Tammy Grace, in Nevada, told me, Before, people were pretty much doing their own thing. Using Open District is making them work together, foster communications, and reach decisions about how to consistently and accurately gather data on student performance. The informal collaborations between library media specialists and teachers described above are fully supported in all three products. CCC s EdMap integrates with its formidable curriculum resources to submit their successful lessons to an online repository that other users can share over the Web. The result is a vibrant collection of evolving best practices.
Conclusion Knowing what IT s worth depends entirely upon context.
Only when technology serves an entire system that s working in concert to support student learning can its benefits be realized. Until we begin looking at what s really happening with our students on a daily basis, we have no hope of adequately addressing the question. As Heide Hayes Jacobs reminds us, For years we ve lacked the power of an overarching context for making curriculum decisions. The information that would inform decisions has been lacking or impossible to collect and understand. We are fortunate to live in a time when we can move beyond this limitation and apply the power of technology to improving the art of learning.