[DDN] Bill Gates Gets Schooled
Hi, There is an interesting article in Business Week [June 26th, 2006] regarding some of the Gates Foundations efforts in changing the school system. I think it indicates that when it comes to education, as in solving issues of the Digital Divide, it takes more than gold to create glitter. md -- Jon maddog Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association Board Member Emeritus: USENIX Association (2000-2006) (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries. ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
[DDN] Australia to give away porn-filtering software to all families
(article) The Australian government plans to spend about $86 million to provide all the country's families with free Internet pornography-blocking software. (s) Under this scheme, families will be offered a filtered service or a free filter for their home computer, either for download from a dedicated Web site or delivered to them on CD-ROM, Coonan stated. All ISPs will also be required to offer filters to new and existing customers at no additional cost. More at: http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-6086259.html Don Cameron ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
RE: [DDN] bill gates transitions
C'mon Don - Please don't get caustic. There is a difference between a mission and an opinion. I wish you luck in your mission of moving the leviathans. I think this thread has in fact seen better days. Jesse Sinaiko - Chicago, IL ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
Re: [DDN] bill gates transitions
Consider this thread over. Please take it off-list if you wish to continue it. I think this thread has in fact seen better days. -- -- Andy Carvin acarvin (at) edc . org andycarvin (at) yahoo . com http://www.andycarvin.com http://www.digitaldivide.net http://www.pbs.org/learningnow -- ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
[DDN] Southeast ICT Symposium 2006
Get the early bird rate; make your reservations now! For more information you can visit us at http://www.e-nc.org/WirelessICT2006/index.asp. Please pass this information on to other potential conference attendees. Thank you! Southeast ICT Symposium 2006 November 13th 14th, 2006 UNC - William Ida Friday Center UNC-Chapel Hill Campus Box 1020 100 Friday Center Drive Chapel Hill NC 27599-1020 Theme: ICT Delivering the Economic Promise: e-Communities, a Critical Strategy for Creating Community Wealth For the past three years, the Southeast Wireless Symposium has brought together national experts and community leaders to discuss the deployment of wireless networks. In 2006, the e-NC Authority is expanding the scope of the conference to cover Information Communication Technology, a broader concept that encompasses information technology infrastructure generally, with specific emphasis on broadband Internet technologies and the powerful applications they deliver. This year's Southeast ICT Symposium will focus on the new and evolving technical, political, legal, and financial issues surrounding municipal broadband deployment. Industry experts and community leaders will present research results and practical hands-on experience derived from case studies on applying ICT to create digital communities and enhance rural life. Get the early bird rate; make your reservations now! For more information you can visit us at http://www.e-nc.org/WirelessICT2006/index.asp. Please pass this information on to other potential conference attendees. Thank you! Best regards, Donna Sullivan Senior Program Director for Integration of Communities/Innovation e-NC Authority (w) 919.250.4314 (c) 919.915.0217 (f) 919.250.4325 www.e-nc.org ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
[DDN] registering for a digg account
hi Digital Divide Network community - the community-controlled tech news web site named digg.com is now receiving 9 million site visits per day. when news of the DDN community reaching its 10,000 registered member comes out, we have the power within our community to propel that news to the front page of digg. (it only takes about 50 diggs (i.e. votes of approval) within 24 hours for a submitted story to rise to the front page of digg.) if you don't yet have a digg.com account yet, thanks for registering for one today. your mouse click can propel our community forward. if news about the DDN community reaches the front page of digg, then it would be more likely that Wired magazine (or somesuch) might want to cover the Digital Divide Network in an article. that would be a needed (and important) step forward for the movement. it would also be the catalyst in moving our community from 10,000 members to 100,000 members. as my high school math teacher used to say with a wink when he handed out exams, remember, there is always strength in numbers. so true. - phil -- Phil Shapiro [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.digitaldivide.net/profile/pshapiro http://philsrssfeed.blogspot.com http://www.his.com/pshapiro/stories.menu.html Wisdom starts with wonder. - Socrates Learning happens through gentleness. ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
[DDN] TechSoup Stock's Fiscal Year ends June 30th!
