant investment in hardware and infrastructure will be required if the promise of
educational
technology is to be realized, the Panel believes that the effective use of these resources to
improve our
nation's educational system poses an even greater challenge. Even the earliest computer-aided
instruction
systems (typically used in a "drill-and-practice" mode to teach isolated facts and basic skills)
provided the
benefits of self-pacing and individualized instruction, and a number of studies have found such
systems to
offer significant improvements in learning rate, particularly within low-achieving student
populations. In
recent years, however, attention has increasingly focused on the ways in which technology
might help to
achieve some of the central objectives of educational reform, providing students with the ability
to acquire
new knowledge, to solve "real-world" problems, and to execute novel and complex tasks
requiring the
effective integration of a wide range of basic skills.
Within the framework of this newer paradigm, technology is viewed not as a tool for improving
the
efficiency of traditional instructional methods based largely on the unidirectional transmission
of isolated
facts and skills from teacher to student, but as one element of a new constructivist approach in
which
teachers concentrate instead on helping their students to actively construct their own knowledge
bases and
skill sets. This approach is typically characterized by the independent exploration of a limited
number of
topics in unusual (relative to traditional instructional methods) depth, and often relies on the
availability of
extensive information resources that can be drawn upon by the student as and when needed.
Students may
also use the computer as a tool for various forms of simulation; for written, musical, or artistic
composition;
for mathematical manipulation and visualization; for the design of various devices,
environments, and
systems; for the acquisition of computer programming skills; for the collection and analysis of
laboratory
data; for many forms of problem-solving; and for various modes of group collaboration.
Neither the constructivist pedagogic model nor the proposed role of technology within a
constructivist
curriculum have yet been validated through a process of extensive, rigorous, large-scale
experimentation,
and it is quite possible that alternative approaches may ultimately be found useful as well. This
caveat
notwithstanding, a combination of theoretical considerations (based in part on research in
cognitive
psychology and other fields) and the observation of a limited number of apparent "success
stories" suggest
that computing and networking technologies could potentially find their most powerful
application within
the framework of the constructivist paradigm.
While the role of the teacher is likely to change within a technology-rich constructivist
classroom, the Panel
found no evidence to suggest a diminution of that role. Preliminary research suggests that the
potential
benefits of such an environment decline as class size increases, and that teachers will still be
required to
play an important role in helping students to assimilate abstract concepts and develop
higher-order thinking
skills. Teachers can be expected to spend a great deal of time monitoring, directing, and
assisting in the
(largely self-directed) learning process, and helping to "debug" faulty "mental models." There
is some
(again preliminary) evidence that students spend more time interacting with teachers and other
students
within the technology-rich classroom, calling into question the intuitively plausible notion that
computers
might interfere with the acquisition of valuable social and collaborative skills. Technology may
also
improve educational outcomes by supporting various forms of interaction with parents and the
community.
While the greatest promise of educational technology lies in the possibility of utilizing
computers and
networks as an integral part of virtually all aspects of the curriculum, most of the elementary
and secondary
schools that actually use such technologies today do so in far more limited ways. A large
fraction of current
usage especially at the high school level is accounted for by "computer education," which aims
to teach
students about computers (focusing, for example, on the acquisition of keyboarding skills;
instruction in the
use of word processing, database management, spreadsheet, and other software tools; and the
study of
computer programming) rather than using computers as a tool for learning in all subject areas.
Educational
games and instruction in isolated basic skills also account for a significant portion of current
usage particularly within the elementary school but few schools have integrated computing and
networking technologies extensively and effectively into the learning process, or used it as a key
element of
educational reform.
One obstacle to the effective integration of information technology is a dearth of state-of-the-art
software
and digital content designed for the K-12 school environment. A plateau in the sales of
traditional
Integrated Learning Systems has led to a precipitous decrease in R&D spending by ILS vendors
at a time
when education reform is placing new demands on such systems. Moreover, neither traditional
vendors nor
newly organized firms have thus far invested in the development of software suitable for use
within a
constructivist curriculum to the extent that will be required to effectively cover a wide range of
content
areas (especially at the secondary school level) and skill levels. Among the apparent reasons for
these
market problems are weak incentives for private sector R&D (resulting from inadequate
software
acquisition budgets and various forms of market fragmentation); lack of modern hardware
within the
schools; peculiarities in the procedures used for software procurement; and inadequate federal
funding for
innovative early-stage research whose benefits cannot be appropriated by any one company, and
which is
thus unlikely to be conducted without public sector involvement an economic externality
sometimes
referred to as the "free rider" problem.
Teachers and Technology
In order to effectively integrate new technologies into the curriculum, teachers will have to
select
appropriate software, construct new lesson plans, resolve a number of logistical problems, and
develop
appropriate methods of assessing student work. The Panel finds, however, that our nation's
K-12 teachers
currently receive little technical, pedagogic or administrative support for these activities, and
that few
colleges of education adequately prepare their graduates to use information technologies in their
teaching.
