Secretary of Education Arne Duncan Announces Launch of "Digital Promise"

Digital Promise is a new national center founded to spur breakthrough technologies that can help transform the way teachers teach and students learn. September 16, 2011.

Aneesh Chopra: Good morning, everybody.

Audience: Good morning.

Aneesh Chopra: Good morning!

Audience: Good morning.

Aneesh Chopra: My name is Aneesh Chopra.

I have the honor and privilege of serving as the President's

Chief Technology Officer.

And it is extraordinarily exciting for me to be here today

because we'll be talking about a subject that's been near and

dear to the President's heart and a big priority for our

office as we look to improve our learning and educational

outcomes powered by the potential of technology

and innovation.

In the President's joint session to Congress,

when he laid out the vision for the American Jobs Act,

the President spoke broadly about the need to out-innovate,

out-educate, and out-build the world with specific emphasis

on opportunities for job creation in the near term.

He emphasized the new initiative to modernize 35,000 schools,

but made particular emphasis that when we put people back

to work fixing roofs and windows on those schools,

we should also install science labs and high-speed Internet in

classrooms all across the country,

acknowledging the importance of modernizing our educational

infrastructure for 21st century.

Today, we make the first down payment on the President's

vision with the rollout of the Digital Promise Board of

Directors and Initiative.

And I must tell you on a personal level,

the Board had a chance to meet with President Obama just a

few moments ago.

And Board, tell me if I'm wrong, did he fire you all up?

Did he fire you up?

He certainly did.

He gave them some direct instructions to move this

program forward.

And I am so excited to get this particular event off and running

in the spirit of the President's charge to that Board.

To kick us off, I want to invite the godfather of the legislation

that brought us Digital Promise, Kentucky's own

Congressman Yarmuth.

Please, give him a big round of applause.

(applause)

Thank you.

Congressman Yarmuth: Well, thank you, Aneesh.

Good morning, everyone.

It is an incredible honor for me to be here today to help launch

Digital Promise.

This is a great day for our country and a great

day for our future.

I'm here as a member of Congress.

And since we have a 13% approval rating,

I really appreciate that applause.

(laughter)

We take it wherever we can get it.

I'm also here because four and a half years ago as a freshman

member of Congress and a new member of the House Education

and Labor Committee, I met with Ann Murphy,

a person who was part of an amazing group of education,

innovation and business leaders, committed to doing nothing short

of completely revolutionizing education and learning through

advanced technologies, a project called Digital Promise.

The goal was to do for education what the National Science

Foundation does for science, what the National Institutes of

Health does for medicine.

I was sold.

And I introduced a bill to create something called then the

National Center for Learning Science and Technology.

Now we have another name, which I will guarantee you will not

replace Digital Promise.

This will also be known as Digital Promise,

the nonprofit entity that we are here today to launch.

It was approved with a lot of help and a lot of bipartisan

support and signed into law as part of the Higher

Education Act.

My role, while I am exceedingly proud of it,

was a small part in an extraordinary initiative that

has been more than a decade in the making.

And it is pretty clear that with the leadership of Secretary

Duncan and all of you here today,

the decade of work that got us to this point will surely pale

in comparison to what lays ahead.

I firmly believe that today is one of those days that we will

look back upon years from now and think,

I knew it was going to be big, we're at the White House,

after all, but I had no idea it would be that big;

that we would completely change the way children learn,

revolutionize education, and strengthen our nation.

So no pressure at all.

But what we all know is that with dedication,

collaboration and sometimes most critical federal investment,

technology can be transformative.

In the 20th century, there was a direct correlation between

America leading the world in education and also in

innovation, technology and economically.

That an increasingly globalized marketplace with other countries

competing more successfully across the board,

Digital Promise can ensure that this generation of American

children is the most educated the world has ever known,

and by extension, the next generation of American adults

will be the best trained, most capable citizens to lead the

world in the 21st century and beyond.

That is what this center is all about.

That is why I'm so proud to be here.

And that is why I'm so proud to introduce a very

special young man.

Josniel Martinez is an 11-year-old 7th grader who

attends Global Technology Preparatory School in East Harlem.

He's already seen how digital learning can make a difference.

When he was in the 6th grade, his school partnered with the

city of New York to implement the New York City connected

learning program funded by the American Recovery and

Reinvestment Act.

That program is a citywide initiative managed by the New

York City Department of Information Technology and

Telecommunications and the New York City Department of

Education, in which CFY, a national nonprofit organization,

is a lead partner.

It's a perfect example of a program where a partnership

worked together to bring digital learning into schools and

Josniel is here to tell us how it changed his life.

Now, just by a quirk of fate, Josniel was born at the same

time that Digital Promise, the idea, came into being.

So there's a little karma there, Josniel.

Please join me in welcoming with a warm round of applause,

Josniel Martinez.

(applause)

Josniel Martinez: Well, hi.

My name is Josniel Martinez.

And I am proud to be here today to introduce Secretary

Arne Duncan.

But before I do, I want to tell you a little bit about myself

and how digital learning has changed my life forever.

Back in 1999, my parents moved from Dominican Republic all the

way to East Harlem.

(laughter)

I did pretty well in elementary school.

It was okay.

But it was still hard for me to accept now that I'm a 6th grader

and have more responsibility, more homework,

and moving to a new school called Global Tech Prep, a.k.a.

Global Technology Preparatory in East Harlem.

And if you didn't hear me, East Harlem.

