The comments below are adapted from a presentation I put together for senior policymakers in a developing country who have high level oversight of the use of technology in thousands of schools.
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What do you do, Sir?" famously asked economist John Meynard Keynes.) ("When my information changes, I change my opinion. If this is the case, what is a policymaker to do?Įxamples like this do tend to complicate some of the 'expert' opinion that is congealing into conventional wisdom. But if teachers are better trained, many may emigrate in search of better paying teaching jobs in other countries. Consistent with what is considered 'best practice' from around the world, policymakers in the region recognize that providing more training and support for teachers is crucial if the investments in technology are to have real impact. (They are also important because they might actually be right, of course, and all of the rest of us wrong, but that's another matter!) Even where there is an emerging consensus among leading thinkers and practitioners about what is critically important, this doesn't mean that what is actually being done reflects this consensus - or indeed, that this consensus 'expert' opinion is relevant in all contexts.Īn EduTech blog post from last year, for example, identified a dilemma faced by many Caribbean countries: They are putting lots of computers into schools. Divergent opinions and voices are important, if only to help us reconsider why we believe what we believe. That said, the fact that "everyone agrees about most everything" isn't always such a good thing.
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Even some groups and people associated with the 'give kids computers, expect magic to happen' philosophy appear to have had some of their more extreme views tempered in recent years by the reality of actually trying to put this philosophy into practice. People who work with the use of ICTs in education tend to be a highly connected bunch, and the diffusion of better (cheaper, faster) connectivity has helped to ensure that 'good practices and ideas' are shared with greater velocity than perhaps ever before.
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At one level, this has been a welcome development. Over the past two years, I have increasingly made the same comment to myself when involved in similar discussions in other parts of the world. At an event last year in Uruguay for policymakers from around the world, a few experts who have worked in the field of technology use in education for a long time commented that there was, in their opinion and in contrast to their experiences even a few years ago, a surprising amount of consensus among the people gathered together on what was really important, what wasn't, and on ways to proceed (and not to proceed).