Contributing to this problem is the fact that only about 15 percent of the typical computer
budget is devoted
to professional development, compared with the 30 percent or more that is generally believed to
represent a
more optimal allocation. Moreover, most of these expenditures are aimed at training teachers to
operate a
computer, rather than to use computers to enhance their teaching. In addition, many teachers do
not have
adequate access to technological and pedagogical support on an ongoing, "as-needed" basis.
Fewer than
five percent of all schools have full-time computer coordinators capable of providing such
sustained
assistance, and such coordinators as are available typically spend only 20 percent of their time
helping
teachers, selecting software, or formulating technology-oriented lesson plans.
Fortunately, technological progress may itself contribute toward the solution of some of the
problems of
professional development by making educational software easier for teachers to use; by helping
teachers in
various ways to recover some of the time invested in the introduction of technology; and by
supporting
online professional development seminars and remote mentoring and consulting activities,
which the Panel
believes are likely to prove significantly more cost-effective than conventional instruction under
appropriate
circumstances.
Perhaps the greatest single factor now holding back the adequate preparation of teachers is a
lack of
sufficient time in their work week to effectively incorporate technology into the curriculum.
Unless
additional time can be made available by eliminating or de-emphasizing other, less critical
tasks, however,
each hour set aside in the school week for technology-related curricular design and professional
development can be expected to (directly or indirectly) add between $4 and $5 billion to our
nation's yearly
expenditures for K-12 education. Moreover, research reviewed by the Panel suggests that the
typical
teacher will require between three and six years to fully integrate technology into his or her
teaching; in the
presence of continued technological innovation, a teacher's learning curve is thus unlikely to
ever level off
entirely.
While America's colleges of education have the potential to play an invaluable role in preparing
our
teachers to use technology effectively in their professional activities, information gathered by
the Panel
suggests that most education schools are still far from realizing that potential. Although
pre-service
instruction in the use of technology is required by 22 states (in contrast with only two states that
require in-service training), the courses used to satisfy such requirements typically provide no
actual experience in
using computers to teach, and impart little knowledge of available software and content.
In order to prepare our teachers for the effective use of technology, education schools will have
to
overcome some of the same problems now encountered by our nation's K-12 schools:
inadequate funding
for the acquisition of hardware and software; a paucity of programs aimed at providing
education school
faculty members with the background necessary to prepare future teachers in the use of
technology; and the
lack of sufficient time for professors of education to incorporate technology within both the
content and
methods of their courses.
Economic Considerations
Based on currently available data, the Panel estimates that public elementary and secondary
schools in the
United States spent between $3.5 and $4 billion on educational technology during the 1995-96
school year,
including investments in hardware, wiring, infrastructural enhancements, software and digital
information
resources, systems support, and technology-related professional development. This figure,
which represents
about 1.3 percent of projected total spending in our schools, is extraordinarily low by
comparison with most
other information-based industries, and in the opinion of the Panel, will have to rise
significantly if
technology is to have a material impact on the quality of American education.
By way of contrast with these current expenditure figures, the seven studies reviewed by the
Panel suggest
that annual expenditures of between $6 billion and $28 billion (or between 2.4 and 11.3 percent
of total
educational spending) will likely be required to adequately support various degrees of
technology usage
within the public schools, and that even those spending levels will be insufficient to support the
sort of
technology usage that might be considered optimal if cost were not an issue. Because
computing and
networking hardware will account for only a minority of this spending, educators and
policy-makers will not
be able to rely solely on one-time bond issues and private capital campaigns of the sort often
used to finance
the construction of school buildings, and will have to budget for substantial ongoing operating
expenditures
if they are to avoid a situation in which valuable hardware is left unused.
Based on models from other industries, it seems likely that further experience with the use of
technology in
our schools could ultimately result in significant improvements over time in the educational
outcomes
achievable at a given level of expenditure. Such improvements, however, are likely to be
critically
dependent on rigorous, large-scale programs of research and evaluation aimed at assessing the
efficacy and
cost-effectiveness of various approaches to the use of technology in actual K-12 classrooms.
Most importantly, educational technology expenditures are best analyzed not on the basis of
cost alone, but
in terms of return on investment. While it would be difficult to quantify all of the benefits that
might be
derived from the use of educational technology, the Panel believes that a substantial investment
in
technology may be justifiable even if no value is placed on the direct (economic and
non-economic)
benefits accruing to the American people, using return calculations based solely on projected
marginal tax
revenues associated with an increase in their expected lifetime taxable earnings.
Equitable Access
Educational technologies have the potential to either ameliorate or exacerbate the growing gulf
between
advantaged and disadvantaged Americans, depending on policy decisions involving the ways in
which such
technologies are deployed and utilized on behalf of various segments of our country's student
population.