As you may know, TechSoup Stock (www.techsoup.org/stock) distributes donated technology products from companies such as Adobe, Cisco, Intuit, and Symantec to nonprofit organizations. I'd like to let you know about the end of TechSoup Stock's fiscal year on June 30 (or visit www.techsoup.org/stock/fiscal.asp). Many of the donation programs at TechSoup Stock allow organizations to receive a fixed quantity of technology donations between July 1 and June 30 of our fiscal year. You may place your donation requests any time before June 30, 2006 and become eligible once more to receive a donation once again on July 1, 2006. IMPORTANT: The Microsoft Software Donation Program (MSDP) IS NOT affected by the June 30 deadline. As June 30 approaches, your organization still has time maximize the benefits of our donation programs. To see which donation programs are on a fiscal year-end schedule, visit www.techsoup.org/stock/fiscal.asp NOTE: Your organization may be eligible to order from multiple programs and place more than one order per program during our fiscal year. To check which donation programs your organization is still eligible to order from, visit www.techsoup.org/stock/restrictions.asp Malin Coleridge Business Analyst TechSoup.org (a program of CompuMentor) Tel: (415) 633-9346 Fax: (415) 512-9400 http://www.techsoup.org BLOCKED::http://www.techsoup.org/ http://www.compumentor.org BLOCKED::http://www.compumentor.org/ ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
[DDN] Angus King: An Insider's History of the Maine Laptop Program
Hi everyone, Former Maine governor Angus King gave a fascinating, entertaining speech today at the Anytime, Anywhere Learning Foundation (AALF.org) conference here in Boston. I've posted detailed notes from the speech on my blog: http://www.andycarvin.com/ permalink: http://www.andycarvin.com/archives/2006/06/angus_king_a_brief_h.html I also recorded a podcast and have asked the governor for permission to post it; waiting back to hear from him. Here's a taste of my notes: By 2000, our finance people said we'd have a $70 mil surplus in the state budget that no one anticipated. It hadn't been earmarked for anything. So I put these insights together and said I want to do something that helps people compete, isn't incremental, and should involve edtech. We could have used the money for anything, but I wanted to do this. My chief of staff said that we could create an endowment to give laptops to every 7th grader forever. And I said, wow. We worked on this idea and announced it six weeks later. Other people plan projects like this for more than a year - that's better. But if we had waited, the legislature would have spent the money. If we didn't get our mitts on that money, it would get parceled out and been used incrementally. A reporter then asked a question we hadn't thought of - will the kids or the schools own the laptops? I had no idea. I could have said I don't know, but I blurted out, the kids. Wrong answer. Huge political mistake. People hated the idea that the govt would give these tools to kids. Seventh graders became the most hated minority in the state. So that was a big mistake. It was referred to as Governor King's Laptop Giveaway. Why don't more politicians try projects like this? It's because I got the shit kicked out of me. Ten to one of all emails were against it. Governor, what were you smoking? Governor, we are a poor state, let someone else lead. Yes, and they will still lead. One guy even suggested it would be better to give kids chainsaws ...What did we learn? If you're thinking of doing something like this, go to one vendor. Don't spread it around - you want one throat to choke. When something goes wrong, you don't want the computer company blaming the network company. Get one vendor who can deal with the whole issue and be your partner. For us, Apple was a real partner. They moved people to Maine, were fantastic with repairs, a real partner. Things also have to work. If you're gonna do this, the damn things have to work. If something doesn't work more than once or twice, the teachers will fold up the laptops and go back to the book. Reliability is a huge factor in this. A teacher just isn't going to put up with it otherwise. Third - you can't spend too much time or money on professional development. The best thing we did was focus on professional development from the very beginning, starting with a grant from the Gates Foundation. This is not a hardware project. It's an educational project. This device is something that assists teachers, not replace them. So you need to help teachers integrate it into the curriculum. If all you're doing is buying hardware, it's going to be a failure, and I don't want that to happen because my name is associated with this kind of project. Fourth - assessment. This obsession with testing is focused on rote knowledge. It's not capturing what these tools can really do. It's a tool that helps you solve problems, which is what life is all about. It's not for memorizing what year Columbus discover America. But the tests are testing that kind of knowledge. So do not - do not - promise your school board that one-to-one laptops will improve test scores, or you'll be out of a job. You can say they improve writing skills - all the research is showing this. But it's really about problem solving thanks, andy -- -- Andy Carvin acarvin (at) edc . org andycarvin (at) yahoo . com http://www.andycarvin.com http://www.digitaldivide.net http://www.pbs.org/learningnow -- ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
