Bruce Baker of Rutgers University shows in this post that the dream of cutting costs by replacing teachers with computers has been oversold and is a fantasy. It lures entrepreneurs and snake-oil salesmen into education but there is no evidence to support the claims.
Baker traces the latest iteration of the myth of cutting costs and achieving efficiency. Open the link to see the graph that promised huge savings:
“Modern edupreneurs and disrupters seem to have taken a narrow view of technological substitution and innovation, equating technology almost exclusively with laptop and tablet computers – screen time – as potential replacements for teachers – whether in the form of online schooling in its entirety, or on a course by course basis (unbundled schooling).[ii] For example, the often touted Rocketship model (a chain of charter schools), makes extensive use of learning lab time in which groups of 50 to 70 (or more) students work on laptops while supervised by uncertified “instructional lab specialists.”[iii] Fully online charter schools have expanded in many states often operated as for-profit entities.[iv] The overarching theme is that there must be some way to reduce the dependence on human resources to provide equal or better schooling, because human resources are an ongoing, inefficient expense.
“In 2011, on the invitation of New York State Commissioner of Education John King (later, replacement of Arne Duncan as U.S. Secretary of Education), Marguerite Roza, at the time a Senior Economic and Data Advisor to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,[v] presented the Productivity Curve illustration (Figure 11) at a research symposium of the New York State Board of Regents.[vi] Roza used her graph to assert that, for example, for $20,000 per pupil, tech-based learning systems could provide nearly 4x the bang for the buck as the status quo, and double the bang for the buck as merely investing in improved teacher effectiveness.
“The most significant shortcoming of this graph, however, was that it was entirely speculative[vii] (actually, totally made up! Fictional!) – a) not based on any actual empirical evidence that such affects could be or have anywhere been achieved, b) lacking any definition whatsoever as to what was meant by “tech-based learning systems” or “improve teacher effectiveness”, and c) lacking any information on the expenditures or costs which might be associated with either the status quo or the proposed innovations. That is, without any attention to the cost effectiveness frameworks I laid out in the previous chapter. The graph itself was then taken on the road by Commissioner King and used in his presentations to district superintendents throughout the state![viii]”
We now know from experience and evidence that fully online schools produce worse results with no savings in cost or efficiency (the cost savings are turned into profits for inferior education).
A very important post.
A very important post. I agree. More snake oil from the Gates Foundation. Tech is better and cheaper than any human teacher. I think this non-sense needs to be attributed to Bill Gates because he loves to pontificate about getting the most “bang for the buck” in education. He uses the Bill and Melinda Foundation to put a happy face on his desire to make public education obsolete.
How did we survive with mere pens, pencils, notebooks, chalk and books? Remember when getting to thread the occasional film in the projector was a bit of a power rush? Sniffing the ink of a freshly mimeographed quiz? Having to lift your left hand to push over the typewriter carriage? Yet somehow we figured out how to adapt with changing times and technology. Although I still don’t get this obsession with texting.
I could smell the mimeos! We were probably damaging our brains but oh the smell! Texting I am just now investigating as I try to send photos of my grandkids to their parents from our summer family vacation. My children taught me how to take pictures this summer. Why are they so much better at teaching than the instructional videos provided by the cell company? H-m-m, do you suppose it has something to do with real hands on, real time human contact?
There’s a YouTube video that answers your question 😉.
So-called reformers and tech snake oil salesmen are confident that sticking kids in front of screens and devices will lower labor costs, and they may be right about that, at least initially.
But there’s also a strong likelihood that district costs would rise once the companies achieve monopoly status and those pesky teachers have been reduced to temps. It would certainly increase profits for makers of software and hardware, and provide lucrative career opportunities for Broad Institute types and their ilk, who lust to sell off the carcass of public education.
It should also be obvious that this is an academically and socially unsound thing to pursue. About that, we can also assume, based on the endemic behavior of so-called reformers, and especially Silicon Valley, that they couldn’t care less.
” Epple, Romano and Zimmer paint a rather ugly picture of the outcomes achieved by fully online “cyber” charter schools, noting: “online ‘cyber’ schools appear to be a failed innovation, delivering markedly poorer achievement outcomes than TPSs.”