Although federal programs have played a major role in limiting certain inequities, disparities in
the access
to and use of information technologies by students of different socioeconomic status (SES), race
and
ethnicity, gender, and geographical location, and by children with various types of special
needs, remain a
source of concern to the Panel.
Income-related inequities in the number of students per in-school computer have narrowed
significantly
over the past decade, largely as a result of Title I spending, which provided about $2 billion in
federal
funding over that period for the provision of educational technology within low-income schools.
Low-SES
students, however, still use computers less extensively in school, and are less likely to use
computers for
higher-order learning activities, than their higher-income peers. Such disparities may be
accounted for in
part by differences in the preparation and support available to teachers at more and less affluent
schools.
The largest SES-related inequities, however, are found in the availability of computers within
the home:
Whereas computers were found in 73 percent of all homes with college-educated parents and
more than
$50,000 in annual household income in 1995, they were present in only 14 percent of all
households headed
by adults having no more than a high-school education and a combined income of less than
$30,000. Since
school-aged children in homes with computers frequently use these machines for schoolwork or
other
educational purposes, these SES-related disparities in home computer ownership materially
limit the
educational opportunities available to low-income students, and thus help to perpetuate familial
patterns of
socioeconomic disadvantage.
As in the case of socioeconomic status, Title I funding has helped to reduce, but not eliminate,
racial and
ethnic disparities in the access to computers within the school. Hispanic students, in particular,
attend
schools with an unusually low density of computers, especially at the elementary school level.
Once again,
however, the disparity is even greater within the home. As of 1993, for example, the rate of
computer
ownership was 57 percent lower in African-American homes, and 59 percent lower within
Hispanic
households, than in the homes of non-Hispanic whites. While a portion of this gap is accounted
for by
differences in socioeconomic status, differences of 36 percent and 39 percent, respectively,
remain even
after controlling for household income, educational attainment, age, gender, and location of
residence
(urban or rural). Race and ethnicity thus represent an independent source of inequity in
children's access to
educational technology a source of additional concern to the Panel.
Although certain regional differences are apparent in the use of computers, in-school computer
density is
roughly comparable across the nation's Western, Midwestern, Northeastern and Southern
regions. Rural
schools enjoy a significantly higher density than their urban counterparts, but this difference
would appear
to be largely explained by the fact that rural schools are smaller on average, and smaller schools
tend to
have a higher computer density. While the available statistics do not support a definitive
quantitative
comparison of different types of urban environments, anecdotal evidence suggests that inner
city schools
may face special problems in making effective use of educational technology, as may rural
schools in
certain areas where wide area networking is rendered more expensive by a lack of economical
telecommunications access.
Gender-specific variation in the extent of computer use is relatively small in magnitude, both in
school and
at home, but certain systematic differences are found in the ways in which boys and girls use
computers.
Although research has shown that high school girls make 50 percent greater use of the computer
for word
processing than their male classmates, for example, they have been found to account for only 26
percent of
all elective computer use before and after school, and for only 20 percent of all in-school
computer-based
game-playing activities. There is also some evidence that girls and boys engaging in
computer-related
learning activities may differ in their relative responses to cooperative, competitive, or
individualistic
reward structures a phenomenon which, if validated, could have implications for both the
design of
optimal pedagogical methods for and the provision of equitable access to male and female K-12
students.
One less obvious form of inequity involves the accessibility of educational technology to
low-achieving
students. The available data indicates that students with higher grades are allowed more
in-school computer
time than their underperforming peers, in spite of a substantial body of evidence suggesting that
technology
may in fact be of greater relative benefit to low-achieving than to high-achieving students. This
disparity is
compounded by the fact that when underperforming students do use computers, they are more
likely than
high achievers to engage in drill and practice on isolated basic skills, and less likely to use
computers for
tasks involving the acquisition and integration of a wide range of knowledge a practice that runs
counter
to the recommendations of many educational technology researchers.
Technology also has the potential to significantly improve the educational opportunities
available to many
American students with learning disabilities, behavior disorders, emotional problems, or
physical
disabilities. The realization of this potential, however, will depend in part on the widespread
availability of
special input, output, and other devices, and of teachers and support personnel who have the
training
necessary to effectively deploy such technologies. The case for federal involvement in
mobilizing
technology on behalf of students with special needs rests in part on the observation that within a
typical
school district (and in the case of certain less common disabilities, even within a given state),
the number of
students with a given disability is likely to be too small to adequately amortize the cost of
researching,
developing, and effectively deploying the assistive technologies that would provide appropriate
educational
support for those students.
