Knowledge Networks in Focused Teaching and Learning Communities: Promoting Successfull, Sustainable and Scaleable Educational Improvement

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

9811907 Lewis College and universities nationwide lament the increasing difficulty of enrolling ethnically and linguistically diverse student bodies that reflect the population of the nation. Proposition 209 in California, the Hopwood Decision in Texas, and the growing trend toward such legislation in other states (proposed in Michigan and Washington) have further focused the discussion of who is able to attend college. With the decreasing market value of a high school diploma and an increasingly diverse workforce, one third of whom are members of minority groups (SCANS, Report, 1992), a premium must be placed on a college education for all ethnic groups. For the past year, RAND and AVID had been collaborating on a new model of networked resources called AVIDnet. They have already produced surveys, focus groups, and preliminary designs of systems that would use technology to provide an infrastructure of support for expanding AVID Programs. This effort represents one of the first trials of its kind to demonstrate how rich, networked interactive media can directly be made to serve the needs of the public-school teaching and learning community at middle and senior high grade levels. The purpose of the design, implementation, and evaluation proposed in this Planning Grant and in future larger-scale research, is to extract valuable lessons in real-time from the AVIDnet development experience. Results of the research would be expected not only to inform future uses of AVIDnet but also to support efforts undertaken by others to enhance teaching and learning through effective use of these new media.