http://vjrconsulting.com/storage/RESEARCH_Digital%20Literacy_FINAL_082912.pdf

Digital Literacy
& Citizenship: The Teacher's Perspective


A Common Sense Media Survey Snapshot FALL 2012

Senate Committee Holds Hearing on Impact of America Competes Act
Wednesday, 7 November, 2012

The day after the elections, at first blush, feels like Groundhog Day. After all the campaigning, spending and voting, very little appears to have changed. President Obama was given another four years in the White House, John Boehner (R-OH) was assured another two years as Speaker of the House of Representatives, and Harry Reid (D-NV) will continue as the Senate Majority Leader. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) will also hold on to his Minority Leader slot. The only question mark is what future Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) will choose for herself-will she stay as Minority Leader or will she go?

Digging a little deeper, education advocates lost a few champions on both sides of the aisle. Representative Judy Biggert (R-IL) lost her seat in the election, and Dale Kildee (D-MI), Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), Jason Altmire (D-PA) Mazie Hirono (D-HI) and Todd Platts (R-PA) will not be returning to the House Education and the Workforce Committee for a variety of reasons. In the Senate, Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) retired, leaving a vacancy on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, and Mike Enzi (R-WY), while remaining on the Committee, will give up his Ranking position, most likely to Lamar Alexander (R-TN).

Turning to the topic of education spending, the Chair of the House Labor, Health and Human Services and Education Appropriations Subcommittee, Denny Rehberg (R-MT), lost his bid for a Senate seat. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) won his Senate contest, and Jerry Lewis (R-CA) retired. That leaves three vacancies on this all important Subcommittee for the Republicans.

While several other House Members with education connections will not be returning, in particular, Betty Sutton (D-OH), a former teacher, among the newly elected are education supporters such as Carol Shea Porter (D-NH) and Dina Titus (D-AZ) who both served on the Education and the Workforce Committee in the 111th Congress. In total, there will be 76 new Members in the 113th House of Representatives.

In the Senate, there will be 12 new Members. The number of women will reach 19, an increase that will surely change some dynamics in the Senate Chamber. Surprisingly, the Democrats picked up two seats, bringing their total majority to 54. Among those newly elected, Joe Donnelly (D-IN) is a former teacher and school board member, and once Congresswoman now Senator Mazie Hirono (D-HI) served on the Education and the Workforce Committee in the House. Now a Senator, Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) has expressed strong support for early childhood education and higher education policy.

While Democrats had a lot to celebrate on the National level, 30 Republicans will be serving as governors in 2013. Several interesting ballot initiatives around the country also indicated a strong interest in education reform and for the most part more investment in spending on education. In two states-Georgia and Washington- the of expansion of charter schools was supported; in Idaho, three laws were overturned that were strongly opposed by teachers in the state; and California Governor Jerry Brown (D-CA) successfully pushed through a tax increase that will provide an additional $6 billion for K-12 education. On the other hand, a generous tax increase for education failed in Arizona. Another troubling sign that was noted in terms of state contests was the election of individuals who do not support the adoption and implementation of the common core college and career ready standards. This will be something to watch closely in the months ahead.

Maryland's version of the Dream Act, making in state tuition available to undocumented students who had attended high school in the state, was passed by a wide margin. Coupled with the poor showing for Republicans across the country among Hispanic voters, many advocates hope there will be support for much needed immigration reform in the 113th Congress.

While the President was criticized during the campaign for not providing a plan of action for his second term, his priorities for education have been well defined by his first four years. Unable to drive a reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) through the Congress, the President succeeded in rewriting K-12 policy through a combination of financial carrots, regulatory reform and the granting of an unprecedented waiver plan for all interested states. He has acknowledged that his pledge to expand early childhood education was not met; he has said he wants to provide incentives for colleges to hold back on tuition increases and do more to make sure access results in degree completion; he says he will pay more attention to parental involvement as he pushes for a rewrite of the ESEA bill; and he is certain to continue to fight for his signature programs-Race to the Top, Investing in Innovation (i3), School Improvement Grants and Promise Neighborhoods. The Congress has a long list of reauthorizations that are past due beyond ESEA-the Higher Education Act, Career and Technical Education, the Workforce Investment Act, the Education Sciences Reform Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, who has declared his desire to remain in office, will be engaged in all education efforts the House and Senate choose to promote.

Prepared for Triangle Coalition by: Ellin Nolan, Washington Partners, LLC (enolan@wpllc.net)

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2012/11/congress_likely_to_stay_divide.html



Congress Likely to Stay Divided, Will Gridlock on K-12 Continue?