Research and Evaluation
Both the enormous importance and the enormous cost of K-12 education in the United States
argue for
careful research on the ways in which computing and networking technologies can be used to
improve
educational outcomes and the ratio of benefits to costs. The majority of the empirical research
reported to
date has focused on traditional, tutorial-based applications of computers. Several
meta-analyses, each based
on dozens of independent studies, have found that students using such technology significantly
outperform
those taught without the use of such systems, with the largest differences recorded for students
of lower
socioeconomic status, low-achievers, and those with certain special learning problems. While
certain
methodological and interpretive questions have been raised with respect to these results, the
most significant
issue may be the question of whether the variables being measured are in fact well correlated
with the forms
of learning many now feel are most important.
Although constructivist applications of technology are intended to more directly support the
goals of the
current educational reform movement, research on such applications is still at a relatively early
stage. Most
of the work in this area is formative in nature, intended more as a preliminary exploration of
new
intellectual territory than a definitive evaluation of any one possible solution. Although some
interesting
and potentially promising empirical results have been reported in the literature, a substantial
amount of
well-designed experimental research will ultimately be required to obtain definitive, widely
replicated
results that shed light on the underlying sources of any positive effects, and which are
sufficiently general to
permit straightforward application within a wide range of realistic school environments.
One important issue that arises in this context is the manner in which "favorable" educational
outcomes are
defined and measured for purposes of evaluating the relative effectiveness of alternative
approaches to the
use of technology. Conventional, standardized multiple-choice tests have certain advantages,
but tend to
emphasize the accumulation of isolated facts and basic skills, and not the acquisition of
higher-order
thinking and problem-solving competencies of the sorts that are central to both the
constructivist paradigm
and the goals of contemporary educational reform. Since researchers, educators and software
developers
can be expected to develop content and techniques that optimize student performance with
respect to
whatever criteria are employed to measure educational attainment, progress within the field of
educational
technology will depend critically on the development of metrics capable of serving as
appropriate and
reliable proxies for desired educational outcomes.
While research in a wide range of areas could directly or indirectly facilitate the effective
utilization of
educational technology within our nation's K-12 schools, much of the research that the Panel
believes to be
most important falls into one of the following three categories:
To date, however, research on educational technology (and indeed, on education in general) has
received
minimal funding particularly when measured relative to our nation's expenditures for K-12
education,
which currently total more than a quarter trillion dollars per year. By way of comparison,
whereas some 23
percent of all U.S. expenditures for prescription and non-prescription medications were applied
toward
pharmaceutical research in 1995, less than 0.1 percent of our nation's expenditures for
elementary and
secondary education in the same year were invested to determine what educational techniques
actually
work, and to find ways to improve them.
Research funded by the National Institute of Education dropped by a factor of five (in constant
dollars)
between 1973 and 1986, and although steps have recently been taken to ameliorate the severity
of this
decline, federal funding continues at a small fraction of the level that would seem appropriate
even if our
goal were solely to minimize ongoing expenditures by enhancing cost-effectiveness, without
any attempt to
improve educational outcomes. State, local, and industrial support for educational research has
for the most
part been limited to functions that are unlikely to significantly advance the general state of
knowledge
within the field, a reflection of intrinsic economic externalities that will not be overcome in the
absence of
funding at the highest level of taxing authority. Moreover, private foundations and corporate
philanthropic
programs have in recent years tended to favor "action-oriented" programs over research and
evaluation,
leaving no obvious alternative to pick up the slack left by inadequate federal funding.
Quality control problems affecting the administration of federal research programs in the field
of education
have historically presented another obstacle to progress in the field of educational technology.
While
certain programs (most notably, those overseen by the National Science Foundation) have
generally adhered
to high standards of excellence, independence, and scientific integrity, others (including the
Office of
Educational Research and Improvement and its institutional predecessors) have in the past been
adversely
affected by counterproductive political influence and other problems. Fortunately, considerable
attention
has been given over the past several years to the strengthening of OERI, which enjoys a broader
mandate in
some respects than the NSF, and could thus play an important role in advancing our nation's
understanding
of the potential applications of technology to K-12 education.
Programs and Policy
The President's Educational Technology Initiative, which was announced in President Clinton's
January
1996 State of the Union address, was designed to achieve four goals which the Panel believes
will indeed be
central to realizing the promise of educational technology: providing our schools with the
modern computer
hardware, local- and wide-area connectivity, high quality educational content, and appropriate
teacher
preparation that will be necessary if information technologies are to be effectively utilized to
enhance
learning. This initiative serves as an umbrella for a number of distinct, but interrelated
programs aimed at
achieving these four goals within a relatively ambitious time frame.
One Administration program that has already shown considerable promise is the Technology
Learning
Challenge, which awards five-year matching grants averaging $1 million each to help local
consortia
(typically consisting of private and public sector partners) to apply technology within schools in
their
respective areas. Although the overall impact of this program will be limited by funding
constraints, these
grants would appear to represent an excellent example of the effective leveraging of federal
dollars in
support of high-quality, locally-initiated efforts to improve education through the use of
computing and
communications technologies.
