We Need an Eco-Smart Model for Online Learning

Jim ShimabukuroBy Jim Shimabukuro
Editor

Two articles that appeared in my Google alerts today (7.17.10) grabbed my attention. Both were out of California. One was a San Francisco Chronicle editorial blasting the University of California’s vision of an internet-delivered bachelor’s degree program.

The other was an op-ed by James Fay and Jane Sjogren, sharing their vision of a hypothetical Golden State Online, or GSO, a “stand-alone online community college campus.”

On the surface, the visions seem to be quite different, and the viewpoints are obviously different. However, below the surface, both visions share a common flaw — they’re based on models of online learning that are, in my opinion, simply not sustainable.

This got me thinking about an alternative model that would be infinitely sustainable. After a few starts and stops, I came up with an eco-smart model for online learning, or E-SMOL. Continue reading

JRTE Spring 2010 Issue – A Sacrilegious Review

Jim ShimabukuroBy Jim Shimabukuro
Editor

Three of the four articles that make up the spring 2010 issue (v42n3) of Journal of Research on Technology in Education caught my attention more for their assumptions than their stated purposes. These assumptions highlight, for me, some of the weaknesses inherent in efforts to introduce technology into schools and colleges.

In “Technology’s Achilles Heel: Achieving High-Quality Implementation,” the “heel” for Gene E. Hall is school and college administrators. According to Hall, “Education technology scholars and practitioners are engaged with some of the most promising and interesting innovations.” However, these innovations don’t find their way into classrooms because of the failure of administrators to implement them. Thus, our enlightened ed tech guiding lights are “confronted first hand with the challenges associated with disappointing implementation efforts and failures to go to scale.” Continue reading