The only legitimate evidence we have is that total cyber instruction is an abject failure. The rest of this so-called innovation is hype, spin and the will of billionaires. Parents need to understand that cyber instruction is doing less with less. Billionaires and many politicians would like to get rid of those pesky teachers that require a salary and benefits, but they know how to make a difference. They know how to guide, encourage, challenge young people to find their way and be responsible citizens.
DeVos announces “Rethink Schools” bus tour.
Someone should find out if this is actually coordinated. It feels like a big, integrated “public schools suck!” campaign that was carefully launched after Labor Day.
Shouldn’t the people who fund The US Department of Education (the public) know if they are coordinating political campaigns with tech billionaires?
The branding effort also neatly ties in with a book ed reformers are all pushing- “Reinventing Education”
Come on. This is HUGELY manipulative and cynical. The ed reformers in government all leave and go thru a revolving door directly to these foundations and they all push the same thing on the public at the same time, along with a huge marketing effort for a book by yet another privatizer which is then endorsed by the same 150 ed reform “thought leaders”
A perfect little echo chamber circle. The only people who aren’t in this club are the public.
Bringing the government in to sell it using taxpayer fund takes it right into “propaganda” territory.
I want an investigation into why the US Department of Education is joining a tech billionaires political campaign to privatize public schools. This is an improper use of taxpayer funds. If DeVos wants to back privatization efforts and travel the country attacking the schools 90% of US families attend she can use her own damn money.
It is outrageous that the federal employees in the US Department of Education believe they can use taxpayer money to fund “public schools suck!” tours.
Do these people ever put in any effort serving the NINETY PER CENT of US families who use the unfashionable public sector schools?
Do your jobs. Leave the privatization campaigns to the private sector. ADD SOME VALUE to one public school, anywhere. Do the work you’re paid to do. No one hired you to provide publicly-funded propaganda to coordinate a slick marketing effort with a billionaire.
It seems to me they could be helping public school families in Houston and Florida – why don’t they try doing that? The “public schools suck!” tour trumps offering actual assistance to public school families? How ARE those public school families in Houston and Florida getting along? Does anyone in DC care?
I am somewhat encouraged by the fact that Congress limited the funding for the Trump-Devos voucher pending debacle. It may mean that representatives are hearing from frustrated, angry public school constituents. If this is true, I hope concerned parents and supporters of public education continue to repeatedly contact representatives to let them know they want adequately funded authentic public education. It may mean they know “reform” has failed to deliver so they don’t want to waste more money, but it may also mean they oppose vouchers, which have a lot fewer supporters than charters.
Boy it really must suck being a public school family in one of these “portfolio districts”
Some of these places are 50% or better public school families. Those families and schools are completely ignored in the glowing reviews of the charters.
The ed reformers in charge simply neglect to mention that half the families exist, let alone how their public schools are doing. They focus exclusively on the charter schools they prefer.
Reading these “rah rah for charter schools!” accounts one wonders who works for the 50% of families in these districts who DON”T attend charter schools.
https://www.the74million.org/article/reinventing-americas-schools-david-osbornes-book-offers-city-by-city-case-studies-of-cities-rethinking-21st-century-education/
Will the federal employees at the US Department of Education continue to exclude public school families this month, as they have done for the last 8 months?
They are aware in DC that 90% of US families use the public schools they oppose,right?
Can we find some public employees who are interested in serving the schools that exist, instead of their personal ideological vision of the schools that SHOULD exist?
Has Betsy DeVos met with a single public school family since she took this job?
Who, exactly, do these people work for? Not public school families. That’s for damn sure.
It’s both amazing and horrifying how loud money talks in this country.
Not only was the tech billionaire given blanket coverage on all tv networks, she is now given an entire federal agency to promote her campaign.
Why bother with elections? We’ll just submit financials. Wealthiest runs public education.
I wonder if DeVos and Company will lower themselves to enter an actual public school at some point during their publicly-funded “public schools suck” tour.
It’s tough for the Best and the Brightest. Sometimes they’re forced to do things like brush up against an assistant principal or something who attended a “less selective” state college. Icky.
Tech is not luring snake oil salesmen into education
Silicon valley snake oil salesmen are using tech to lure the unsuspecting public.
That makes what they are doing fraud.
Right again. Flashing lights, bells and whistles is literally all it is.