School of the Future promotes education
Arming educators with technology in the classroom, helping at-risk youth and aiding school systems nationally, the Center for the School of the Future at Utah State University is engineering new approaches to education.
According to the center’s mission statement, its goal is to “improve the quality and effectiveness of all levels of education by identifying, researching and developing proven educational practices and supporting their dissemination and adoption.”
Tim Smith, director of technology for the center, said one way they are accomplishing this is through a program called Preparing Teachers to use Technology, or PT3.
“There’s really no better time to prepare teachers to use [technology] when we’re looking to replace half the teachers in the nation,” Smith said.
He said PT3 is a three-year project funded by a grant from the federal government targeted toward pre-service teachers graduating from USU.
The program enables student teachers to integrate technology into their classrooms by utilizing the Internet, developing an online portfolio-based assessment to evaluate their ability to meet national and local teacher-technology standards and learning new software specific to their content area, Smith said.
Matthew Taylor, director of research and evaluation for the center, said technology has empowered educators.
“It’s not just about finding resources on the Internet, it’s also finding people who know how to use it,” Taylor said.
Smith said, “We recognize that there are some excellent inservice teachers that know how to implement technology and sometimes we bring them on campus to help teach.
“This semester is the busiest ever,” Smith said. “It’s really our own worst enemy – it’s packed – they’re lining up outside the door, but it’s a good bad thing.”
The center is not only focused on technology, but also keeps a strong focus on the behavioral and emotional needs of at-risk youth, Richard West, director of the center, said.
West said one program at the center is called Analysis Linking Evidence of Response Trends, or ALERT, and “is a simple way of taking the vital signs of a school.” It’s just like going to the doctor, he said.
The program is implemented in many Utah schools and surrounding states, West said. In the computer labs of the schools, ALERT will come up before students log in and they will be asked six or seven questions about what happened to them the day before, relationships with teachers or other kids, and generally how they feel, West said.
Taylor said the results from the short survey are “a shock to the [faculty] that are there.”
West said the results show “an alarming amount of kids are not happy.”
In one school system, ALERT found 33 percent of the kids had been hit, pushed or shoved, West said.
“And if you get 60 to 70 percent of kids responding to the questions, you have a pretty good idea of what’s going on,” he said.
West said, “With this information, principals and superintendents are able to log on to the server and get a complete diagnosis of their school. That’s why ALERT is so amazing.”
This information is useful to help identify anti-social behavior and violent patterns in students so schools are more capable of heading off larger problems, West said.
The Center for the School of the Future also holds an annual conference called Interventions for At-Risk Children and Youth. This year’s conference will be held June 17 to 20 and nine of the most-prominent consultants on the subject in the nation will be speaking.
West said anyone can register who is involved or concerned with kids at risk. The only requirement is to register.
“I think the problems of kids at risk today are probably more life-threatening,” West said. “We have fewer support systems.”
We’ve always had at-risk youth but because of the problems today education on the subject is even more relevant, he said.
West said, “Sept. 11 has heightened awareness, but we’ve been on this for a long time.”