In February 1996, President Clinton also proposed a program called the Technology Literacy
Challenge,
which would create a $2 billion Technology Literacy Fund that would be used to "catalyze and
leverage
state, local, and private sector efforts" to meet the four goals outlined above. Federal funds
would be
allocated to the states (or under certain circumstances, local communities), which would be
given
considerable flexibility in deciding how to achieve the goals of the President's Educational
Technology
Initiative. If enabling legislation is in fact enacted, the Panel believes that this program is
indeed likely to
significantly advance the objectives outlined by the President, particularly during an initial
period in which
wide-ranging, exploratory experimentation with a number of different technological and
pedagogic
approaches is likely to prove most productive.
The Panel also believes, however, that a large-scale, rigorously controlled, federally sponsored
program of
research and evaluation will ultimately be necessary if the full potential of educational
technology is to be
realized in a cost-effective manner. Data gathered systematically by individual states, localities,
school
districts, and schools during an initial phase of federally supported educational technology
efforts could
prove invaluable in determining which approaches are in fact most effective and economically
efficient,
thus helping to maximize the ratio of benefits to costs in later phases. Federal funding will
ultimately also
be required for research aimed at analyzing and interpreting this data.
The effort to incorporate technology within America's K-12 schools has also been directly or
indirectly
advanced by a number of other programs that have been initiated, supported, or promoted by the
White
House, including the Commerce Department's Telecommunications and Information
Infrastructure
Assistance Program, which provides federal matching funds to develop the information
infrastructure
available to schools; the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which requires the Federal
Communications
Commission to revise the universal service system in such a way that elementary and secondary
schools are
provided with affordable access to advanced telecommunications services; and the Department
of
Education's Regional Technology Consortia Program, which was designed to help educators
(among
others) to utilize technology through various forms of professional development, technical
assistance, and
information dissemination.
Responding to current pressures for fiscal restraint, the Clinton Administration has also made
effective use
of extra-budgetary tools, relying on the purposeful coordination of already-funded programs, the
encouragement of extra-governmental efforts based largely on voluntarism, and the personal
persuasive
powers of the President and Vice President to leverage as extensively as possible those aspects
of the
President's Educational Technology Initiative that will require the appropriation or
redeployment of federal
funding. One example in the first category is provided by the activities of the Committee on
Education and
Training of the National Science and Technology Council to promote the use of technology for
education
and training, and to coordinate the programs of the various federal agencies that currently
engage in
education-related research and development.
The second category of extra-budgetary leadership is exemplified by Presidential and Vice
Presidential
support for the Tech Corps, a private sector organization organized to coordinate the provision
of volunteer
technical assistance to the schools, and for NetDay96, a "high-tech barn-raising" event in which
private
companies and individual volunteers helped to wire a significant fraction of California's
elementary and
secondary schools to the Internet. While the Panel believes that it would be unrealistic to
expect such
purely voluntary efforts to dramatically reduce the dollar cost of effectively utilizing educational
technologies on an ongoing basis, it seems clear that such efforts can play an important
supporting role, not
only directly, but also by calling public attention to the pressing technological (and other) needs
of our
nation's K-12 schools.
Both President Clinton and Vice President Gore have assumed leadership roles in promoting the
use of the
Internet by educational institutions, calling for the connection of all American classrooms to the
Internet by
the year 2000, with special emphasis on economically distressed areas. The President and Vice
President
have also made effective use of their respective offices to acknowledge (and thus direct
attention toward)
the efforts of those who have made particularly effective use of educational technology. While
some of the
objectives outlined in this report cannot be achieved by the President alone, and will require the
appropriation or redeployment by Congress of substantial funds, the Panel believes that the
Clinton
Administration has thus far done an excellent job of addressing such needs as can be satisfied in
the absence
of such funding.
The body of this report includes a number of relatively specific recommendations related to
various aspects
of the use of technology within America's elementary and secondary schools. In order to focus
attention on
a limited number of high-level strategic (as opposed to tactical) issues which the Panel believes
to be most
important, however, much of this detail is omitted from the summary of selected
recommendations that
follows.
To ensure high standards of scientific excellence, intellectual integrity, and independence from
political
influence, this research program should be planned and overseen by a distinguished independent
board of
outside experts appointed by the President, and should encompass (a) basic research in various
learning-related disciplines and on various educationally relevant technologies; (b) early-stage
research aimed at
developing new forms of educational software, content, and technology-enabled pedagogy; and
(c) rigorous,
well-controlled, peer-reviewed, large-scale empirical studies designed to determine which
educational
approaches are in fact most effective in practice. The Panel does not, however, recommend that
the
deployment of technology within America's schools be deferred pending the completion of such
research.