(laughter)

I ended up getting a promotion in doubt letter saying that if I

don't work hard enough, I might get left back.

Well, just imagine this.

Your boss sends you a letter, says,

if you don't work hard enough, you're going to get fired.

Now, think, wouldn't you want to roll down on the floor,

start crying, saying, noooooo!

(laughter)

I did.

(laughter)

So I tried to do my best.

I was determined to go to 7th grade.

But so was my mom.

She wasn't letting me go down.

And I knew that some of the challenges that were going to be

in front of me were concentrating.

That was one of the hardest things I ever had to do.

I thought technology could help me.

I even picked Global Tech Prep because I knew it can help me.

I knew that they make blogs, make videos, use PowerPoints,

Microsoft Word, everything that we need to educate ourselves.

But still wasn't passing, unfortunately.

Until a nonprofit called CFY -- Google them -- came to our

school and told us that we were going to give all the 6th

graders a login to a site called power my learning.

It's a site with millions, hundreds -- let's say millions

of games, and each of those games teaches us anything we

want, math, science, ELA, music, it doesn't matter what subject.

It's there.

And the good thing is we get to keep the computer they gave us.

It was a learning device.

Now, here's where my mom comes into this play.

She put on a schedule for me, Josniel Martinez,

to get on the computer three times a week and use it.

So at least three times a week I'm prepared, I know,

my brain is working, says I want to learn now.

Sometimes I can wake up in the morning.

My head is like school, school, school, watch, watch, school,

school, school, school.

And then my mom did something else.

I used to watch TV all the time.

I used to stay up late, watch Friends, That '70s Show,

anything that was on, I used to watch all of that.

Then my mom, she cut that in half.

She put it on a plate and everything.

She told me, huh-uh.

She cut that.

So now I'm watching maybe one hour, maybe two hours of TV.

By most of the time, I'm either studying, reading a book,

or doing something that can help me benefit in school.

Now, my school helped, too.

They cost -- they put a whole team together.

I'm talking about my principal, my teachers, everything,

just to help me, one student.

And the CFY software helped a lot.

Without them, I think I couldn't pass.

Now, what do you think digital learning do for me,

Josniel Martinez, the same Dominican boy from East Harlem,

still the same person.

Well, it brought everyone who was important to me.

Miss Russell, who is in the crowd right now,

some of the CFY people, they actually put some software on my

computer to help me, they did everything for me.

And there was no joke.

I got a 3 on my math exam, and I have a 3 on my ELA exam,

just perfect.

(applause)

And while I needed a lot of support,

now I feel that I can do this all by myself.

And when I mean a lot of support,

I mean double the White House's, plus a different universe.

That's how much.

Now, look at me in ten years, Secretary Arne Duncan,

because I'm going to college, maybe even work for a President,

and maybe one day you'll be working for me.

(laughter and applause)

And I know now I'm supposed to introduce Secretary Arne Duncan.

But before I do, I want to thank Miss Russell, my mom,

my friends, my family, everybody from Global Tech Prep,

for helping me to get up here.

And now it's my pleasure to introduce the Secretary of

Education, Arne Duncan.

(applause)

Secretary Duncan: Let's give Josniel another round of applause.

(applause)

I could no more have done that here in 7th grade than fly to

the moon.

And I will absolutely get my resume ready.

(laughter)

In all seriousness, though, it's a really inspiring story.

And what it tells me is what I've -- reinforces what I've

known all my life, is that we have great young people.

Surround them with the right adults,

caring adults who go beyond the call of duty,

give them technology, give them the opportunity,

give them the support, the world's the limit.

And you have to not just graduate from high school.

You have to go to college.

You have to graduate from college.

And you can be in this White House someday.

You've got to really aspire to those things.

But we all have to come together to provide those opportunities

to every single child.

Before I begin, I just want to thank a couple of people,

Newt Minow, Larry Grossman and Ann Murphy.

If you guys could please stand.

You're the godfathers of this effort.

(applause)

They started this work over 12 years ago,

a long time to get here.

But I can't tell you how thrilled me and Karen Cade and

Jim Shelton, my staff, are to be a part of this.

And the opportunity you guys are providing through your

vision is huge.

And I feel both the pressure and the opportunity.

We need to deliver for you.

But appreciate so much the leadership that you

guys have provided.

Josniel's story is extraordinary and we have many stories like

that around the country.

But the honest reality, the unfortunate reality,

is we don't have enough of that.

And far too often, America's classrooms have failed to

harness technology's potential to transform students' lives and

create a new world of opportunity for them.

With technology, teachers and parents can deeply engage

students in learning.

They can personalize instruction in ways that folks previously

thought were impossible, and they can solve the inequities,

both in our communities and in our schools,

by providing all children, not some,

but all children with access to world-class resources anytime

and anywhere.

And that's obviously why all of us are here today and obviously

this is the choir here today.

We understand that technology provides the opportunity to make

rapid progress in advancing equity and excellence in our

education system so that these kinds of stories become the

norm, rather than the exception.

And my simple message to all of you today is that we need to act

and we need to act now to lead the digital transformation of

education and training both for our children and for adults

looking to retrain and retool.

We have yet to unleash technology's full potential to

transform both teaching and learning.

Technology can help provide all students with access to a

world-class curriculum.

It's a tool that can provide equitable access to high quality

learning opportunities for low-income students and

struggling schools, be they inner city urban,

rural or remote.

This work is especially important today because the

truth is, other countries are ahead of us here in

the United States.

And in tough economic times like these, we can't just do more.

