Teachable opportunity

It’s laudable that Gov. Mike Beebe has created a task force to reckon with the state’s digital-learning policies.

Let’s hope the group, christened Faster Arkansas, doesn’t rush to conclusions by just looking around at other states. Now is the time for educational innovation, not imitation.

One of the national assessments cited in the task force’s genesis is the Digital Learning Report Card, which grades states on 10 elements comprising 39 metrics. The elements range from student eligibility and access to content and instruction to accountability and funding, with detailed criteria spelled out for each one.

Arkansas received an F on the report card, as did 20 other states. In fact, only one state earned an A.

In looking over the online map color-coded for grades, there’s a surprising disparity between states that scored highest, and states with the highest per-pupil spending. Of the top 10 states in per-student expenditures as calculated by the Census Bureau, eight received Fs, and two got Ds.

There’s powerful New York, which spends more than twice what Arkansas does per pupil, only besting us by 1 percentage point (48 percent over 47 percent).

There are states like Connecticut and Massachusetts, which outspend us by $5,000 to 6,000 per student, unable to earn even one A across the 10 report card elements ( Arkansas received a 92 percent score, A-, in Quality Instruction policy).

Turning things around, none of the six states earning better than a C were among the top 20 states in per-pupil spending.

The sole A in the nation was earned by Utah, which happens to be dead last in the nation in spending per student. Of the five states receiving Bs, none fared better than 25th in spending. Clearly, throwing money at schools doesn’t automatically translate into digital learning leadership.

In contrast to the generally inverse relationship between state education spending and digital learning policy proficiency, there is a strong correlation between low population density and high Digital Learning Report Card scores.

Florida, a national pioneer in digital learning, is anomalous as the only top-10 population-density state to earn better than a C. Two of the other top three graded states-Utah and Minnesota-sport decidedly sparse populations, 41st and 31st in density respectively.

On the other end of the scale, six of the eight top-spending states with Fs were also among the top 10 states in population density.

The fact that the highest scoring states on the report card tend to be sparsely populated and on the modest end of the education-spending scale spells a special opportunity for Arkansas.

Philosophically, education is considered the great equalizer. Today, maybe digital learning is the great equalizer in schools.

Reading through the Digital Learning Report Card elements and metrics, they address virtually every challenge faced in efficiently managing a lot of small, distant school districts.

“All students are digital learners,” Element 1 (Eligibility) declares. That’s a perfect preamble for a rural education system policy. Digital technology and capacity is exploding as broadband reaches almost every geographic nook and cranny, and devices become more affordable and ubiquitous among young people.

Consolidation was a 20th Century solution to educating a rural population. But how many iPads would the cost of one school bus buy? How much broadband would the fuel costs of a fleet finance?

Here in the infancy of the digital age, learning should no longer be constrained by proximity or calendar or even curricula.

In the 21st Century, why limit schools and students to the classes offered on campus, the teachers on the payroll or the months between August and May?

Remove traditional thinking about education, and suddenly teaching a rural population is full of innovative opportunity.

Policymakers keep trying to figure out how to make students fit our education system instead of the other way around. If open-mindedness can reign, we’ll discover another aspect of the genius of the digital revolution: it can revitalize small schools and communities.

Many rural communities are dying to find some sort of economic development. What a stimulus it would be to re-open local schools as digital learning regional centers. What new careers await educators who learn to excel in the new paradigms that will emerge in digital learning.

Imagine a school like Weiner offering a broader curriculum than any

physical school on the planet, and students receiving instruction from the best teachers anywhere-and vice versa with other states.

“A retired NASA scientist in Cape Canaveral who is qualified to teach physics in the Sunshine State should be able to teach students in any state in the country,” asserts Element 6 (Quality Instruction). Ditto with an agriculture scientist in Arkansas.

Policy decisions for decades have been based on inputs; digital learning can shift focus to outcomes measured and delivered at the speed of broadband, fostering real accountability that taxpayers deserve.

The costly, desolate path of consolidation is well-documented and Arkansas can continue down it, leaving empty schools and wrecked local economies as casualties.

Or we could be the first state in the nation to make digital learning the rule for our rural population, rather than the exception.

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Dana Kelley is a freelance writer from Jonesboro.