I hope you have an enjoyable summer, with time to reflect on where you are and where you want education to go. As the examples in this e-mail point out, our students are growing up in a world quite different from when we were children. Do we need to rethink how we are preparing students for the future?

 Sincerely,    Bill Daggett

Information Technology  

Watch the Cookies  

Internet searches leave behind cookies that track activity on a computer’s browser engine, but cookies can’t identify the computer user by name. If two people access a site on the same browser, the cookie can’t distinguish between them. However, when a user registers for services provided, such as free e-mail accounts, news alerts, or personalized homepages, cookies sent are no longer “anonymous” and can be linked to a specific user. While such data has the capacity to help match researchers and consumers with needs and preferences, “Web watchdogs” warn about the potential threat to privacy.  

Source: Wired News, April 5, 2005 www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,67062,00.html?tw=
wn_story_mailer  

As the Internet becomes an increasingly important learning tool, students – and consumers – need to be educated about its safe and responsible use.  

Signal Strength — Using Cell Phones In-flight?  

The Federal Communications Commission is testing a new technology called "pico-cell" that would allow airline passengers to use cell phones safely while in flight, without interfering with the airplane’s electronic and navigation systems. Some airline industry professionals, however, warn that not only would cell phone users be less likely to heed on-board safety instructions from the crew, but also angry reactions from other passengers would result from non-stop phone conversations throughout the cabin.  

Source: Chicago Tribune, April 12, 2005  

Students need to understand that what is technically possible is not always the best – or most satisfactory to the most people – solution to a problem. Critical-thinking skills, such as finding solutions in unpredictable situations, are the key to using technology, not just efficiently, but also wisely. Having students research and debate issues like in-air cell phone use is engaging and highly relevant.  

Biotechnology  

Training the Brain

Scientists estimate that, by age 65, 23% of people have mild cognitive impairment, believed by some to be an early stage of Alzheimer’s disease. Almost half of people over 85 suffer from Alzheimer’s. “Plasticity” is the term that cognitive scientists use to describe the ability of the brain to change itself at any age. Researchers at Posit Science Corporation in San Francisco are trying to leverage this capacity to develop “brain-training” software that will “re-teach” people skills they have lost and build new neural pathways to achieve enhanced mental capacity.

Source: www.positscience.com/science.html#matureadults

The application may also have benefits for children and adults with certain learning disabilities and brain injuries. 

Steps to Longevity?

Aubrey de Grey, a Cambridge University researcher who heads the Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence (SENS) project, is working to extend human longevity by investigating seven factors that he believes cause aging. De Grey’s ideas include the use of such bio-nanotechnologies as modifying human genes and using soil-based microorganisms to break down “junk proteins” that build up in human cells. De Grey also runs the Methuselah Mouse competition, which offers prizes for practices that reduce aging (senescence) in lab mice. You could win part of $1M for your ideas by visiting www.livescience.com/humanbiology/050309_m_prize.html – if you have the time.  

As bio-nanotechnology increasingly offers us the potential of living longer, understanding both the science itself and the bioethics behind it must become part of how we teach students to deal with an unpredictable world. Knowing how to deal with uncertainty –Quadrant D of our Rigor/Relevance Framework – will be a critical proficiency for students.       

Did You Know? According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Americans born in 1900 could expect to live to be 47.3 years old. By 1950, it had increased to 68.2 years. The average life expectancy for someone born in 2002 number is 77.3 years (80.3 years for white females).  

Source: www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus04trend.pdf#exe  

Nanotechnology  

Protein Nano-particles Fight Cancers  

A promising new breast cancer treatment called Abraxane was recently approved by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration. The drug is a reengineered form of another widely used chemotherapy treatment, but Abraxane is far less toxic because it is manufactured using protein nano-particles instead of a potent solvent that causes serious side effects. As a result, Abraxane has the potential to be used to blast tumors quickly, instead of being administered to patients in small doses over time. The nanotechnology used to engineer the drug may also work with drugs for other types of cancer.  

