Conference Call: Susan Patrick

Susan Patrick, Director of the Office of Educational Technology at the United States Department of Education joined Kent Tamsen and several CALET members for a conference call about forming a new Colorado Educational Technology Plan. Some notes follow:

We asked Susan to address four questions:

1. What is the desired effect of the soon-to-be-released National Educational Technology Plan and what should we accomplish with a Colorado plan?
   
   -The plan is intended for members of Congress to help them understand the state of education and how our schools can better utilize technology to transform education. Priorities around data systems integration and access, e-learning and virtual schools, and online assessment were established. Key to the process has been to get away from metrics concerning ratios of technology to students and to focus on student achievement as the measure for the impact of technology.
   
2. What would you recommend for inclusion in our process to write a state plan?
   
   -The Federal Government is working toward a "customer-oriented" philosophy and the Educational Technology Plan aligns with that effort by involving students as constituents in the development. We recommend taking special effort to involve students appropriately, understanding that they want structure and guidance in providing their input. Recognize that the "millenials" are generally very tech-savvy and their knowledge and skills can be a great asset to educational improvement.
   
3. Are there any structure recommendations you have for the design of our state plan?
   
   -The National Plan was designed for Congress and as such has significant space dedicated to background. The plan at the national level is intended for guidance and information for policy makers and state/local leadership. The state and district plans should have increasingly detailed information about actual activity and will likely spend less effort on the background section seen in the National Plan.
   
4. What further involvement do you and the Department of Education want in our planning process?
   
   -The USDOE will assist any way they can. There are useful details at http://www.nationaledtechplan.org/

Some important points:

• Make sure technology is helping to develop new teaching models and think about online content, effective instruction and transformational activities.
• It is essential that we incorporate 21st Century skills for preparing today's students for a global economy.
• Remember that the bottom line is student achievement.

Minutes by Dan Maas