We have to be smart enough to do more with less.

A couple of examples of what the competition looks like as you

look across the globe.

South Korea has committed to phasing out all textbooks and

replacing them with digital products by 2015.

And they're going to make that happen.

Uruguay, maybe not a country we all think about every single

day, Uruguay now, today, has given every single student a

computer, every single one.

And we're faced with one fundamental basic question: Will

the United States lead in this effort or will we be a laggard,

will we follow?

And despite the real challenges, I am absolutely optimistic that

the United States can and will lead the digital transformation.

And today marks, I think, a critically important

turning point.

Through the unique public/private partnership of

Digital Promise, we are rallying the full forces of the federal

government, academia, entrepreneurs,

the technology sector and researchers.

And the level of talent in this room today is

pretty extraordinary.

You represent creative entrepreneurs,

generous philanthropists, smart investors.

You are innovative leaders who are committed to this work and

committed to making difference.

We have a tremendous, tremendous opportunity to pull together and

solve the complex problems of educating every child and every

adult in this country.

I especially want to thank Congressman Yarmuth for his

tremendous leadership.

Along with Senator Dodd, Representative Yarmuth worked

to authorize Digital Promise and the Higher

Education Opportunity Act.

And that's the reason we're all here today.

Please give him another round of applause.

Thank you so much.

(applause)

President Obama has repeatedly said that winning the future

will require investments in education,

innovation and infrastructure.

He fundamentally understands that transforming the use of

educational technology will require significant research

and development.

And he also understands that our nation's schools and classrooms

are in serious need of modernization.

In far too many places, today's school buildings simply aren't

ready to support digital learning.

And last week, I went on a whirlwind six-state,

three-day bus tour across the Great Lakes region.

And I never, ever asked or want the red carpet treatment.

But when I visit schools, it's not uncommon for them to clean

up, tidy up a little bit.

But it was really clear that no amount of fresh paint was going

to cover up the fact that many of these schools simply aren't

prepared to lead the digital revolution in education.

And the American Jobs Act, President Obama is proposing

a $25 billion investment to modernize at least 35,000 of

our nation's schools, especially schools that

serve the neediest students, with facilities in the most

need of repair.

The President has committed to passing the jobs bill that

includes money to create school buildings that can give students

a 21st century education.

The Administration's commitment goes far beyond renovating and

modernizing schools.

Our goal is to become an engine of innovation that provides

leadership and support for reform.

The National Education Technology Plan we released last

year lays out an ambitious vision to leverage the full

power of technology to support compelling and personalized

learning environments for all children, regardless of race,

ethnicity, ability or disability or zip code.

We understand that technology is a critical,

critical ingredient in our work to make education the great

equalizer it must be.

But this is clearly not a task for government alone.

We can work to create an environment for innovation.

But experts in school, schools, research labs, entrepreneurs,

whether big or small, they will do the difficult work of

developing new technologies and getting them into homes and

schools and districts across the country.

Digital Promise will aid that work by bringing together people

from business, education, the research community,

to advance the education technology field.

Even as we're launching this new effort,

a group of school districts has already stepped forward to lead

this transformation and we're calling them the League of

Innovative Schools.

Researchers at the University of Chicago will also organize a new

alliance of more than 35 of America's top education

researchers dedicated to identifying policies and

practices that improve education outcomes for America's most

disadvantaged children.

A leading gaming company is committed to bringing their

creativity and expertise to this important effort.

Digital Promise will be a truly collaborative effort

across all sectors.

Working together, the collaboration can help

lead America in providing a world-class education for

millions of students using technology.

We all know, we all recognize that there are no silver bullets

in education.

But I absolutely do believe that we must use every tool at our

disposal, including the extraordinary creativity of

entrepreneurs, who are committed to producing the game changing

technologies we need.

The goal of all this work is admittedly ambitious.

We want to fundamentally reimagine learning.

And fortunately, we have examples of schools and

inspiring stories to tell like we already heard this morning.

Take another story, that of Daniel Mendez,

when he enrolled in San Diego's High Tech High,

he was repeating 10th grade.

Not too dissimilar to the challenges you were facing.

Like most disadvantaged children,

he faced some real significant obstacles.

With a long commute, family responsibilities,

and few educational resources at home,

he struggled to complete homework.

Unfortunately, that's the type of child that far too often is

simply written off.

Folks think they can't make it.

But things turned around for him when High Tech High issued him a

netbook with high speed Internet access.

His grades improved immediately.

Teachers noticed that he was doing extra reading

to dive deeper.

He passed all of his courses.

And today he's a senior, thriving academically and

planning to go to college this fall.

Across the country, in rural South Carolina,

technology helped Nicholas Huther be a full participant

in school, even when he was homebound because of

cancer treatment.

As a fourth grader, Nicholas used a laptop and a webcam to

participate in his class at Plainview Elementary School.

With the help of technology, he engaged in class discussions and

asked questions, almost as if he was actually in the room.

With the creative use of technology,

he had access to his teachers, and to his classmates and to so

many learning opportunities that would have been unavailable to

him otherwise.

And today, Nicholas attends middle school.

In rural Tennessee, the Niswonger foundation,

one of our I3 winners, is using technology to give high-need

students access to AB classes and language classes that

otherwise they would not have the opportunity to take

advantage of.

And there are so many stories, so many stories like these,

that demonstrate what technology can do and the potential for

technology to help engage students and

to make learning fun.