Report to the President on the Use of Technology Education Technology Initiative President and First Lady | Vice President and Mrs. Gore2. Potential Significance
2.1 Serious Problems
While the continuing expansion of international trade has the potential to confer substantial
long-term
benefits on American companies and workers, it also presents certain challenges. As trade
barriers fall and
cross-border transaction volume increases, our children will find themselves competing more
directly with
the citizens of other countries to provide goods and services within the world marketplace.
Indeed, the
effects of international competition have already become evident in the (permanent or
temporary) loss of
U.S. market share to European and Asian economic competitors within certain industries and in
competition-induced productivity improvements which, while beneficial in the long term, have
been
accompanied in some cases by "corporate downsizing" and economic insecurity on the part of
American
workers.
2.2 The Role of Technology in Education
Some of the specific ways in which technology might be used within the context of the
constructivist
curriculum are outlined in Section 4.
2.3 The Promise of Educational Technology
Rigorous, systematic, well-controlled research will ultimately be required to identify the
specific factors
responsible for such apparently successful outcomes and to ascertain their range of applicability
and the
extent to which they can be generalized. Most researchers and practitioners in the field of
educational
technology, however, are already convinced that information technologies have the potential not
only to
improve the efficacy of our current teaching methods, but perhaps more importantly, to support
fundamental
changes in those methods that could have important implications for the next generation of
Americans. 3. Hardware and Infrastructure
Although elementary and secondary schools in the United States have for some time been
acquiring new
computing and networking hardware faster than they have been retiring old equipment, access
to modern
hardware remains a significant impediment (though by no means the only impediment) to the
widespread
application of technology within grades K-12. The amount of equipment available for
instructional
purposes remains suboptimal relative to the country's K-12 student population, and a large
fraction of the
equipment that is available to the schools is obsolete and of very limited utility. This problem is
compounded by a lack of appropriate infrastructure for the operation of modern computer and
networking
equipment, and by a shortage within the schools of trained personnel capable of supporting the
use of such
equipment.
3.1 Computers and Peripherals
One commonly employed measure of the penetration of computers into American schools is the
ratio of
students to computers. Over the years since microprocessor-based personal computers first
became widely
available, this ratio has declined significantly, dropping from 125 in the 1983-84 school year to
10.5 in
1994-95.9 This figure, however, still falls
short of the
ratio of four
to five students per computer (which has been achieved by only a very small minority of all
U.S. public
schools) that many experts consider to represent a reasonable level for the effective use of
computers within
the schools. Middle and junior high schools have less access to computers than senior high
schools on a
per-student basis, and elementary schools have an even higher student/computer ratio.
3.2 Building Infrastructure
3.3 Local Area Networks
3.4 Wide Area Networks
3.5 Systems Administration and Technical
Support
4. Software, Content and Pedagogy
4.1 Computer-Based Tutorial Systems
4.2 The Constructivist Model
4.3 Constructivist Applications of Technology
4.4 The Human Element
4.5 How Technology is Currently Used
4.6 The Educational Software Market
5. Teachers and Technology
As schools continue to acquire more and better hardware and software, the benefit to students
increasingly
will depend on the skill with which some three million teachers are able to use these new tools.
In order to
make effective use of educational technology, teachers will have to master a variety of powerful
tools,
redesign their lesson plans around technology-enhanced resources, solve the logistical problem
of how to
teach a class full of students with a smaller number of computers, and take on a complex new
role in the
technologically transformed classroom. Yet teachers currently receive little technical,
pedagogic or
administrative support for these fundamental changes, and few colleges of education adequately
prepare
their graduates to use information technologies in their teaching. As a result, most teachers are
left largely
on their own as they struggle to integrate technology into their curricula.
5.1 What Teachers Need
5.2 Potential Modes of Support
5.3 The Problem of Insufficient Teacher Time
5.4 Technology in the Education Schools
6. Economic Considerations
While funding by no means represents the only challenge that will have to be overcome if the
potential of
educational technology is to be realized, most of the other challenges would be far less
formidable if cost
were not an issue. As a result of current budgetary pressures, however, along with a persistent
historical
pattern of significant inflation-adjusted increases in educational expenditures, economic
considerations have
in fact assumed a position of central importance in the ongoing deliberations surrounding the
topic of
educational reform.
6.1 Current Technology Expenditures
6.2 Projected Cost of Educational Technology
Table 6.1
Breakdown of McKinsey/NIAAC Cost Projections
Cost Category
Laboratory Model
Classroom Model
Initial
Annual
Initial
Annual
Hardward
34%
17%
51%
14%
Softward, Other Content
20
26
14
21
Local Interconnection
12
5
13
4
Wide-Area Networking
7
15
4
7
Professional Development
19
31
14
41
Systems Operation
8
6
4
13
Table 6.2
Cost Projections of Various Authors
Source
Project Cost/Year98
Glennan and Melmed99
$9 to $22 billion
Harvey100
$7 to $15 billion
Keltner and Ross101
$7 to $21 billion
McKinsey102
$6 to $23 billion
Means and Olson103
$23 billion
Moursund104
$14 to $28 billion
6.3 Educational Productivity and Return on Investment
7. Equitable Access
Equitable access to information technologies in education has been a central concern of
educators and
policy-makers since microcomputers first entered our nation's schools some twenty years ago,
but has
gained special attention during a period in which powerful desktop computers and global
Internet
connectivity are rapidly becoming an integral part of the lives of some but not all American
families.