Source: Business Week Online April 11, 2005. www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_
15/b3928059_mz011.htm  

Our high school curriculum needs to make room for an introduction to emerging sciences to spark- students’ interest in becoming the inventors - and educated consumers - of future scientific breakthrough.   

How Small Is Nano?  

For fun, match each object with its approximate size in nanometers. Answers are below "By the Numbers". (Source: IBM Infenion. See Business Week Online url above and click on Related Items: Graphic.)  

Pass the Chips  

Smaller is faster and better, but is also much hotter. Too hot, in fact. And computing times and tasks performed today by silicon chip features in the 90 nanometers (nm) range will need to be miniaturized to 20 nm or 10 nm over the next decade. However, carbon nanotubes continue to be refined and improved every day and will eventually replace traditional transistors – at lower costs, greater efficiency, and enhanced durability and without the side effect of heat generation. Nanotube transistors, engineered from carbon atoms, can carry up to 1,000 times the current of the copper wires used in today's silicon chips and are 10 times stronger than steel, making them vastly more efficient and far less vulnerable to damage from heat or manufacturing flaws.  

www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_
16/b3929120_mz018.htm 

American society needs to both leverage and keep pace with emerging computer technologies. Our well-being as a nation depends on our willingness to invest in education and research that will prepare today’s K-12 students to be leaders in the field.   

Education Trends  

Get ‘Em While They’re Fresh  

Alcorn State University is hoping to raise its retention and graduation rates by creating support structures for freshmen and other “new” students. Counseling, tutorials, monitoring freshmen attendance, and other strategies have raised the college’s sophomore continuation rate and overall graduation rate. And like high school, college completion rates are typically lower for minority students.    

Source: washingtonpost.com April 5, 2005 at

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A26230-2005

Apr4.html

Alcorn’s efforts mirror what we are seeing in many of our successful high schools: structures and interventions targeted at freshmen, such as freshmen academies, literacy programs, and mentoring, that nurture the individual-to-school relationship from the outset. The International Center’s forthcoming resource kit, Reinventing 9^th Grade — Academics Through Personalization, describes successful practices and models that target the critical freshman year.  

Achievement Up, Improvement Slows  

A recent study by the Northwest Evaluation Association (NWEA), publishers of the MAP academic growth assessment tool, indicates that NCLB has had a positive impact on raising student achievement. The data also indicates that progress in continuous improvement has slowed slightly, putting NCLB’s 100% proficiency goal by 2014 somewhat at risk. The study used reading and math data from over 300,000 students in grades 3-8 in two dozen states. NWEA hopes to provide similar progress reports annually.  

For further information, visit www.nwea.org/research/nclbstudy.asp  

We at the International Center have predicted for some time that incremental improvements in proficiency, especially across all subgroups, will become harder to achieve as overall test scores rise. As many of the schools we work with have experienced, sustaining improvement can be as difficult as rescuing a failing school. Unrelenting emphasis on the classroom is key.  

By the Numbers  

• On average, black and Hispanic 12^th graders perform at the same level in reading and mathematics as white 8^th graders. 
• By the age of 24, nearly half of young adults raised in affluent families have graduated from college, compared with only 7% of young adults raised in low-income families.
• Of prison inmates in the U.S. under the age of 25, 80% lack a high school diploma and 40% are functionally illiterate. 
• 50% of black high school dropouts have been incarcerated.
• 26 million American children grow up in low-income households. 
• 43% of math teachers in high-poverty schools lacked a major or minor in math.  

Source: Qualified Teachers for At-Risk Schools: A National Imperative. 2005. National Partnership for Teaching in At-Risk Schools. Washington, DC.  

ANSWERS to How Small is Nano?

a. 3, b. 2 , c. 1, d. 6, e. 5, f. 4, g. 7  

Correction: Several readers pointed out a typographical error in “By the Numbers” in last month’s Views You Can Use. The overall graduation rate for African-Americans should have been listed as 56%, for Hispanics 52%, and for whites 78%. We apologize for an incorrect transcription from the original tables. The regional data by group was still significant, even without the correct national averages. Thanks to those readers who were kind enough to alert us.

Your feedback is welcome.  

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