Dive Brief:

• With the 2016 NMC/CoSN Horizon Report anticipating online learning and virtual reality will gain prominence in K-12 schools over the next five years, administrators should be thinking now about preparing their district’s network infrastructure.
• Ed Tech Magazine reports IT leaders should be monitoring school networks to track usage and brace for growth, always having about 25% more bandwidth capacity than they need to facilitate upgrades.
• As instruction shifts more toward digital tools and online programs, schools must also keep the homework gap in mind, strategizing ways to ensure students have access to high-speed internet after they leave the classroom.

Dive Insight:

Textbooks have been an especially portable learning tool. Though arguably heavy, students could bring them wherever they needed to study. If the modern textbook is accessible only through an internet-enabled device, schools have to maintain their side of the bargain and provide it — or perhaps reconsider technology plans.

The District 5 Schools of Spartanburg County worked around some of the constraints of a homework gap when it launched a 1:1 device program, choosing Dell laptops that allowed students to work productively offline and access everything they needed for homework. Still, recognizing students need the internet for research and other things, administrators have started a pilot to send home mobile hotspots with students in two Title I schools. This is becoming a common response to achieve equity.