Congress Likely to Stay Divided, Will Gridlock on K-12 Continue?
By Alyson Klein on November 6, 2012 11:36 PM

The U.S. House of Representatives is likely to stay in GOP hands and the Senate under Democratic control, according to the Associated Press. Over the past two years, that combination has meant a lot of sniping and not much action on big issues, including the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

So does two more years of a divided Congress mean two more years of gridlock on key issues? Lawmakers will get their first test soon. Even before the new Congress takes office, lawmakers must figure out a plan to head off "sequestration," a series of planned, 8.2 percent trigger cuts to nearly every federal K-12 program, including special education and money for disadvantaged students.

Earlier today, U.S. Rep. John Boehner, the Speaker of the House, said that he would see a House GOP victory as an indication that voters don't want to see tax increases, which some Democrats have called for as a way to help put the nation on firmer fiscal footing.

"The American people want solutions-and tonight, they've responded by renewing our majority," Boehner told the Republican National Committee in an election night speech. "With this vote, the American people have also made clear that there is no mandate for raising tax rate."

The divided Congress must also get to work on a lengthy list of education legislation, including renewing the ESEA, as well as the laws that govern higher education, special education, career and technical education, and workforce development. And the lawmakers have to figure out how to cope with a roughly $7 billion shortfall in the Pell Grant program, and a planned rise in student loans, which are set to double to 6.8 percent next year. More here.

Over the past two years, the Republican House and the Democratic Senate have clashed on education funding issues. GOP lawmakers in the House have tried to boost funding for special education and disadvantaged students, while eliminating President Obama's favorite programs, including Race to the Top, Investing in Innovation, and the School Improvement Grants. So far, Democrats and the administration have been able to keep those programs funded. Will that dynamic continue?

Committees in each chamber have also approved bills to renew the ESEA law. While both scale back the federal role in gauging student achievement, they go in different directions when it comes to school improvement, teacher evaluation, and program consolidation. It's unclear whether lawmakers will get to work on finding a compromise between those bills-or allow the administration's plan to offer states waivers from key mandates of the current version of the ESEA, the No Child Left Behind Act, to stay in place.

No changes to congressional control means no changes to congressional leadership on education issues. U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, will remain the chairman of the panels that oversee both education spending and policy. Rep. John Kline, R-Minn, who wrote a series of ESEA renewal bills that significantly scale back the federal role in K-12, will stay as the helm of the House Education Committee.

One change? Sen. Michael B. Enzi of Wyoming, a big advocate for rural schools who co-sponsored an ESEA reauthorization bill with Harkin, is term-limited as ranking member (top Republican slot). Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennesse, a former U.S. Secretary of Education who has been very skeptical of the federal role in education in recent years, will get first dibs on taking over that position in the next Congress.

Some important congressional race results tonight:

*Sen. Robert Casey, D-Pa., a big supporter of prekindergarten programs, was re-elected in Pennsylvania.

*Rep. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., who was endorsed by Democrats for Education Reform, won the Senate seat in Connecticut.

*Former Rep. Pete Hoekstra, a Republican, who helped champion the A-plus Act, which sought to significantly scale back the federal role in K-12, was unable to unseat Sen. Debbie Stabenow in Michigan.

*Joe Donnelly, a Democrat, and former school board president and a fan of expanding higher education access, won the Indiana Senate race.

*Rep. Judy Biggert, R-Ill, a long-time member of the House education committee and a moderate was defeated by former Rep. Bill Foster, a Democrat.

*Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., defeated former Gov. Tommy Thompson, who has a long record on K-12 issues.

Media Diversity: Why No One Cares
by Joseph Miller, Esq.

Media advocacy has always focused on the shortcomings of regulators and media giants. Although the faults of both regulators and the media industry are significant, advocates rarely discuss the role candidates for national office might play in rousing interest in media diversity among the electorate.

How long should we wait for a regulatory or industry-led initiative to improve media diversity? Despite its mandate under Section 257 of the Communications Act, the Federal Communications Commission has failed to collect and aggregate minority ownership data in a form the public can use. With the exception of tiny glimmers of change in newsroom diversity, hiring, retention and promotion diversity at top media companies is dismal. Among Diversity Inc.'s Top 50 Companies for Diversity 2012, Cox Communications (#25) and Time Warner (#40) were the only media companies listed. Factoring in companies that are more relevant in a converged media industry, AT&T (#4) and Verizon Communications (#39) were also featured. But there is really not much need to look further than the senior management teams of top media companies, which are overwhelmingly white (Disney, Comcast, News Corporation, Viacom) despite the fact that minorities comprise 27.6 percent of the U.S. population, to see the lack of racial, ethnic and gender diversity among those who control so much of what we see and hear.

But the most daunting challenge for policymakers is not to confirm whether these disparities exist-everyone knows they do-it is to address the underlying reasons for the lack of a political impetus to address them.

