The National Educational Technology Plan

The Office of Educational Technology along with the U.S. Department of Education have come up with a plan to improve technology use in the education sector.  The Obama administration has a couple of goals that it wants to achieve in regards to education.  The administration wants to increase the number of people graduating from college and wants to close the gap in achievement among all students.  That is where the National Education Technology Plan (NETP) comes into play.  The plan has set goals and has made recommendations in five areas.  The areas are "learning, assessment, teaching, infrastructure, and productivity" (Office of Educational Technology and the U.S. Department of Education,  2010, p. vii).  According to the plan it "...calls for engaging and empowering learning experiences for all learners...focus what and how we teach to match what people need to know, how they learn, where and when they will learn, and who needs to learn" (Office of Educational Technology and the U.S. Department of Education,  2010, p. vi).  In other words the plan wants for educators to provide a learning environment that will enable learners and educators to work and collaborate with one another.  Educators must change and adapt the way they teach to meet the needs of the 21st century learner.  In order for educators to do so, they must be provided with professional development that will help them facilitate and implement the use of technology in the classroom. "Episodic and ineffective professional development is replaced by professional learning that is collaborative, coherent, and continuous and that blends more effective in-person courses and workshops with the expanded opportunities, immediacy, and convenience enabled by online environments full of resources and opportunities for collaboration" (Office of Educational Technology and the U.S. Department of Education,  2010, p. viii).  Ideally this technology plan is great for all stakeholders in meeting the set goals.  The only concern I have with this is the fact that not every school has the resources or technology available needed to meet the goals. How are campuses expected to meet these expectations when the technology and resources are not in place?