No matter where students are or what obstacles they face,

a digital education can offer them a personalized plan to

engage them and support their ongoing learning and success.

We have a long, long way to go before America becomes a leader

in digital learning.

But we know what's possible and we know what's at stake both for

our children and for our nation.

America has always, always been a technological leader.

Our country pioneered manned space travel and the creation

of the Internet.

And yet today, our country is lagging behind other countries

in leveraging the power of technology in our classrooms.

It's time for us collectively to keep the digital promise to

America's children and provide all of them with a personalized

instruction that both raises the bar and levels

the playing field.

Thank you so much for your collective leadership,

commitment and collaboration in helping us keep that promise.

Thank you.

(applause)

Tom Kalil: Good morning. My name's Tom Kalil.

I'm the deputy director of the White House Office of Science

and Technology Policy.

I'm going to be moderating the next panel.

But before I do that, I want to welcome two leaders from the

National Science Foundation who are going to be making an

important announcement about cyber learning.

NSF, as you know, has played a critical role in the development

of technology.

They funded the NSF net, which played a very important role in

the emergence of the Internet.

They funded the development of the first graphical web browser,

which really helped the Internet take off.

They funded a project of two Stanford kids that turned out to

be Google, which was a pretty good investment.

And they're going to be making some exciting announcements

about the investments that NSF is going to be making in the

area of cyber learning.

So today we're fortunate to have Joan Ferrini-Mundy,

who leads NSF's efforts in education and human resources,

and Farnam Jahanian, who leads NSF efforts in computer science.

So come on up.

(applause)

At this time, I'm also going to ask our fantastic panel to

please come up and be seated.

This morning we've got Mark Edwards,

who is the superintendent of Morrisville Graded School District.

Dave Weiner, who is the Deputy Chancellor of New York City.

Gabe Newell, who is President and Founder of Valve,

a leading video game company.

And Shirley Malcolm, who is on the Board of the Digital Promise

and also leads the efforts in Education and Human Resources at

the AAAS.

So come on up.

(applause)

Joan Ferrini-Mundy: Good morning, everyone.

It's a great pleasure for us today to join Secretary Duncan,

Chief Technology Officer Chopra, the Digital Promise Board of

Directors, Congressman Yarmuth, and all of you,

to discuss the potential and the promise of learning

technologies, especially cyber enabled learning technologies.

For several decades, the National Science Foundation has

invested in the development of innovative learning tools for

science, technology, engineering and mathematics education.

From cognitive tutors to Lego mind storms to scratch,

NSF has been a long-time supporter of learning

technologies that can be used at all education levels in all

settings across a wide range of disciplines

and for all learners.

As technology advances at a rapid pace,

realizing the potential of the new learning technologies

depends on more than inventing exciting tools and resources.

Success also depends on designing ways that innovative

tools can be effectively integrated into learning,

on understanding their impact on learning,

and on supporting and engaging teachers with the resources to

use them well.

So we are very excited about the potential of Digital Promise to

help bring innovative learning technologies from labs into

schools and to other educational venues.

We look forward to ongoing collaboration with the U.S.

Department of Education, the Digital Promise endeavor,

federal agencies, and all who are committed to improving

learning opportunities for the nation's students,

teachers and public.

Today, we announce a portfolio of new awards in our NSF-wide

program, Cyber Learning Transforming Education.

The program aims to improve learning by integrating emerging

technologies with knowledge from research about how people learn.

We are confident that the learning technologies that are

being developed through this program will enhance our ability

to collect and manage data, to give personalized realtime

feedback, and to promote better learning overall.

This group of funded projects has the potential to transform

learning, anytime, anywhere, and for anybody.

I now invite my colleague, Farnam Jahanian to talk more

about this exciting portfolio.

Farnam Jahanian: Good morning.

Josniel, I think in about 15 years,

we're all going to be working for you.

(laughter)

I am pleased to announce that NSF's cyber learning program

has just awarded approximately $15 million

to more than 30 institutions.

These projects cover a wide range of areas and show deep

creativity from the research community.

This investment is part of a commitment of more than

$40 million across NSF in merit-reviewed cyber

learning projects.

Awardee institutions include community colleges,

universities, and nonprofit organizations and companies.

These projects address learning across a broad variety of

context, elementary schools through high schools,

post secondary education institutions,

and informal learning environments such as museums,

libraries, and of course cyber space.

Several of the projects explore the use of large-scale data to

solve complex problems.

For example, researchers at the Ohio State University are

developing a virtual simulation workbench which uses geospatial

technologies and social networks to create online

interactive maps.

High school and college students can navigate the globe and use

graphical, cultural and economic data to solve real world

problems related to transportation, agriculture,

urban planning and emergency response.

In another large-scale data project,

researchers at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell,

have joined forces with Machine Sciences Incorporated to build

software that will allow middle and high school students in

different parts of the country to share,

analyze and dynamically visualize data.

The cyber learning research portfolio also include projects

that focus on learners with special needs.

Researchers from Brigham Young University will investigate the

use of augmented reality to improve learning by deaf and

hearing-impaired children in planetariums and other venues

where learners are challenged to continuously move their

attention between a signing interpreter and a demonstration.

There are also projects that will develop learning

technologies for learning language skills,

such as one awarded to researchers at Harvard,

MIT and Northeastern University, to investigate the use of

interactive robots to help preschoolers develop vocabulary.

This project leverages emerging technologies in robotics with

recent findings from social, developmental

and cognitive psychology.