Why don't we care? Despite the central role of the media in democratic politics, made clear by the record amounts of money the Obama and Romney campaigns have spent on political advertising, media diversity is frankly not that high up on the average American's priority list. A recent Time Warner Cable report finds that, while subscriber survey respondents were willing to pay $25 more per month for general, "opinion" diversity, they were willing to pay just $7 more per month for any improvement in "information that reflects the interests of women and minorities."

The demographics of most media companies' senior ranks bear little resemblance to the demographic cross-section of the public media executives work tirelessly to reach. According to 4th Estate.net, which evaluated front page stories from 38 different newspapers between January and mid-October, 2012, non-white reporters wrote a paltry 9% of stories on the economy, 9.2% of stories on social issues, and 7.3% of stories about foreign policy. Most startlingly, 98.2% of stories on immigration-an issue that is most contentious with respect to U.S. policies toward Latino immigrants-were written by white reporters. Why is the state of diversity in the media so discouraging? Do the media lack diversity because there is a lack of consumer demand for it? Or is it the other way around-has the media industry suppressed demand for diversity to preserve its control by non-minorities?

This is more than just a chicken-or-the-egg conundrum. The lack of racial and ethnic diversity in the media is a consequence of post-racial politics.

If a candidate perceives a particular initiative will secure a substantial number of votes from a powerful racial constituency, historically that candidate will make the issue resonate with voters. For some, the race appeal is made using racial code language. Richard Nixon's White House Chief of Staff, H.R. Haldeman, famously noted: "[T]he whole problem is really the blacks. The key is to devise a system that recognizes this while not appearing to." Thus, while the Supreme Court has encouraged states to pursue race-neutral policies to achieve diversity, politicians have actually turned that doctrine on its head: some politicians have advanced racial-neutral initiatives-such as the "War on Drugs" or the fight against "Voter Fraud"-to perpetuate inequality.

Ohio State Moritz College of Law Professor Michelle Alexander has done extensive research on the means by which some policies without a specific racial component have actually perpetuated the same disparities that were so prevalent during the Jim Crow era. Specifically, Ms. Alexander has argued that, despite the fact that drug crimes were actually declining, the Reagan administration decided in 1982 to pursue Nixon's idea of a War on Drugs to garner the votes of whites who felt threatened by the advances of the Civil Rights Movement. President Bill Clinton carried the torch, trying to convince white voters that he would be even tougher on drugs and crime than his Republican predecessors.

The current fight against "Voter Fraud" is another campaign some believe is racially-encoded and designed to suppress minority votes. These kinds of race-neutral campaigns leave their opponents in the unenviable position of being on the defensive having to assert a racial impact in an environment in which the mere mention of race is frowned upon.

The post-racial nature of today's political discourse precludes politicians from addressing race head-on. Politicians are unlikely to explicitly address race in their campaigns as there is a fair risk that doing so would be considered taboo-or, at best, impolite-and alienate voters. Accordingly, media diversity has been relegated to the bottom of the pile of campaign initiatives candidates are likely to advance. This is unfortunate since politicians play such a powerful role in legitimating even the most dubious platforms.

Joseph Miller, Esq., is Deputy Director and Senior Policy Counsel for the Media and Technology Institute at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. More information on Mr. Miller and his work can be found on the Joint Center website.

FCC Chairman, Experts, Discuss Driving Broadband Adoption and Effects on Economy at Joint Center
by TIFFANY BAIN on OCTOBER 3, 2012

Although it had only been in its new office location for less than three weeks, the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies continued with old business recently with its "Broadband, the Economy, and Driving Adoption" panel discussion.

In collaboration with Comcast, the Joint Center gathered a panel of broadband data experts and pragmatists to identify the factors impeding high broadband adoption rates in low adopting communities, share real-world examples of the effects of broadband in low-income and minority communities, and discuss lessons learned in convincing the aforementioned communities to adopt broadband.

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Julius Genachowski delivered remarks prior to the main discussion and emphasized the increase in prevalence of broadband across the country.

"Four years ago, these issues were issues that technology folks talked about," he began. "It's changed dramatically in the last few years, and I'm seeing people all over the country outside of these circles understand the benefits of it."

While technology enthusiasts and people beyond the Beltway recognize and experience the benefits of broadband, Genachowski mentioned that nearly one-third of the United States' population has not realized the many advantages broadband offers.

Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst at Leichtman Research Group, and Madura Wijewardena, director of research and policy at the National Urban League Policy Institute, pinpointed the divides within home broadband adoption rates.

Leichtman suggested that income and age were significant divides in relation to broadband adoption, noting that nearly all households with incomes above $50,000 subscribe to broadband (91 percent) and have a computer at home (97 percent), while households that earn under $30,000 have lower broadband subscription rates (47 percent) and are not likely to have a home computer (59 percent). He also said that based on his firm's research, low adoption rates could be attributed to lack of "hardware" and "knowledge," rather than prior leading reasons such as cost and accessibility.