On the one hand, it has been frequently noted that new computing and networking technologies
have the
potential to empower historically disadvantaged groups of Americans with greater access to the
sorts of
knowledge-building and communication tools that might help them to overcome at least some
of their
respective disadvantages. While the Panel believes this potential can scarcely be overstated, it
also believes
that the ways in which educational technologies are actually deployed and used will determine
whether they
serve to narrow these historical disparities or widen them even further.
7.1 Dimensions of Access
7.2 Socioeconomic Status
7.3 Race and Ethnicity
7.4 Geographical Factors
7.5 Gender
7.6 Educational Achievement
7.7 Students with Special Needs
8. Research and Evaluation
In view of both the significant changes and the substantial investment in hardware and
infrastructure,
software and content, professional development, and support services that will be required to
make effective
use of computing and networking technologies within our nation's K-12 schools, it is perhaps
not surprising
that researchers, educators, policy-makers, and taxpayers have inquired as to the available
evidence
regarding the efficacy and cost-effectiveness of educational technology. In addition (and in the
judgment of
the Panel, more importantly), any research that sheds light on how technology might be
employed in a more
efficacious (according to some reasonable set of criteria) or cost-effective manner would be of
great value
in maximizing the ratio of benefit to cost. With our nation now spending more than a quarter
trillion dollars
each year on K-12 education, even small improvements in this ratio could have a material
impact on
America's aggregate state and federal budget deficit (as affected by the denominator) and future
economic
competitiveness (as influenced by the numerator).
8.1 Effectiveness of Traditional Applications of Technology
Table 8.1
Meta-Analyses of the Effectiveness of
Traditional Computer-Based Instruction
Meta-Anaylsis
Number of Studies
Instructional Levels
Average Effect Size161
Hartley (1978)162
33
Elementary & secondary
0.41
Burns & Bozeman (1981)163
44
Elementary & secondary
0.36
Bangert-Drowns, Kulik & Kulik (1985)
51
Secondary
0.25
Kulik, Kulik & Bangert-Drowns (1990)
44
Elementary
0.40
8.2 Research on Constructivist Applications of Technology
8.3 Priorities for Future Research
8.4 Research Funding
8.5 Structural and Administrative Considerations
9. Programs and Policy
The future of educational technology in the United States will be determined not solely by the
President and
his various agents within the executive branch of government, but also by Congress, educators,
the private
sector, and the public at large. The charge of this panel, however, was defined more narrowly:
While its
members are hopeful that elements of this report may be of interest to various other readers as
well, the
Panel's primary objective has been to advise the White House on matters over which the
President is
capable of exerting at least some measure of control or influence. In this section, we briefly
review some of
the central elements of the Administration's current policy on educational technology, offering
both
feedback on current programs and suggestions as to the sorts of actions the President might
wish to take in
the future.
9.1 The President's Educational Technology Initiative
9.2 Funded Programs
9.3 Leadership and Coordination
10. Summary of Findings and Recommendations
This section consists of a summary of the Panel's principal findings and an abbreviated list of
general
recommendations to the President. In the interest of brevity, however, and in order to highlight
such
information and advice as the Panel believes to be most important, this section does not include
all of the
detailed findings and recommendations incorporated within the full text of the Report.
10.1 Overview of the Panel's Findings
10.2 Principal Recommendations
Acknowledgments
The Panel wishes to express its gratitude to the following individuals, who contributed in
various ways to
the preparation of this report:
Dr. Bruce Alberts
National Academy of SciencesProf. Ronald E. Anderson
University of Minnesota
Prof. Stephen Andrade
Brown UniversityTimothy Barnicle
Department of Labor
Gary J. Beach
ComputerWorld, Inc.Ellen R. Bialo
Interactive Educational Systems Design, Inc.
Charles Blaschke
Education TURNKEY Systems, Inc.Prof. Robert K. Branson
Florida State University
Carolyn Breedlove
National Education AssociationWilliam Burns
Association for Educational Communications and Technology
Dr. Rodger W. Bybee
National Research CouncilDavid Byer
Software Publishers Association
Dr. Iva E. Carruthers
NEXUS Unlimited Inc.John Cherniavsky
National Science Foundation
Dr. Daryl E. Chubin
National Science FoundationRobert Cleveland
Bureau of the Census
Wilmer S. Cody
Kentucky State Department of EducationPaul Cohen
D. E. Shaw & Co.
Dr. John Cradler
Far West LabsProf. Christopher Dede
George Mason University
Dr. Denise Dougherty
Office of Technology AssessmentDr. David Dwyer
Apple Computer, Inc.