And along with supporting the design of new technologies,

the cyber learning program funded projects from Arizona

State University, Carnegie Mellon University,

and the University of Pittsburgh that focus on developing a new

generation of intelligent tutoring system.

To conclude, the projects within the NSF cyber learning portfolio

stand to demonstrate the promise of learning technologies to

transform our schools and to enhance our lives.

Thank you very much.

(applause)

Tom Kalil: Thank you.

So before we start with the panel,

I want to recognize a couple of the other individuals and

organizations that have made commitments to help launch the

Digital Promise initiative.

A number of organizations have come together to support the

2012 National Stem Video Game Competition,

including the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at the Sesame workshop,

Eli Media, and this is a video game competition to identify

new ways to use video games to support stem teaching

and learning.

It's being supported by the AMD Foundation,

the Entertainment Software Association, Microsoft Xbox,

CPB and PBS Ready to Learn Initiative.

So please join me in welcoming and supporting that.

(applause)

The Morgridge Family Foundation is providing a $2 million gift

to the Nature Conservancy to support the development of

digital content that is based on conservation science.

And John, so -- is in the audience,

so please join me in welcoming John and the

Morgridge Family Foundation.

(applause)

A number of organizations in the technology community,

the Tech America Foundation, the Information Technology Industry

Council, the Software and Information Industry Association

are all working together to build industry support for the

Digital Promise.

So if you are in the house, please stand up.

(applause)

And last, but not least, a number of foundations have

stepped forward to help launch the Digital Promise,

including the Carnegie Corporation and the

Hewlett Foundation.

So please join me in welcoming them and thanking them.

(applause)

So we have a terrific panel and let's get started.

Mark, you're the Superintendent of the Moorseville Graded School

District and you've recently been using technology to support

both challenge learning, real world problem-solving and

improving the graduation rate in your school district.

How have you been doing that?

Mark Edwards: Well, it's an honor to be here and thank you.

We've provided all students in Mooresville, North Carolina,

it's a small district north of Charlotte, 5,600 students,

we've provided all students 3rd through 12th grade with

a laptop computer.

We ranked 99th in the state in funding out of 115 districts and

we've been able to move forward using digital resources as our

primary curriculum model.

Our graduation rate has gone from 64% to 91% during the last

four years.

We've also increased our composite academic performance

from 68 to 88% and we're currently 3rd in the state.

We have also --

(applause)

Thank you.

During that same time our poverty ratio has gone up

by 25% so we have felt the effects of the economy.

But our performance in biology, in which every student has to

pass as a state exam, has gone from 68% to 93%.

Another area that we're particularly proud of is at the

3rd grade level our composite pass rate for reading is 94%;

92% for African-Americans, 91% for Hispanic students.

We've also been able, last year we made 100% of our AYP goals,

this year we dropped to 92%.

There's some more stringent requirements.

But I think the real key to that has been leveraging

digital resources.

Our motto was "Every Child Every Day" and we have used the

relevance and the engagement in using technology.

We've been able to leverage the use of digital data to

inform teachers and to expedite and to bring

precision with intervention.

And we've also been able to build collaboration and a

convergence of teachers, students,

family and community working together which students feel

every day.

I really do believe that the key to this has been a sense of

spirit of working together to make a difference and laptops

are huge; digital resources are huge.

But the community sense of obligation/responsibility for

Every Child Every Day has been a key to it.

We've had hundreds of visitors from 42 states

in the last three years.

And I don't think anybody walks away saying anything dramatic

other than the fact that we've provided resources,

we're using 24th century digital resources and I do believe that

there's great opportunity and "may the promise be with us!"

(laughter)

Thank you.

(applause)

Tom Kalil: The President's Council of Economic Advisors has developed

a report that is looking at the market for learning technology

and we're fortunate this morning to have both Katharine Abraham

and two of the folks, Ben Jones, and Ronnie Chatterji,

who helped out on the report.

And one of the things that they identified as a challenge to

using technology to transform learning was

the nature of the marketplace.

You have 15,000 different school districts.

You've got lengthy adoption cycles.

It's difficult for schools to make evidence-based decisions

about what to buy.

A lot of school districts don't spend a whole lot of money on

educational software.

So what do you think are some of the things that a large school

district look New York City could do to help drive more

innovation in learning technologies?

David Weiner: Sure, thank you very much.

My name is Dave Weiner, I am a Deputy Chancellor in New York

City and one of the areas that I oversee is called

our Innovation Zone.

The Innovation Zone was started about three years ago.

Chancellor Joel Klein was there and he basically brought

together private partners, federal funds and local funds

to actually build what we call the iZone now.

Within the iZone this past year we had about 40 schools in it

and we actually, this school year that just started a few

weeks ago, we now have 185 schools in the iZone.

These schools are basically using technology to personalize

learning for students so we have lots of examples of schools that

are basically, one example a school we called "School of One"

which basically uses technology to individualize instruction for

every single student in the class and actually every single

student in school in math.

Students come in, they are working literally on a computer,

there actually is a teacher facilitating as well,

and every single student could be at a different place.

But it's personalized to each child so that they're growing

and it's not, you know, teaching to the middle where some kids

are at the top, some kids at the bottom don't get taught,

but every single child has an individualized plan for them

which is regularly assessed to make sure it continues.

So we've have lots and lots of examples.

Josiah School is one of the schools that's in our iZone.

And we're kind of launching the next stage of it.

It directly relates to the question that was asked.

We've created what we call an education ecosystem.

