Future Tense: BC's 21st Century Vision for Education?

Now that I'm finished my Web 2.0 course, I can pick my topics and write as I choose - a better Christmas present, I can't imagine! I've been busier on Twitter and playing with my new smart phone, so my blog has been sitting idle, but it hasn't been forgotten, gentle reader. With a colleague busily working the blog scene with her grade 10 students, I'm working to show her (and them) how blogs can be more than response sites. It has kept me thinking about what I want to do next.  Last night, my inspiration arrived via Twitter - the Premier's Technology Council released its' document "A Vision for 21st Century Education." This is local to British Columbia and a little political background is probably necessary.

Our provincial premier, Gordon Campbell, is in the last throes of his leadership days. He recently resigned, but won't step down until a successor is chosen by his party. This is the same premier who was arrested for drunk driving in Hawaii and hosted the Winter Olympics while waving around red mittens. All that stuff aside, he's also known for wanting BC to be "the most literate" or "best educated" place in the world.  Rumours have been flying for months that the Ministry of Education has been focused on John Abbott's teachings and has received multiple training days on 21st Century education. Now we know where the push for change has come from.

The Premier's Technology Council released it's vision document yesterday afternoon and already it's being read, dissected and discussed. This isn't the first document they've released, but this is the first time they have addressed education. It's interesting to note that not one of the council members has a background in public education, however they consulted with a large group of education administrators and post secondary folk. It's an interesting document and refreshingly says that the present system is not in crisis, but that it needs to reform and adapt.

Union City H.S. New Jersey

As a vision that imagines what could be if there were no constraints, it is powerful and compelling.  I like to think like that way, too. I imagine my library working as a Learning Commons - open spaces, great furniture so that people could work in a variety of settings as needed, great bandwidth so my digital resources could truly supply the needs of staff and students, enough equipment (including e-reader devices, netbooks, digital cameras and Flip camcorders,) and time to teach Guided Inquiry - something more like the KSS library in Kelowna - an exemplary learning commons. It's amazing what can happen when you have control of funds, a clear vision and community support.

It's the community support piece that will make this vision document soar or fade. The question I have is whether the powers that produced it truly want the general public to have that discussion? Given that Ministry of Education officials and Superintendents recently were at a conference glowing about privatized British and American schools leading the way in 21st Century education, while ignoring the Finnish model, I have my doubts about the government working hard to help build a strong public education system and funding the changes that would need to occur in buildings, equipment, teacher training and curriculum. My front line experience of the last 20 or so years warns me to be sceptical.

One of the premises that the Vision document and other reform advocates keep repeating is that students need to be ready to adapt to all the changes coming, so we need to change the system to help them be prepared. While the public school systems of North America aren't perfect, they certainly prepared most of the current CEO's, politicians and advocates to function very successfully in today's world. They are literate, numerate, civic-minded, cooperative, collaborative and creative. They learned these skills both at school and in the real world. Some of them also learned these things in their adolescence without benefit of computers and a wired world.  Many of the skills being touted as 21st C. skills are basic people skills and require strong families and communities that encourage and support children. If societal change is to be the foundation of  a model being called 21st Century education, then we need to talk about working families, single parent families, poverty and consumerism. We also need to talk about tax structures that benefit large business and unfairly burden students and working families with the cost of a shift to a knowledge society.

I support many of the ideas of the Vision document. I applaud the Council for creating a discussion document. Now - who will propel this document into the broader community for the discussion about what kind of a society we truly want in the 21st Century? I'd like to be part of that, because my elementary-age children will either benefit from a truly remarkable public education or be victims of another private enterprise push to own the schools of British Columbia under the disguise of creating 21st Century schools.