My inquiry interests haven’t changed and I plan to pursue the relationship between technology and community in the classroom. My essential question remains, How can teachers responsibly engage with new technologies to enhance their classrooms as supportive learning environments?

This area of research would greatly benefit colleagues insofar as teachers must play a prominent role in defining the role of technology in education, or risk having corporate specialists redefine 21st century education for them. There is a war being waged between those who wish to make the case that public education still matters and those who argue that new technologies provide better opportunities to engage and educate students. Jane van Galen’s article Learning in the Digital Age: Control or Connection? argues how corporations and politicians are proactive in reconciling new technologies with their educational agendas and that teachers are not given a seat at their table. Teachers must therefore acknowledge that there are special interests that, for better or worse, seek to make public education and the classroom teacher irrelevant. It is therefore up to us as professionals to be proactive in the debate on why our work still matters in the 21st century and this cannot happen until we first educate ourselves and develop new curricula and pedagogies that welcome new technologies into how we teach. It is with this spirit of engagement and determination that I forward this modest proposal to you, dear reader.

Until next time,
Alex M.