TeleRead Update #7TeleRead Home Page | Clinton's NetDay Remarks | NetDayWire (Highly Recommended)
NetDay, 1997: What Bill Clinton Could Learn from Sue Smith
While Bill Clinton was rightly talking up NetDay, which has wired tens of thousands of American classrooms, a "plugged-in" teacher was despairing that she rarely got online.
"They've put the computers off in this room and I hardly ever get time to go there," she said. The teacher--let's just call her Sue Smith, since we know how much schools love "controversial" employees--told me: "It's been weeks since I had time to check my e-mail." That's how comfortable she was with technology.
Even with an Apple humming away in her classroom in the near future, she would still need to learn how to blend the computer in with her curriculum. But was there time? Not exactly. Her school superintendent, in fact, wanted to reduce the hours when teachers could plan their lessons. Apparently preparation time was not teaching time.
While I heartily approve of NetDay, Sue's example shows the perils of relying too heavily on "wire up the classroom" approach as a K-12 panacea. Multimedia computers in the classroom have their place. But often education might be better served if time-short teachers also had less expensive computers and Net connections at home. Instead of just splurging on new machines, Sue's district might have arranged for teachers to get used computers, so some would be available as loaners for home use. There might even be a plan for teachers to buy them. Yes, that's far from a total solution--the older machines can be terrors to use--but it would be better than no computers at all. Nowadays some hyper-useful organizations are outfitting donated antiques with better software; and, laudably, NetDay's organizers and the White House itself are encouraging the recycling of old machines. Time for local school districts to help bring these efforts home--to the teachers!
What's more, Sue's district could have allowed more time for training and made it easier for overworked teachers to fit it into their schedule at their convenience. There remained, too, the question of what Sue could find online. The present Net teems with wonderful educational resources, but it's still far from a substitute for libraries with real books--to address students' exact interests and encourage sustained thought.
Enter TeleRead. It's a comprehensive plan to drive down the cost of sharp-screened computers fit for reading, for the Net and for education in general; try reading a novel off most computers today. By making easy-to-use hardware more available, TeleRead would help reduce one of the main risks here: letting the gadgetry distract teachers. Teachers should never forget their mission. It isn't to educate the children in the Internet, but to use the Net for English, math, science or whatever is the main show.
The White House itself has acknowledged the need for teacher training in "how to use the computers," and that's among the goals of a Youth Tech Corps. But what's "how to use"? Just how to hook into the Net or boot up Microsoft Word? Or how to use the technology for specific subjects and also encourage sustained thought?
Washington already is making some funds available to help blend the technology in with curriculum, but not enough (states this year have received $57 million in technology literacy grants, according to Reuter).
Beyond that, there is the time problem discussed above.
Simply put, teachers need easy-to-use, education-friendly computers at home so that if nothing else, they can better fit the new "literacy" training in with their schedules. TeleRead, anyone?
--David H. Rothman, rothman@clark.net
Below I'll reproduce the President's NetDay remarks
in full.
REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT AND THE VICE PRESIDENT AT NETDAY EVENT
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
______________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release April 19, 1997
REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
AND THE VICE PRESIDENT
AT NETDAY EVENT
The Oval Office
10:40 A.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Hi, students!
STUDENTS: Hi, Mr. President. (Laughter.)
THE PRESIDENT: Now, is that Mr. Contreras with you?
Hello, Miguel, how are you?
MR. CONTRERAS: Buenos dias, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Buenos dias. Now, why don't you tell us why you're
volunteering this weekend?
MR. CONTRERAS: Well, we've got quite a number of union members
here in Los Angeles as part of the national AFL-CIO NetDay, that
are coming together here to help wire 38 schools and empowerment
zones in Los Angeles. And we're going to kick it off today. We
think that educational opportunities is equivalent to civil
rights here, and we want to make sure that all our students have
the necessary tools to bring them into the 21st century.
So we're glad that you're supporting this effort. And the unions
here -- in particular, the International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers, Local 11; we have the CWA -- Communication
Workers of America, and the United Teachers of LA all have turned
out
today to ensure that the wiring is a success. So we're going to
move forward today.
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you.
And, Ms. Robinson, what benefits do you expect to flow from this
to the students at your school?
