Leaving a large footprint through e-Learning

I am just waiting for the e-learning unit at the Ministry of Education to catch up with the “leaving a large footprint” implications in The Waste at the Heart of the Web article by Phil McKenna in New Scientist 16 December 2006. 

What difference will this thinking make to the highly individual focus of our e-learning action plan where the key idea is “placing the learner at the centre” - learning with “teachers and learners at the centre of their own communication and information networks” when we realise that

“Every time you search Google, a data centre stirs into life wasting heaps of energy.”

McKenna explains that the rising energy costs are associated with the changing ways we use computers as more individual users adopt online applications “offering video access, music, photo storage and even word processing from remote servers." 

When we count the cost of adopting PLE’s utilising Web2.0 connectivity for every student in New Zealand (pre-school, primary, secondary and tertiary) in coal equivalents

“The creation, storage and movement of 10 megabytes of data uses nearly a kilo of coal” Mark Mills, Analyst Digital Power Group

it seems likely that the Minister Responsible for Climate Change Issues will want to be involved in any future discussions around the costs and benefits of e learning for New Zealand.

Unsurprisingly, balancing the promotion of elearning against meeting our commitments to cut greenhouse gas emissions is not discussed in the e-Learning Action Plan for Schools 2006 -2010, although the significant costs of e-learning are alluded to.

“e-Learning can require a major investment and professional commitment by educators.  We need to know if these investments in e-learning are making a positive difference for all our students and how we can do better.” p18 Enabling the 21st Century Learner

The cost focus in the action plan document is much narrower – more of an "if we are going to pour energy, time and money into something it would be smart to find out if we are getting "bang for bucks”" – except they call it “Evidence based practice”

Part of the Schooling Strategy MoE 2005, the term “Evidence based practice” is currently cropping up every place, everywhere, every time – it is classic mother statement stuff – “eduspeak” that is difficult to challenge without sounding like a complete dork.

The “An elearning action plan for schools” document devotes half a page to evidence based practice calling it “Knowing What Works” and suggesting that bang for bucks answers will come from “programme evaluation and research in key Ministry e-learning initiatives”

This interests me – I want to see if research data that emerges from the key Ministry e-learning initiatives in 2007 (including the e-fellows research reports) can escape the critique that has dogged previous New Zealand based educational research without the e.

I am still too ready to uncritically accept research reports downloaded from the Ministry of Education website and reported on in press releases from the Minister.  So much so that I was gobsmacked when I first stumbled across the critique from the Education Policy Group (Massey University) and others of the ideological interpretations and flawed research design within these often cited (but seldom read in full) documents

Picking up the Pace,
Shifting the Focus,
Quality Teaching Best Evidence Project
Te Kotahitanga Research
The Teaching of International Languages in NZ Schools in Years 7 and 8

It made me appreciate that relying on the educational interpretations of others may not be such a smart thing in the context of New Zealand educational research.

Alison (2004) argues in The Politics of Research PPTA February 2004, that all of the following have happened in New Zealand educational research at some point in the last ten years.
•    Research is misread by politicians who claim it proves something it doesn’t
•    Politicians put a particular slant on research results, emphasising the aspects which suit them and ignoring the aspects which don’t
•    Politicians highlight pieces of research that appear to suit them, but ignore those which don’t
•    Government, as the largest source of money for research, commissions only work which is likely to feed into its political agenda
•    Researchers doing work commissioned by the government are influenced by that and ‘sanitise’ results which do not suit their paymasters
•    Researchers who insist on maintaining their integrity and reporting honestly cease to getting government contracts because of it

If problems with educational research arise when its purpose is subverted to support particular policy directions, then I am going to have to be very alert when reading any research from the key Ministry e-learning initiatives this year.  I figure that the introduction of an e is unlikely to alter the game plan.

Comments

[ailsa]

EBP, has been used in health to support best practice in everything from wound dressings to restraint. It has shown that tap water is as good as saline in reducing bacteria counts, but sadly neglected that water hurts and saline doesnt. Health professionals may be better informed on how to restrain, but the core philosophical issue of 'what is care for' and 'should restraint be a part of care' was neglected in evidence based articles. The eduspeak smothers thinking in words that are difficult to challenge- evidence, a basis and best practice all sound as good and wholesome as apple pie.
My education actually did me a great service that I was not aware of at the time. 30 years later I can praise the choice of literature, George Orwell with Animal Farm. I hated it at the time- not all education is, or should be, enjoyed, and Teachers wait a long time for praise!
In my workplace the SEPs (Student evaluation of a paper) would never be able to pick up such longterm effectiveness of course content or teaching effectiveness.