Federal officials address ed-tech concerns

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Before an audience of chief technology officers from across the country at the Consortium for School Networking's March 1 CTO Forum, Karen Cator, director of education technology for the U.S. Department of Education, and Federal Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra discussed the nation's education technology efforts and held a frank question-and-answer session that ranged from the proposed education technology budget for fiscal 2011 to removing barriers to classroom technology use.

Technology as a force multiplier is one focus of the 2009 book Liberating Learning: Technology, Politics, and the Future of American Education, by Terry M. Moe and John E. Chubb, which predicts that online learning will completely transform schools into learning centers where students take many of their classes online. And ed-tech advocates and school IT staff will have to focus on supporting networks, infrastructure, and other systems that enable this kind of an environment. It is important to "create technology systems in our schools and districts that allow teachers, students, and administrators every single day to do the work they need to do" without being hampered by the way the technology operates -- or doesn't operate, Cator said.


Federal officials address ed-tech concerns