We started this about a month or two ago.

Actually, a little longer now, probably about three or four

months ago, and largely what we believe is that within the

district we cannot innovate fast enough and so we have to look to

outside partners to come in.

But in order to do that we've got to define exactly what needs

we have.

What areas we need support and help in.

And we need to be able to pilot some of these programs to be

able to see how well they can grow.

And then programs that don't work we're going

to shut down quickly.

And programs that do work, like School of One we're going to

expand pretty rapidly.

And we really see the school district as being the nexus of

that connection between outside entrepreneurs, developers,

funders that want to come together to try out these

different types of options.

One thing that, I've been to quite a few of our iZone schools

and the only one thing that, you know,

puts them together into one bucket is that they are all

completely different.

And that's kind of something that we

really feel is important.

That what might work for Josiah in East Harlem,

may not necessarily work for a kid in Statton Island and the

way the technology is being used in The Bronx may look different

than the way it's being used in Brooklyn.

But using technology to personalize instruction is

really the main theme that kind of goes throughout it.

Tom Kalil: And what are some of the ways in which you think you could

leverage the purchasing power of New York City potentially even

working with other school districts to help drive the

evolution of the market?

David Weiner: So we're hoping that through Digital Promise and through

Educational Ecosystem we're basically able to come together

with different urban districts, Newark, Baltimore,

D.C., Philadelphia, to be able to say there are some common

themes that we're having.

Supporting students getting through 9th grade with enough

credits, actually, to be 10th graders has been a struggle for

us and some of our other large urban districts.

And by being able to define these challenges and problems

that we're having we hope to go to the marketplace and be able

to say these are the challenges and we need your help in

creating technologies to actually be able to innovate

and improve that.

So almost a buyer's consortium of school districts and

organizations that can come together to outline the

challenges we have and look to the outside marketplace to help

us figure out how to improve on those challenges.

Tom Kalil: Great.

As I mentioned early, Gabe Newell is the President and

founder of Valve, which is an incredibly successful

video game company.

Clearly the video game industry knows a lot about how to grab

and maintain the very high levels of attentive time on

task, both young people and grownups.

What role do you think there could be for your company and

for the video game industry more broadly in terms of transforming

teaching and learning?

Gabe Newell: Well, we got here because of our customers.

We've been successful as a video game company,

as an entertainment company because we watch exactly what

our customers are doing.

And what started to happen was that teachers and students

started to bring our games into an educational setting and

we're, like, aren't we enemies; right?

(laughter)

I mean, aren't we entertainment?

And isn't that, you know, in opposition to education?

So we started talking to the teachers and we started talking

to researchers and the more we looked at it it seems like the

technology, the engineering, the design,

the science behind what we do is the same as the science and the

technology that shows so much opportunity in

the educational field.

So we decided, well, if that's true,

then teachers should be good video designers and,

video game designers, and we should be able to build

compelling, engaging curriculum.

So we decided to go ahead and try to do that,

so we're in the process of building some middle

school curriculum.

We're building new tools.

We're building new distribution technology to give teachers and

students the ability to have access to that.

And then we're going to give those tools themselves to the

teachers and students.

So we're going to learn a lot about that.

We're going to learn, you know, how these technologies

are converging.

And I also think that we're going to show other video

game developers what the opportunity is,

how they can be contributing, how everything that we've been

learning in our industry to engage and excite children,

is very applicable in an educational environment as well.

And we're very excited working with teachers to figure out how

what we do can be a tool to them rather than a distraction.

Tom Kalil: Right.

It seems one of the things that a great video game does

is continually keep you on the knife edge between a challenge

being just too hard in which case you give up in frustration,

and being too easy in which case you get bored.

What are some other things that the video game industry has

figured out how to do that you think are broadly applicable to

great teaching and learning.

Gabe Newell: You know, we have to think about progression,

we have to think about pacing, we have to think about

appropriate levels of frustration.

Our best -- well, you have to be challenged; right?

Tom Kalil: Right.

Gabe Newell: And you can't be too challenged or you walk away from the task.

Tom Kalil: It has to be hard fun.

Gabe Newell: It has to be, yeah, it has to be hard fun is a good way to do it.

I think one of the biggest steps forward we came to recently is

when we started using biometric information to directly measure

sort of frustration and engagement levels among game

players and it taught us a lot about everybody has a different

optimal pathway through an experience,

and we think that those are the kinds of lessons that are going

to be very applicable, just as applicable in the classroom as

they are in people's dens.

Tom Kalil: Great.

Shirley, one of the points that Secretary Duncan made is that we

really have to harness these technologies in ways that are

not only going to promote excellence, but equity.

What do you think are some of both the challenges and

opportunities in using digital learning to promote equity and

to expand the circle of opportunity?

Shirley Malcolm: One of the things that really excited me about the first

presentation was that when called upon to talk about

performance of different groups, that there was the opportunity

to see that in fact that it had made a difference for all kids.

And I think that that is the real opportunity that is there.

Obviously the real challenge is to make sure that the tools that

are needed are going to be available.

I think that these, the stubborn performance gap,

and I will say it in all honesty,

that this is an unusual situation to be able to report

data such as Mooresville has reported.

In most cases, that's not what we're seeing.

We're seeing a gap that persists and that just does not move.

And so the question is why is that.

In part it is because we have thought about learning really as

only something that in fact happens in school all too often.

When in fact it happens or should happen everywhere.

Being able to have the technology allows you to do that

everywhere, you know, anywhere any time with the students.

