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I really wish your reporting might be a tad more skeptical. Did you ask White to provide examples of the “significant research demonstrating its potential to accelerate student learning.”?
How could you let Vanderveen get away with his ridiculous statement that an online credit recovery program lends “itself to greater rigor”? How does online learning provide more ” individualized attention”? And how does the DOE get away with not disclosing how much this is costing? All in all, this reads like a press release out of the DOE PR office. This is another potentially disastrous experiment to dilute our children’s education, and you seem to swallow this, hook line and sinker.

On-line “distance” courses and credit recovery were both approved by the Regents in a new regulation passed Oct. 2009. I don’t recall any Regents or NYSED announcement that they were doing this because the NYCDOE had already started a batch of iSchools and needed to have them regularized, since they would otherwise have been illegal and not able to grant actual course credits towards Regents diplomas (perhaps local diplomas as well – I haven’t checked yet.)

Surely Merryl Tisch and at least some of the other Reegies knew what Klein, et al. were doing at that time. Surely there should have been some serious information about this NYCDOE program made public at that time. Surely there should be some statutory requirements that ALL data from these iSchools, pilot and otherwise, be made public at the time it is gathered so that the public, scholars and commentators can examine it to see if iSchools – at least those in the NYCDOE – actually are effective in producing better student outcomes.

The stealth involved in all of this stinks to high heaven. Perhaps we’ll see something in depth about it when NYSED submits its i3 application to USDOE?

I personally think the idea of online learning is great, but “think” and “know” are different. I believe we are all entitled to more than another stealth Regents/NYCDOE series of moves. Or better yet, let Tisch, the rest of the Regents, Klein and Bloomberg do all they want – but puhleez! Let them pay for it, and not out of taxpayers’ dollars. And of course, give parents of kids in these schools full information BEFORE their kids are put into these “pilot” programs. Who knows? Perhaps there’s a parent out there who feels strongly that his or her child will do poorly in such a program for reasons the NYCDOE has no awareness about. Perhaps the vendors are not all they’re cracked up to be. Perhaps the costs are far in excess of costs incurred for similar pilot and online programs in other states?

It’s time the Regents, NYSED, Klein, Bloomberg and the NYCDOE take major decisions regarding taxpayer funded public education programs out from under their very large rock. Sunlight is the best disinfectant. Hopefully, these programs won’t need disinfectant, but without full and prompt public disclosure of all available information, one can only assume to the contrary. It could wind up being just more smoke and mirrors, and lord knows we’ve had enough of that out of NYSED and the NYCDOE.

Leonie – I went over some web materials and had a strong feeling that some of the “teachers” or “tutors” were in and from offshore outfits. There are some private tutoring firms working in the States who use tutors from India, etc. and …

What a nice cheap way to teach kids here. Of course, I’m assuming the offshore teachers or tutors would be used for the kids in the “credit recovery” programs, i.e., the poorest kids, kids of color, etc. because if they pulled this on kids from middle class families, the parents would be up in arms and doing a big public snit in a New York minute.

This is one reason I’d like full financial disclosure re the vendors. Revolution Learning, Vander Ark’s outfit, appears to have been started as a venture capital outfit and they are looking to make big bucks, from what I can tell.

We had a particularly noxious venture capital-financed outfit started when NCLB was initially written. It was started by a bunch of folks who were, by repute, extremely close to George W. Bush, Margaret Spellings, etc. and it has done extremely well. Of course, the fact that there is no research showing its programs are effective didn’t stop it from spreading like wildfire … with that kind of backing. Well, this looks to me like the new Dem. version of the venture capitalist-there’s-gold-in-them-thar-education-ills private profitmaking effort.

Actually, with full and complete disclosure, it might all work out well, but it’s taxpayers’ dollars and parents’ children these people are playing with. I’m not in favor of using public school children and taxpayers’ dollars to give venture capitalists a free field to experiment at low or no cost to them and their bankers unless the taxpayers and parents have given informed consent – which means only after they’ve received very full disclosure of all relevant facts and issues.

But when was the last time we got full disclosure on anything from the Regents, NYSED, Klein-Bloomberg and the NYCDOE? When was the first time … ?

This conversation on online learning in the school district is exciting! There are a lot of voices of challenge here which is necessary when sweeping and “radical” changes are taking place -everyone deserves to have their questions answered (and of course continue to ask questions!)

I know of a Live Chat to be moderated by the editor of Digital Directions that I think will be informative and engaging. Here’s the link:
http://www.edweek.org/ew/events/chats/2010/05/04/index.html

I’m not affiliated with any aspect of the chat in any way. I’m interested in technology in learning and especially the implementation of online courses in traditional schools so I’m always on the lookout for ways to learn more.

Dee, my question for you is where did you read that tutors will be outsourced? The examples I know of online ed. in traditional schools involve training current teachers in the district to also be online teachers and tutors. I can’t imagine that the district would pay extra money for new teachers; it’s more cost-effective to train the teachers they already pay. I suspect this _might_ have something to do with extending school hours in order to give teachers “virtual periods” but I don’t know for sure as the article didn’t mention who will teach the online courses and how.

I’m also curious as to why the DOE won’t disclose the total cost….

Michael M, good point about an opt-in/opt-out. Should students be given a voice in this?

Anyway, I’m a teacher (not in NY) and an online student so any question about how online education works from a student’s perspective I’ll be glad to answer -note that I’m a grad student.

A number of reformers are hoping with all their might that virtual schooling will “transform” public education by breaking up the “industrial” classroom model and allowing students to tailor their learning to their own needs in a “post-constructivist” manner (Paul E. Peterson uses this term). As others have pointed out, these are all just hopes. There are many problems with virtual schooling–alienation, possibility for cheating, false advertising, and more–and I don’t see why those would vanish. Some might argue that students will be in new global communities and that new possibilities will open up–but there may also be losses beyond what we can see. I am wary of giving up face-to-face instruction. I am wary of software that generates lesson plans based on students’ daily performance on computerized multiple-choice tests (a feature of the School of One, not of all virtual schools). I am wary of models that have barely been tried and are suddenly being expanded without public deliberation. Virtual schooling might have something to offer on top of regular schooling. But virtual schooling cannot replace regular schools, and we should scrutinize any such model carefully before plunging into it.

As far as I’ve read, iZone is not replacing face-to-face instruction and it’s not replacing brick-and-mortar schools. I’m also unsure of how alienation and cheating, for example, are online-specific issues rather than general issues in education. These seem like unsubstantiated and irrelevant worries.

I’m amazed at the vehement skepticism and opposition to this. A lot of the questions in this comment section are good questions but don’t seem focused on finding answers, rather, they are focused on just being doubtful. We can have a productive conversation though -we can address our questions and work out answers while staying focused on the core issues, like what iZone really is, why it’s being implemented, how will it contribute to the advancement of NYC’s children’s education.

One concern I see on this board is that individualized plans might take away something essential about traditional learning. What is that essential thing? Community? Teacher authority? Well, what ways can a sense of community be fostered while students work through their individualized plans? Could diminishing teacher authority be considered a good thing?

Another concern is how students in credit recovery who might have limited literacy will perform. These student could be non literate, meaning no reading or writing skills, or semi literate, meaning writing skills at an elementary level. Would courses be designed with this in mind? And how do we find out.