By Nathan Martin
August 9, 2013
At the foundation of Digital Learning Now! is the belief that policy impacts growth. While digital learning and the use of technology in the classroom will continue to grow and become more prevalent and common, state policy will either help or hinder that growth.
Digital learning will either be implemented in a thoughtful and meaningful fashion in the classroom, empowering students and enabling teachers, or will turn out to be one more patch job on the American education system.
Few articles illustrate the promise of digital learning and precarious nature of its advance than Digital Roundup and this excellent overview of digital learning legislation from Michael Horne of the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation in the fall edition of Education Next. He addresses the key role of policy early on:
“Although many in the burgeoning education-technology start-up world downplay the role of policy, ultimately policy is decisive in a highly regulated system where school districts hold near monopolies over publicly funded instruction. Policy helps to determine the rules of the public education–technology marketplace: what will and won’t be funded, and what incentives will and won’t exist to create products and services that boost student outcomes.”
Horne references the work of DLN, noting that in 2012 “more than 150 bills related to K–12 digital learning were signed into law.” It’s also worth adding that more than 700 bills were considered over this same period.
Looking at course access laws in Florida and Louisiana, Horne highlights the Florida Virtual School and Louisiana Course Choice Program. Texas, Utah and Michigan followed the lead of these two states, but in each of these new states, with each advance, new challenges have come.
Another exciting development and trend in digital learning is competency-based learning, moving past seat time to knowledge-acquired as a standard for measuring growth and accomplishments.
As Horne says,
“Competency-based learning—in which a student only progresses once he or she has demonstrated mastery of a concept or skill—is critical for digital learning to optimize the experience for each child. For true competency-based learning to emerge, policy changes are necessary.”
Advancement is not without setbacks and Horne runs through a number of states (Tennessee, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maine and New Jersey) where policy is working to limit or choke off the growth of digital learning.
As states continue to work through the complex and weighty issues surrounding the adoption and implementation of digital learning, careful thought and good policy will be essential to ensure that the next generation of students can benefit rather than suffer from policy crafted by today’s legislatures. To that end, revisit the report card as Digital Learning Now! will continue to keep its finger on the pulse of digital learning legislation.