Computer-illiterate teachers?
I read that teachers in Idaho are pushing back on requirements that they become computer savvy (NY Times, Jan. 3). While the Idaho Statesman, a local newspaper, writes this off as politics (there are always at least two sides in these matters), blaming it on legislators pandering to high-tech companies (apparently they contributed to some school superintendent’s election campaign), it reminds me that I’ve heard about teachers resisting technology even in high tech areas like the Northeast and the West Coast. (I apologize for my bias, but I can’t think of Idaho as another Californian Silicon Valley or Bostonian 128 Loop. It’s the land of down-to-earth good people—the exception being Aryan supremacy groups—and beautiful, rustic scenery.)
In defense of teachers in general, it’s not like school districts make it easy for them to get any kind of additional training, let alone computer literacy. Legislatures and governors everywhere are slashing budgets for education, so teacher training goes down the toilet with many other programs. This is certainly happening here in NJ where, in spite of appearances, our governor performs well in the role of the anti-Santa Claus. I’m at a lost to come up with a way for a teacher, who has been twenty years on the job and wants to update his or her knowledge and skill sets, to actually do so. I give education a high priority. I also know things are wrong with the system. But slash and burn tactics on the part of governors and legislators is not the answer for our kids.
Considering that our judges rule on tech cases without the foggiest clue about what they’re dealing with, is it any wonder that the most people in the public sector are technophobes from legislators on down? There is an anti-science, anti-technology, let’s-blame-the-scientists prevalent attitude in a society that has little left to manufacture beyond scientific and technological innovation. Almost anywhere in the world, workers work for less. They might make more inferior products than U.S. workers, but cheap labor has always been the draw for world-wide corporations trying to maximize their profits. Moreover, when so many in a society ignore scientific evidence and believe that human beings and dinosaurs co-existed just after the Earth was created six thousand years ago, is it any wonder that science literacy, which includes computer literacy, has a low priority in our country?
Yet we all like our gizmos. I say this with CES opening in Las Vegas, with its 3D Wii, OLED thin TV screens, and super thin iPad look-alikes, among other things. The corollary to this observation is that too many of us are not really technophobes but technical savages. We shove around those little icons on our iPads and smart phones, use our TiVOs and DVRs, and watch our wide-screen TVs without thinking or caring much about where all these wonders come from. However, they will stop coming unless we do something about education in this country. Arthur C. Clarke made the observation that the science and technology of a sufficiently advanced ET society would be indistinguishable from magic. He almost got it right. We now have people, very human people, the so-called “users of technology,” who can’t distinguish the gizmos in their life from magic. The adage holds—ignorance is bliss.
I’m not on a campaign here to turn every U.S. citizen into either a hardware or software guru. In particular, teachers have a few other things to worry about, especially in economically depressed and/or inner city ghettos where basic survival skills that used to be summarized as the three R’s have to take precedence. When a kid has to worry about where his next meal is coming from (one in six in America is the current estimate), has no idea who his father is or rarely sees him, thinks praise from older gang members is more important than a teacher’s, hopes the shank he carries to protect himself gets through the metal detector, and wonders if getting high will solve all his problems, I’d say that street smarts are more valuable than anything he can learn in school—and teachers in these areas know this. America’s educational system is in a sorry state—being computer illiterate is just one problem on a long list of ills.
Nevertheless, computer literacy is just a starting point if we are going to keep America strong and competitive. Anyone thinking about it long enough knows that the promotion of technical savagery is not good for the scientific and technological future of this country. Moreover, what people tend to forget is how important being computer savvy is for the humanities and arts. Before you say, “Who cares about that?” let me say that our competitiveness also depends on skilled users being in the work force in these areas of expertise. “An ex-scientist calling humanities and arts areas of expertise,” you scoff. You bet! Let’s consider some examples.
What we often call humanities are soft sciences in today’s world. Mathematical modeling might be minimized and hard sciences like biology, chemistry and physics might play less of a role, but sophisticated users of computer software and hardware are creating new concepts and techniques in non-scientific areas. I can’t imagine many fields today making any progress without databases and statistics. Every day Google publishes a query challenge in the NY Times—I can’t imagine a researcher in any field in the humanities who does not use Google or some other search engine regularly. Political science needs computer technology for decision making, poll taking, etc. History needs computers for data storage. Anthropology can use everything from databases to computer graphics (How do you put flesh on the bones of an ancient hunter-gatherer? How do you analyze the structure of an ancient language no one speaks anymore? Etc.).
Arts and literature, long considered the most creative parts of human endeavor, have been completely invaded and revolutionized by digital technology. Musicians write and mix music with special hardware and software. Computer graphics, animation, and computer-generated special effects are so much a part of Hollywood productions now that whole companies like Pixar and Industrial Light and Magic are featured in almost all the movie credits you care to look at. The old technical wizardry of Star Wars and Jurassic Park is now passé as we head into 3D imaging even for our TV broadcasts. The digital publishing revolution is changing how authors write and readers read while streamlining all that happens between authors and readers. The internet has created a plethora of new positions related to arts and literature, from advertising to blogging and political campaigning.
There is a grave danger we face in America, the bifurcation of our population into two groups: the technical savvy, those people who are sophisticated users of technology—yes, technological savages still, but also experts in the application of computers to their fields of expertise; and those who are not. As we cruise along towards the year 2100, I project that there will be a strong correlation between these two groups and income distribution. In the 20th century, a BA or BS in some area used to be an admittance card to better positions and incomes. In the 21st, those same levels are subpar. Not even advanced degrees will do the trick. However, knowing your field of expertise, including all the computer skills necessary to apply that expertise, should make you employable.
In reference to teaching, though, the problem of becoming computer savvy is difficult. How do you prepare the next employee of ILM or the next pollster for CNN? You can’t. What the teacher needs to have is knowledge about where to direct the student. Teachers, especially at the grade school level, are not specialists—they’re generalists. Nevertheless, just as your primary care doctor is supposed to know enough to send you on to the correct specialist, a good teacher will know enough to point the interested student in the right direction. Most of the time it will be to a path the teacher himself hasn’t followed, but he has to know it’s there. Of course, isn’t that what education has always been about?
And so it goes….
