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Flash-based interactive printing tool that allows students to design and layout a newspaper or brochure.

Those educators among us who are familiar with constructivist and constructionist models of learning understand the impact that social learning theory has had on the field. Likewise those of us who are familiar with the application of new technology in learning understand that customization (or "the user") is what drives every structure, every program, and every software function. It seems, then, that as educators we have a struggle between emphasizing the social nature of learning while maximizing the benefits of each learner becoming more clearly identified in the process. New technology, of course, can help in both aspects, but it is the teaching method that is challenged. I hope that eventually teaching methods will have morphed into a flexible model of instructional design and delivery that I will call "Customized Learner Networks": networks that are both socially constructed and individually driven.

The Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) is engaged in a Proof of Concept for a Virtual Learning Magnet (VLM) for Space Science and Mathematics with support from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). CCSSO's strategic plan calls for setting the education context for a new century, and the Proof of Concept for the VLM supports this by exploring how states can bring together teachers and subject matter experts to support learners with targeted interests in areas of global importance. The VLM is designed to supplement, and not duplicate, the offerings of state-led virtual schools.