And I think that that is a real promise and

it's a real opportunity.

Making sure that we in fact have the access that is available and

not differential expectations for students is really going to

be a challenge.

I was happy to hear that in the cyber learning grants were

included some which addressed issues related

to students with disabilities.

And I think that that's another access issue of a different

kind, but it is in fact an access issue and very happy

to see that these kinds of things are being attended to.

Tom Kalil: What do you think are the opportunities around

professional development, particularly in STEM,

science technology, engineering and math?

As you know this is a major priority for the President to

move the United States from the middle to the top of the pack

over the next decade and certainly teacher quality

is a major challenge in the STEM area.

So what are some opportunities to harness technology in the

area of professional development?

Shirley Malcolm: I think that especially for teachers who are seeking

professional education and professional experiences,

while at the same time they're in the classroom,

they need a place to be able to go and grab and get and learn

and update their content.

They need to be able to have access to hybrid learning

opportunities, not just ones that depend on

face-to-face contact.

And they need to be able, I think just as many of the rest

of us, if they don't understand it the first time around to be

able to go and revisit it time and time again until

they do understand it.

And I think that's one of the things that the technology can

actually allow.

We did a small experiment basically driven by necessity

by the fact that some of the teachers in a program that we

were running this summer could not, in fact,

all of them couldn't be there at the same time,

that we were able to incorporate a digital component with that

face-to-face in-the-lab kind of aspect.

And I think that those kinds of opportunities that we really

have to explore how we're going to be able to move that and to

use that in ways that are thoughtful to help teachers

have the tools that they need to address their learning and

their improvement.

Tom Kalil: Great.

Gabe, one of the things that Valve is doing is making your

level editors available so that's going to really

democratize both teachers and students being able to develop

games for learning.

What are some of the other things that you think the video

game industry can and should do to support games as a powerful

tool for learning?

Gabe Newell: Well, one of the things that we're doing is providing support

materials for teachers.

So there is a website that we've put up called "learning with

portals.com" that will give teachers guides to how to use

in an educational situation the physics curricula and the tools

that we're creating.

You know, just recognizing that you're part of that community

and connecting with giving them the ability to create -- you

know, we're all used to social networking, well, but, you know,

and most of the social networking environments there's

not this notion of a class, there's not this notion of

a teacher.

And those are easy things for us to add, you know, whether it's,

you know, an origin for EA or it's a battle net at blizzard,

and it would be very helpful as we explore ways that

entertainment software is complementary to educational

experiences for other game developers to embed those

kinds of notions into their social networking systems.

Tom Kalil: And are there ways in which you think that the industry could be

incented to do these types of things from a commercial point

of view as opposed to just a, you know,

corporate social responsibility or

philanthropical point of view?

Gabe Newell: Well, absolutely.

I mean, I'd sit down with Bobby Kodak at Activision or John

Riccitiello at Electronic Arts and just walk them through our

experiences and what we've been learning, you know.

I think there are tremendous opportunities to, you know,

not just commercial opportunities,

but I think to better understand the businesses

that we're already in.

And, I mean, these are convergent problems.

Tom Kalil: Right.

Gabe Newell: If they learn how to help a student in a middle school

understand fractions, they're probably going to find that

they're better across the board at everything else that they're

trying to do.

I think, you know, being better at this will help their bottom

line in a very ongoing basis.

Tom Kalil: Great. That's terrific.

So, David, as you have worked on developing an innovation

ecosystem, what are some of the challenges that smaller

companies, which is where a lot of the innovation occurs,

have reported to you as challenges associated with

addressing the educational market and what are some of the

things that you think school districts could do to help

address those barriers?

David Weiner: One of the biggest barriers that we've heard people say

is simply access.

People don't know how to access the marketplace of schools.

It's very difficult to get in.

If you can make a connection you may be able to get into

one school or two schools.

But it's really hard to actually be able to get access.

The second thing is is this idea of piloting programs or having,

you know, some degree of research and design.

In education it's, you know, it's the "do no harm."

There's a nervousness that if we try something new it might

be worse than what we currently have.

And although what we currently have is not great,

we're a little nervous it's going to go down.

And we feel like that that actually is our responsibility

as the district to actually, first of all,

open up our environment to smaller developers,

new people that want to get in, but also to pilot.

One of the things I think we recognize most clearly is we

have about 185 schools that are now in our iZone and we're going

up to 400 in two years, that some of the models that we

create are not going to work.

Tom Kalil: Right.

David Weiner: They may be fine, and they may not, you know,

they may not harm students, but they're not going to be those

groundbreaking leaps forward that we actually need.

But our hope is that of the 400 schools that are trying out lots

of different technologies, and partnering with outside smaller

and larger entrepreneurs, that we will find enough in that to

dramatically be able to grow.

School of One is a great example again because it's something

that has worked well.

It's at a school in Brooklyn right now.

We're expanding to five new Schools of One sites in January

and actually seven additional ones in September.

So data that shows that some of these entrepreneurial,

these different types of ideas that are actually working,

we want to expand quickly and that ideas that aren't going to

work we're going to close down as fast as we can.

And allowing smaller businesses, smaller groups to actually

access and come into the schools,

be able to try things out and pilot things is really where we

feel like we can have a lot of support and influence.

Tom Kalil: So it seems like one of the ways in which large school districts

could help drive the market is to define, as you said,

some specific learning outcomes or specific problems that you're

facing and saying, you know, if you could develop

a technology-enabled solution that would deliver the following

results, and here is how we'd measure it,

then we would buy it.

