OpenEducation Browse Recent ideas

Rather than post each of my "OpenGov" Ideas at 27 different websites, I have posted them at the GSA's website (since they are in the forefront of the OpenGov initiative). So, by this notice, the members of the OpenGov Team for this agency have been informed of those ideas. (At least, now, you can't say you were unaware of them.) http://opengsa.ideascale.com/a/pmd/29640-6960 ALSO -- Those OpenGov Team members,... more »

The deregulation bonanza of the last two presidential administrations has created an educational cost structure in which tuition has doubled in the last ten years and resulting in increases at almost twice the rate of inflation. Students today can easily pay 30-50% of their income servicing their educational debt. Educational debt has become almost impossible to absolve through bankruptcy compared to home ownership and... more »

WHAT Urge governments to publish granular permalinks for all documents on their websites. WHY * Enable citizens to reliably cite government websites on their personal blogs, on public sites like Wikipedia, or elsewhere. * Provide unique identifiers that enable aggregation of citations. * Make the civic discourse surrounding government websites more discoverable. HOW * An easy-to-deploy archival... more »

Disruptive Technologies: A Holistic, Pragmatic Approach New technologies are emerging at a faster pace than Agencies can swallow. The rate of obsolescence outpaces the pace of change. Despite the new technology flood, Agencies lack a strategy to on-board these disruptions. As a result, they often react, flounder, or simply ignore them. We can solve these problems in four major areas of practice: Leadership... more »

One idea that has come to mind is the development of an ED website that kids could use as a place for fun, competitive learning. Kids would register with the site and be able to participate in various learning games against children from all across the country. Games could include game-show style quizzes, logic puzzles, historical scavenger hunts, etc. Children would be rewarded with online awards that they could display... more »

Something that has been missing for decades in our school systems would be the study of both ethics and logic. Ethics at a young age would help foster moral practices in government and business. Logic would help people realize when falacious arguments are being forced upon them in the media, courtrooms, and government broadcasts. As I learned in obtaining my degree, logic teaches you how to think for yourself. What a... more »

There is so much good technology available, but few school districts have the funds or staffing to support it. A large-scale technology infrastructure -- one that all school districts can access -- would benefit all schools, regardless of size and location. A national education technology infrastructure could provide many benefits, such as: * pre-recorded lectures on advanced subjects - currently, many smaller school... more »

Set up an Endowment or Annuity for public schools, so that education is not tied to the economy. How can we provide a FREE and APPROPRIATE education for all our students when we have to lay-off half the teachers to balance the budget because the economy has tanked. In order for education to truly be free and appropriate it has to not be tied so closely to the economy. Schools should run the same during a boom or a... more »

I think it is wonderful that we are having this open discussion. How do we go to the next step and collaborate? One way might be to have, not just "a voting text box" but a "Want to collaborate? box." Those who want to collaborate on a particular issue then would be sent to a webpage where a forum has been set up. For example. I am interested in school board issues. I click onto the "Want to Collaborate." You could... more »

i believe there should be a faster way to get our points through the Goverment and have them respond and people should communicate through the state goverment

Two suggestions of a new name for President Obama's proposed education reform:

"EVERY CHILD ACHIEVES"

"EVERY CHILD AN ACHIEVER"

Postively states that every child will receive an education that will produce college readiness or career readiness upon comletion of high school.

P

In the State of Illinois funding for education is at risk. Districts are faced with huge deficits. As a result, districts are forced to layoff teachers. That means that some of the best teachers will be layed off and some mediocre or poor teachers will remain. We need legislation that will allow districts to layoff any teacher - tenured as well as non-tenured. This legislation will allow districts to disregard the... more »

Many schools-—especially ones in low-income areas—-have realized that there's a more efficient input towards the goal of maximizing testing performance than teaching academic subjects in a way that is rigorous and meaningful. This more efficient input is—test taking strategies! Strategic test-taking involves a different set of actions than does reading and enjoying a chapter book—or reading, enjoying, and writing about... more »

Many psychometricians have argued that certain forms of preparation lead to "test score pollution"—that is, they invalidate the results of standardized tests. (All sorts of studies showing this were done in the early '90s; in the current educational climate, this is a forgotten issue.) Nevertheless, many schools see the implementation of K-12 commercial test preparation curriculums as a more immediately efficacious... more »

I work in a English comprehensive school, we set out children from year 7 to 11 and this works really well. It allows the teacher to plan lessons according to the ability of the students in the class. we only set for the main classes which are English, Maths and Science, the rest of the lessons are taken as a working group in KS3 and then options in KS4. just wondered what you thought of our way of educating the students.... more »