Ira Fishman
Federal Communications CommissionCol. (ret.) Edward Fitzsimmons
Office of Science and Technology Policy,
Executive Office of the President (retired)
Ronald Fortune
Computer Curriculum Corp.Dr. Larry Frase
Educational Testing Service
William Friedel
Software SolutionsProf. Edward A. Friedman
Stevens Institute of Technology
Dr. Kathleen Fulton
Office of Technology AssessmentJames Gates
D. E. Shaw & Co.
Michael Girard
PC/Meter, L.P.Prof. William Graves
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Anne Griffith
Software Publishers AssociationDr. Kathryn Hanson
Silicon Graphics, Inc.
Dr. Beverly Hartline
Office of Science and Technology Policy,
Executive Office of the PresidentJeanne Hayes
Quality Education Data, Inc.
Nancy Hechinger
Pantecha, Inc.Chris Held
Bellevue Public Schools
J. Michael Hopkins
Dr. Beverly Hunter
Bolt, Beranek and Newman
Hon. Lionel "Skip" Johns
Office of Science and Technology Policy,
Executive Office of the President (retired)Ken Kay
Podesta Associates
Dr. Henry Kelly
Office of Science and Technology Policy,
Executive Office of the PresidentDr. Peter Kelman
Pantecha, Inc.
Brenda Kempster
Kempster Group Beth Kobliner
Dr. Harold Kobliner
New York City Board of Examiners (retired)Dr. Thomas Koerner
National Association of Secondary School Principals
Dale LaFranze
Minnesota Educational Computing CorporationCheryl Lemke
Illinois State Board of Education
Prof. Alan Lesgold
University of PittsburghProf. Ann Lieberman
Columbia University
Prof. Marcia C. Linn
University of California-BerkeleyEdna Lee Long-Green
Jostens Learning Corporation
Elizabeth Lyle
Federal Communications CommissionProf. Jacqueline C. Mancall
Drexel University
Prof. Dale Mann
Teachers College, Columbia UniversityProf. Robert McClintock
Teachers College, Columbia University
William McDonagh
Br derbund Software, Inc.Dr. Julia Medin
University of Central Florida
Dr. Anne Meyer
Center for Applied Special TechnologyLynn Milet
Association for Educational Communications and Technology
Dr. Michael Moore
Pennsylvania State UniversityHenry Morockie
West Virginia State Department of Education
Sally Narodick
Edmark Corp.Alan November
Educational Renaissance Planners
Prof. Seymour Papert
MIT Media LabProf. Roy D. Pea
Northwestern University
Dr. Robert Pearlman
Boston Teachers UnionMargaret Petrella
The Pew Research Center for the People & The Press
Bernajean Porter
Educational Technology PlannersDr. Margaret Riel
INTERLEARN
Dr. Linda Roberts
U.S. Department of EducationSaul Rockman
Rockman Associates
Ilene Rosenthal
Lightspan Partnership, Inc.Dr. Andee Rubin
TERC
Richard Rusczyk
D. E. Shaw & Co.Dr. Nora Sabelli
National Science Foundation
Steven Sanchez
National Science FoundationDavid Schaffer
Jostens Learning Corp.
Lynn Silver
Apple Computer, Inc.Jay Sivin-Kachala
Interactive Educational Systems Design, Inc.
Dr. Lewis C. Solmon
Milken Institute for Job & Capital FormationDr. Gwen Solomon
U.S. Department of Education
Prof. Elliot Soloway
University of MichiganDr. Robert Spielvogel
Educational Development Center
Barbara Stein
National Education AssociationVirginia Stern
American Association for the Advancement of Science
Prof. Robert Stevens
Pennsylvania State UniversityGary Strong
National Science Foundation
Dr. Michael Sullivan
Agency for Instructional TechnologyProf. Patrick Suppes
Stanford University
Dr. Ruby Takanishi
Foundation for Child DevelopmentMargaret H. Tilney
GlobaLearn, Inc.
Prof. Rena Upitis
Queen's UniversityProf. Decker Walker
Stanford University
Sandra Welch
Public Broadcasting ServiceDr. Cheryl Williams
National School Boards Association
Dr. Jerry Willis
Association for the Advancement of Computing in EducationDr. Frank Withrow
Council of Chief State School Officers
William Wright
Consortium for School NetworkingBarbara Yentzer
National Education Association
Laura Zawacki
Quality Education Data, Inc.Alfred Zeisler
Integrated Technology Education Group
Dr. Stanley Zenor
Association for Educational Communications and Technology
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