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Schools To Get Their Own DARPA

Posted by Soulskill on from the hall-monitor-death-robots-here-we-come dept.

Julie188 writes "A decade ago, Lawrence Grossman, former president of both NBC News and PBS, and Newton Minow, former chairman of the FCC, proposed that the government set up a multi-billion dollar trust that would act as a 'venture capital fund' to research educational technologies for schools, libraries and museums. Congress has finally approved the idea, and grants could start rolling by this fall. Dubbed the National Center for Research in Advanced Information and Digital Technologies, it should be to education what the National Science Foundation is for science, and DARPA is for national defense."

6 of 151 comments (clear)

  1. Oh, man! I wish I had a DARPA by thomasdz · · Score: 5, Funny

    When I was growing up, all the other kids on my block had a DARPA, but I didn't.
    I had to do with some stupid National Science Foundation

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  2. Finally? by spydabyte · · Score: 5, Insightful

    About time someone in government considers education as important as military "defense" and scientific breakthroughs.

    1. Re:Finally? by StubNewellsFarm · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Do you really think that improving education doesn't fall under "promote the general welfare"? It has just as much justification as "provide for the common defense". Especially since Jefferson and other founders believed so strongly that a representative government would fail without educated citizens, you could also argue that support for education is necessary to "secure the blessings of liberty."

      "I have indeed two great measures at heart, without which no republic can maintain itself in strength: 1. That of general education, to enable every man to judge for himself what will secure or endanger his freedom. 2. To divide every county into hundreds, of such size that all the children of each will be within reach of a central school in it." --Thomas Jefferson to John Tyler, 1810. ME 12:393

  3. I'm a bit dubious... by mcgrew · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The reason is two experiences: one me in school, and the other my youngest daughter in school.

    When I was a kid they came up with the "new math". Basically, it was a different way to do long division. The theory was that this new way better explained how numbers work, but in reality it did no such thing. All it did was to prevent my parents from helping with my homework, since I couldn't do long dividion like they did and they couldn't do it like I was taught. I was at a disadvantage for years, until I learned how to use a slide rule, which actually did teach me how numbers worked.

    When my daughter was in kindergarten they had a new thing called "invented spelling", and it was an unmitigated disaster. She still misspells many words the same way she misspelled them before she learned to read (she's 22 now).

    The truble with new teaching technologies is that unlike medical experiments, you can't do them on animals first. Test them on real kids and if the experiment fails, so do the children.

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    1. Re:I'm a bit dubious... by dwandy · · Score: 5, Funny

      Turns out mcgrew's daughter is an excellent speller.

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  4. Re:Oh, man! I wish I had a DARPA by TubeSteak · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When I was growing up, all the other kids on my block had a DARPA, but I didn't.
    I had to do with some stupid National Science Foundation

    When I was growing up, all the other kids in the country had the National Science Foundation, but I didn't.
    I had to make do with the Texas Board of Education.

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