MS. ROBINSON: Well, we want to be prepared for the 21st century
and we want our children to be familiar and to be competent and
to be ready to use the Internet. So we expect a great deal, great
many benefits from this. We want the Super Information Highway --
we know that is the way of the future and we want all of our
students to be prepared for that.
We have a lot of our staff members here also -- my teachers, my
parents, my superintendent. And so we're all very excited about
the work that's going to take place today.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, thank you.
How many of the young people behind us know how to use a
computer? Raise your hand if you can use a computer. (Laughter.)
MR. CONTRERAS: Quite a number of them.
THE PRESIDENT: Good for you. Well, good luck.
MR. CONTRERAS: Don't ask the adults. (Laughter.)
THE PRESIDENT: Well, don't ask the adults on this side of the
screen, either. (Laughter.) The Vice President can raise his
hand; I'm not so sure about me. (Laughter.)
Have a good day. Thank you.
STUDENTS: Thank you, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Now we want to go to Hartford. There's
Hartford. Good morning.
STUDENTS: Good morning!
THE PRESIDENT: I want to thank all the young
people who are there participating in the Youth Tech Corps. The
Vice President and I just announced that Connecticut will be
getting some more funds from the Department of Education to make
sure that every child in Connecticut will have access to
educational technology. So I want you to tell me about what the
Youth Tech Corps is doing and how that relates to getting
technology out to everybody.
STUDENT: The Youth Tech Corps, first of all, is a program that is
designed to match students who have strong interests with
technology with other students, and use businesses to enhance
this program.
THE PRESIDENT: So those of you who have good skills are helping
those who need it, right?
STUDENT: Or more interested.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, well, maybe you could send me a volunteer. I
need some help down here. (Laughter.)
STUDENT: No problem.
THE PRESIDENT: I see a couple of volunteers in the back
of the room there. They're laughing. (Laughter.)
What have you done on NetDay? What does it mean for Connecticut
and for you?
STUDENT: Well, basically the Youth Tech Corps is -- basically,
we're trying to continue on the process of Connect '96 and just
take it the next step to getting the schools, all the schools
connected and make sure that they can use the computers once they
have computers and they're connected to the Internet.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you find in your own experience that once the
computers are there and they're hooked up to the Internet that
they are widely used?
STUDENT: I think they're widely used if the people using them
know how to. I know, like, a lot of students, there are some that
probably don't know how to. But I think, I feel that they're
widely used.
THE PRESIDENT: What about the teachers? Do all the teachers know
how to make maximum use of it?
STUDENT: No. (Laughter.)
THE PRESIDENT: Some yes and some no, right? (Laughter.)
STUDENT: Yes. Some do and some don't, you
know. Because some teachers actually put their grades on
computer, not for -- but those who calculate it.
THE PRESIDENT: So it's important that we don't let the connecting
of the schools and the classrooms get ahead of training the
teachers and the students about how to use the computers.
STUDENT: Right.
STUDENT: Exactly.
THE PRESIDENT: Because otherwise they're useless just sitting
there, right?
STUDENT: Right.
THE PRESIDENT: Now, is everybody in the room a member of the Tech
Corps?
STUDENT: This is the Corps, this is the beginning of it.
Hopefully, they will continue to be a part of the Youth Tech
Corps.
THE PRESIDENT: Good for you.
Do you want to say anything, Al?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, I just want to congratulate all of you.
It's an exciting day. It makes you feel good to be a part of
this, doesn't it?
STUDENT: Yes.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, congratulations and keep up the
wonderful work.
STUDENT: Thank you.
THE PRESIDENT: You've reminded us of something very important
today about what you're doing, too, because we sometimes get so
focused on making sure all the classrooms in the country are
hooked up that we forget that the hookup is worthless unless the
teachers and the students are trained to use it --
STUDENT: That's right.
THE PRESIDENT: -- and have the time and ability to use
it.
So I thank all of you for what you're doing, and I hope that this
conversation we're having today will lead to some greater
publicity for your Tech Corps so that maybe every community in
the country will have one to make sure that the students and the
teachers can use the computers and the hookups that we're
providing.
Thank you. God bless you and good luck. Hang in there.
STUDENTS: Thank you.
THE PRESIDENT: Bye-bye. Have a good day.
END 10:47 A.M. EDT
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