Dive Brief:

• Jon Phillips, managing director of Worldwide Education for Dell, has nine steps to help schools and teachers get beyond one-to-one device programs and technology itself to think about strategic plans for building “future-ready” classrooms.
• For Ed Tech Magazine, Phillips writes the first step is to develop a vision of student-led learning, then assign benchmarks to track progress toward reaching it with appropriate resources and leadership to do so, and get a base measurement of the current reality.
• Schools should identify skills students need based on future job projections, align professional development plans with teaching them, develop new assessments to measure student progress, consider lending devices to all students or those who need them to develop these skills, foster outside partnerships, and plan collectively and strategically.

Dive Insight:

The expansion of E-Rate funding in 2014 has allowed many schools to get beyond a focus on simple internet connections to expanding wireless. But many more schools have room to develop new projects. More than $245 million was available in the grant program in 2014 than was claimed by school districts and libraries. On the West Coast alone, $133 million was left on the table.

While the grant application may be time-consuming and schools may have staffs that are pressed for time, applying for funding to improve networks, strengthen firewall services, get more backups, or cover maintenance projects may be key to actually getting that work done. And when it comes to firewall services and backups, greater protection may be key to even having a functional network as K-12 schools are increasingly seen as targets for hackers.