Last month, Leapfrog Institutes and Education Futures interviewed Dr. Christopher Dede, Timothy E. Wirth Professor in Learning Technologies, Technology, Innovation, and Education at Harvard University, on what it would take for a state to become a leader in innovation. His answer was quite simple: successful states set up regional economic education development centers. [...]

Upcoming event:

October 31, 2008

Mexico City, Mexico
Conference website: www.e-competencies.org

The Knowledge Society demands that we leapfrog ahead in our education systems, build a new digital literacy, and improve soft skills (creativity, innovation, collaboration, communication, and critical thinking, among others) that could help all 21st century citizens become productive, effective knowledge workers. Educators, policymakers, business leaders, parents, [...]

Whitney Stark at Minnesota Public Radio wrote me to ask what I think about the increase in schools that fail to meet Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) under No Child Left Behind:
Minnesota Public Radio News is interested in learning more about what is going on with Minnesota’s declining and low Adequate Yearly Progress results. What [...]

…but, only if students know the math first.
Media guru Griffin Gardner forwarded this article from ScienceDaily, which suggests that calculators are useful tools in elementary-level mathematics classes.  Citing research by Bethany Rittle-Johnson and Alexander Oleksij Kmicikewycz at Vanderbilt, and recently published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, ScienceDaily writes:
“So much of how you teach [...]

Yesterday, HBS Working Knowledge posted an interview with Clayton Christensen, a professor at Harvard Business School and author or coauthor of five books, including The Innovator’s Dilemma and The Innovator’s Solution. The interview focused on his latest book (co-authored with Michael B. Horn and Curtis W. Johnson), Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change [...]

[Cross-posted from Leapfrog Institutes newswire.]
Last March, Minneapolis Public Schools announced that Edison High School and Washburn High School will be overhauled in response to under-performance. As part of the “fresh start” agenda, nearly all staff members at each school received notice that their contracts would not be renewed, and they would have to reapply [...]

An essay by Charles Murray on the opinion page of yesterday’s Wall Street Journal contains a provocative statement promoting the substitution of focused competency certificates for the BA degree. He writes:
Outside a handful of majors — engineering and some of the sciences — a bachelor’s degree tells an employer nothing except that the applicant [...]

Gustavo Andrade at UNAM in Mexico City just posted a video from a conference I participated in last April. He writes:
3G technology allows us to build an innovative vision of education. Education anywhere and at anytime, with a device that can be your own cell phone. John Moravec at the University of Minnesota explains [...]

Futurelab, in collaboration with the UK’s Department for Children School and Families, has created Million Futures. The project aims to identify what people think are the biggest challenges facing education in the future. Visit this new website and write your thoughts about future life and learning on virtual paper planes which you can launch into [...]

We had the fortunate opportunity to interview Dr. Janet Hively, founder of Minnesota’s Vital Aging Network and co-founder of the SHiFT network. In this video, she shares with us what what is unique about Minnesota’s approach to innovation, the conditions necessary for fostering innovation, and the implications for leaders:
Dr. Janet Hively on Innovation in Minnesota [...]