So by being a more proactive voice of the customer,

you might be in a position of saying, you know,

we don't want to just go out and buy a lot of technology for the

sake of technology, but we want to use it to solve a

particular problem.

Are there things like that that come to mind that could serve as

the basis for a pilot for how procurement could drive

innovation to solve a particular learning challenge?

David Weiner: Yeah, I mean, one of the challenges I think school

districts, and New York City, I would say, is one of them,

has really been defining what those challenges are.

We've done a bad job of saying, hey,

this is the challenge we're facing,

whether it's the achievement gap or supporting students with

disabilities or allowing students to access more

curricula, we've done a poor job of doing that.

The innovation ecosystem, and again kind of coupled with

Digital Promise, we hope, will allow us to be able to say these

are some of the challenges we're facing.

What's really important also is that we looked at all of

our different schools and some of our schools have

different challenges.

One of the schools in the iZone right now is a school called

Brooklyn Tech, it's one of our, one of our exam schools that is

a really high functioning school,

it's a Steiverson-type school so it really has

a top-level student.

Well, one of the challenges that we heard from their community

and their parents were that -- it sounds crazy -- but juniors

and seniors in their schools, their schedules were so tight

they weren't able to access enough AP classes.

So I'm not sure any student wants to take seven or eight AP

classes as a high school student but if there is a child that

does it's going to be at Brooklyn Tech.

So what we actually did is we actually built a digital

platform to actually allow blended learning.

So students are now actually getting some of the learning

in the classroom about half the time.

And then half the time they're required to do it at home as

part of, you know, homework and extended day.

This almost reminds me when I was in college and I had to do

some online work but we're really allowing our high school

students to do it.

So whereas last year Brooklyn Tech seniors could only take

five AP classes, they can now take seven.

(laughter)

Not that again that I would encourage anyone to do that

if they didn't want to, but that's something they could do.

On the other end of the spectrum --

Tom Kalil: That's a high class problem.

David Weiner: Yes, yes, yes, but it is a problem that we're hoping to

solve and that marketplace does.

And on the other end of the spectrum we have schools that

are called transfer schools.

And these schools are for students who have actually

dropped out of a traditional high school and they're trying

to get reengaged.

What we find is these kids come to us at 16, 17,

18 years old with two credits, three credits, so, you know,

it's going to take them four, almost five more years to

actually get through high school.

Traditionally we have been unable to provide more than

about five or six classes a year.

With our online platform now we are actually able to double and

actually almost triple the number of classes a student

would be able to take in a year.

So if you're 17 years old and you have the credits of a 9th

grader you can actually get through high school in two years

as long as you're committed and able to do learning inside the

school day and outside of it.

It allows you to meet students who have

nontraditional schedules.

Students that have to work or raising a child,

that we can actually work around their schedule.

Tom Kalil: So you're trying to move towards competency-based assessment as

opposed to how many hours were you in class?

David Weiner: That's exactly right. That's exactly right.

And we see it basically for all of our students.

Students, some of our top students,

some of our students that are struggling the most,

and all over the board.

So we have defined these challenges and we have worked

with groups like SYSCO and Google and Apple to say these

are some of our challenges; we need to get credit accumulation

faster in a competency-based manner and we need your help in

figuring out how we can do that.

That's really where we've been able to innovate.

Tom Kalil: Right.

Now, Mark, you cited some really extraordinary figures in terms

of the improvements that you've been able to make in student

learning outcomes.

And obviously, you know, there were probably a lot of things

that went into that, you know, leadership, parental engagement,

you know, teacher professional development.

But what do you think were some of the key wins in terms of the

role that technology-enabled learning played in that?

Mark Edwards: Well, you know, one of the real exciting outcomes,

it was kind of an unintended, is the level of collaboration that

goes on after school, that goes on with teachers in the evening

and on the weekends and from state to state and

region to region.

And there is this sense of a collaborative hum that occurs.

And there's this same type of excitement that is occurring

with teachers that we see with students.

And I think the relevance, the fact that it's relevant to the

future rather than part of the past,

is driving our new teachers' energy and excitement.

And I also think that when parents see this opportunity

for children, that they're more inclined to be part of it.

We're seeing in the evenings our teachers will engage with

students on online discussion boards.

Last winter we were out for snow and we had semester

exams coming up.

And we were on a time -- we had to move ahead.

But our teachers sent e-mails and we had hundreds of students

online in the evening connecting with each other,

connecting with their teachers preparing for this opportunity.

So I think that there are huge dividends.

And I think with the Lead Innovative Schools, Terry Grier,

the Superintendent of Houston ISD,

a good friend and colleague, we talk regularly.

Now, he's a district of 200,000 plus students,

but the opportunity to connect locally across the nation,

across the world, I think brings a level of excitement to the

classroom that there's a new sense of opportunity for all.

For teachers and for students.

Tom Kalil: Well, please join me in thanking what has been

an absolutely terrific panel.

(applause)

So we're going to go to the next phase of the program.

There are going to be three breakout sessions.

Everyone should know which breakout session they're

supposed to go to and there will be people with signs telling you

where to go.

I also want to introduce Adam Frankel who is -- Adam,

stand up.

Please join me in thanking Adam.

(applause)

And this is really going to require an all-hands-on-deck

effort, so please talk to Adam if you're interested in talking

about how you can get involved, how your organization can get

involved in making the Digital Promise a reality.

Thank you!