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Created to inform, provoke and stimulate ideas and conversations, the Alfred Deakin Lectures are a celebration of big ideas and brilliant minds. Following on from the very successful 2001, 2005 and 2007 series, in 2008 the Deakin Lectures will again focus on innovation and its importance to all aspects of our economy and society.

Heading into the wild blue yonder of a new school year, we know that some things are inevitable. There will be more to do than last year, and less time to get it done. But what further developments lay ahead? Let's take a look at the predictions for the future of public education. Use the table of contents to the right to navigate your way through our 2008 predictions. Please tell us in the comments field at the end of every article, poll, and video what you think.

Project Tomorrow and Blackboard released Leadership in the 21st Century: The New Visionary Administrator during a breakfast meeting at the NSBA T+L 2008 ConferenceT+L (Seattle, WA) Wednesday, October 29, 2008. This new report, based on the Speak Up 2007 School Leaders Survey, examines school and district administrators' attitudes about technology and learning. The report highlights several Visionary Administrators who have more in common with students than with fellow administrators in terms of technology use and priorities for technology in instruction. 

Remember the old Monty Hall program Let's Make a Deal? In that game show, you could win the prize behind one of three doors. If you started by choosing door 1, should you have changed your mind and selected door 2, if Monty showed you what's behind door 3 (Tierney, 2008)? What has this to do with research? Well ... people are convinced what they know is the right thing and forge ahead with decisions based on their rationalizations, no matter what research indicates. In education, such decisions--especially technology purchasing decisions--can have profound consequences.

Last night was Family Night at my kids' elementary school. You know, that night when you visit your kid's class with the other parents, learn about the curriculum and teacher expectations for the year, sit in little tiny chairs, etc. Each parent was asked to sign the district's Digital Resources Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) for the 2008-2009 school year. Not a single parent read over the AUP; everyone just signed it blindly. Except me, of course. I combed through it because, as a former attorney and technology guy, I want to know what I'm signing on behalf of my fifth-grade daughter.

When - Thursday, August 21, 2008 2pm, ET Description - School administrators across the country are working hard to offer healthy and attractive choices in their competitive food and beverage offerings. Still, concerns persist about inconsistent information, community support, student acceptance and revenue implications.

There's a Chinese proverb that goes something like this: "Tell me and I'll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I'll understand." Leaders should know by now that people tend to resist change when it's forced on them. "Telling" is what initiates the resistance. It causes those being told to spend their energy mostly on NOT doing what you've told them. Yet that resistance is not so much about the change; it's all about being changed.

Tech visionary Lawrence Lessig made a sobering prediction Tuesday at Fortune's Brainstorm Tech conference: "There's going to be an i-9/11 event," he said, "an event that demonstrates the instability of the Internet, and that inspires the government to a response." He said he believes this digital disaster - a major hacker attack or other act of cyber-terrorism in the next 10 years - will prompt the U.S. government to clamp down on Internet freedoms in an online parallel to the Patriot Act.

I'm a big Ken Robinson fan and have pointed to him many times such as in this post on his TED talk from 2006 (and see Sir Ken's ideas on public speaking here). Even if you saw the TED talk, you will enjoy this 15-minute presentation (given sans slides, as is the Sir Ken Robinson style) that he delivered in April of this year to an international crowd of school superintendents at the Apple Education Leadership Summit in San Francisco.

Educators may sometimes feel they are in a race against several clocks-the class period, the school day, the semester, the academic year, high school exit exams and so forth-as they prepare students for academic success. What can district leaders do to appropriately address issues of time and time management? How can they ensure that what is most important-student learning-is not at the mercy of things that are less urgent? As leaders weigh their options, research offers some important reminders.

Your leadership success increases exponentially by the number of leaders you create within your organization. Teachers, as well as administrators, must accept their roles as leaders to properly integrate technology. Then and only then can long-term success be realized. In times of education bashing and dwindling resources, we must acknowledge that our most valuable assets are our human resources and allow our students to build our future in a positive direction in a technological, global society.

The future is now at Boston's Lilla G. Frederick Pilot Middle School. In last week's most-clicked ASCD SmartBrief story, we learned about this school with no textbooks, one laptop per student, parent-teacher IM conferences, and online drop boxes for homework assignments. Leveled software is used to differentiate learning experiences, and built-in automatic assessments help teachers pinpoint students' instructional needs. Advances in technology have also expanded the role of online courses in shaping schools-digital curriculum is going global and, some say, decreasing the number of teachers needed in a classroom. Replacing outdated textbooks with laptops, increasing student engagement, and more focused one-on-one instructional time-is there a downside to increasingly automated learning?

The July issue of Education Update addresses ways educators are striving to develop students for work and life in the ever-changing 21st century. ASCD President Valerie Truesdale applauds the Association as it joins the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, which closely aligns with ASCD's Whole Child Initiative and allows ASCD to sit at the table with corporations like Dell, Apple, and Verizon.

Millions of students regularly experience curricula and lessons that address content and concepts with which they're already familiar. It's not just the 'talented and gifted' kids; there are plenty of students who know the material in a particular learning unit before they even start. They're just never given the chance to demonstrate their knowledge ahead of time. Nor do they have the opportunity to request to be pre-tested.

During the past decade, 21st Century Skills have been described, debated, and, unfortunately, downplayed when one considers their overall impact on instruction and assessment practices in our public schools. Organizations such as the Partnership of the 21st Century and the former North Central Regional Laboratory have successfully articulated a set of well-defined skill sets targeting needed student outcomes for the 21st Century workplace; yet, a careful scrutiny of district curriculum manuals, pacing guides, and scope & sequence charts reveals little evidence of their existence.  

Urging the presidential candidates to make K-12 student access to education technology and modern learning environments a top national priority, leading education association have launched a public service announcement campaign titled One Giant Leap for Kids. The Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE), the National Education Association (NEA) and the State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA) designed the PSA to drive home the message that making investments in technology today is critical to ensuring the ability of U.S. students to compete and succeed in the 21st century global workforce.

We need leaders who see themselves as learners. How can we help school leaders to reconnect with their inner leader? How can we take risks within the parameters of the school environment?

People tend to over-value their assets and ignore embarrassing problems. Part of the problem with Wall Street is that corporations still can't bring themselves to admit that most of the fancy derivatives and other so-called assets they are holding are worth virtually nothing. They hang on, claiming their businesses are strong and denying the truth, until it's too late and the crisis threatens to overwhelm them, one by one. It's the same with personal strengths and capabilities: people tend to over-value their abilities and underplay their weaknesses. As a result, they become complacent about what skills and experience they have and what they can achieve with them.

There is a great deal that leaders can learn from Madonna and her incredible ways, including: How to deal with innovation as fashions and customer demands shift. Effective techniques to reinvent a persona and profile. How to bring a management team along with you, even as you face controversy. How to capitalize on success for the benefit of larger causes.

One of the differences between a happy and an unhappy organization is how well its structures and processes match its objectives. You can call this 'coherence' - a coherent organization is one which is organized and managed in a way that embraces its objectives, rather than just not getting in the way.