Wijewardena indicated that race and education were also dividers and offered a couple of "optimistic points" regarding the narrowing adoption gap between blacks and whites.

"It's fair to say that things are improving," he said. "At a time when business development is on the decline, black business creation has increased."

Urban Affairs Coalition Government and Strategic Partnerships Director Arun Prabahakaran and University of District Columbia Community College Deputy Chief Executive Officer Dr. Julie Johnson shared the lessons they learned while trying to get more low-income and communities of color to adopt broadband at home.

Johnson and Prabahakaran said that they realized that groups with low broadband adoption rates often have "a low perception of need" and "think free is too good to be true," referring to low-income broadband adoption programs such as Comcast's Internet Essentials initiative.

Both pragmatists also realized that one way to encourage broadband adoption in these groups was to host digital literacy classes in places they trust the most because these groups often go where to places where they are most familiar and that are close to home.

To attract and encourage more groups to participate in digital divide classes, Wijewardena recommended that the terms "jobs" and "businesses" be linked to marketing and other communications efforts. He suggested that having jobs and business development is a better "hook" than just saying "we have a digital literacy program."

In his remarks, Genachowski also mentioned that while technology is a huge opportunity for business and education, the biggest obstacle is lack of home broadband access.

"We have to innovate for equity," Johnson said.

The "Broadband, the Economy, and Driving Adoption" panel discussion was facilitated by the Joint Center's Media and Technology Institute Vice President and Director Dr. John B. Horrigan. Horrigan was one of the lead team members on the FCC's 2009 National Broadband Plan, as well as author of the Plan's first working paper titled Broadband Adoption and Use in America.

Tiffany K. Bain is a 2011 public relations graduate of Florida A&M University. She currently serves as the Minority Media & Telecommunications Council's Research Associate. She got her start in the industry in 2007 as an Emma L. Bowen Foundation intern at the nation's leading cable provider.
experts-discuss-driving-broadband-adoption-and-effects-on-economy-at-joint-center/?utm_source=BBSJ+Newsletter+October+8%2C+2012&utm_campaign=BBSJ+Newsletter+October+8%2C+2012&utm_medium=email

Microsoft Groundbreaking Speech and Report on CS Education
http://blog.acm.org/archives/csta/2012/09/microsoft_relea.html

Today Microsoft's General Counsel Brad Smith spoke at the Brookings Institution at an event on education and immigration reform and the presentation (and the report on which it is based) represents a huge leap forward in the effort to make computer science courses available to all high school students.

In a new groundbreaking report called A National Talent Strategy: Ideas for Securing U.S. Competitiveness and Economic Growth, Microsoft argues that it is crucial to the country's future that there be more access to computer science in K-12 education in high schools. This report calls for a new Race to the Future that will help address the critical talent gap in computer science, not just for the high tech industry but for every single industry on the country that depends on computing for automation and innovation.

Speaking at the Brookings Institute today, Smith made a powerful and compelling argument for the key place of computer science within STEM and the link to jobs that are already going unfilled.

It is important to note that Smith and his team at Microsoft have been working with the Computing in the Core group that includes CSTA and ACM and that their passionate engagement in K-12 computer science education issues have been informed by key reports from CSTA and ACM.

I strongly encourage you to watch the Brookings Institute webcast (and perhaps play it for your students!) and to download and read this new report.

Chris Stephenson
CSTA Executive Director

Mobile Phone Problems
Even though mobile technology often simplifies the completion of everyday tasks, cell phone owners can also encounter technical glitches and unwanted intrusions on their phones. In an April 2012 survey, the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project assessed the prevalence of four problems that cell owners might face:

Dropped phone calls
Unwanted sales or marketing calls
Spam or unwanted text messages (based on cell owners who text)
Slow download speeds that prevent things from loading as quickly as you would like them to (based on those who use the internet or email on their cell phone or download apps to their cell phone)
"The big change that mobile connectivity has brought to users is the instant availability of people and data," noted Jan Lauren Boyles, a Pew Internet Project researcher who authored this report. "As mobile owners become fond of just-in-time access to others and as their expectations about getting real-time information rise, they depend on the cell phone's technical reliability. Any problems that snag, stall, or stop users from connecting to the material and people they seek is at least a hassle to them and sometimes is even more disturbing than that in this networked world."

Read or download the full report: http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2012/Mobile-phone-problems.aspx

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/05/education/most-texas-students-found-not-ready-for-college.html?ref=education standards in math and verbal skills on ACT, SAT and TAKS scores in 2010.

ttp://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/thomas-jefferson-hs-fairfax-schools-shut-out-blacks-and-latinos-complaint-alleges/2012/07/23/gJQAPOIO5W_story.html?tid=pm_local_pop