As exciting as some previous political conventions might have been, they pale in comparison to what has transpired in Denver this week. There has been a lot of talk about change, and we certainly need change in our public schools. If we are to rebuild our economy for a 21st-century world, we need to dramatically ratchet up the calibre of the K-12 education we offer our children.

There is no doubt that some children get a world-class education in this country, but not every child. That has to change. Most U.S. educators  would probably agree that the best result of NCLB has been highlighting the inequities in how our schools are funded and the importance of highly qualified teachers in generating strong educational outcomes.

All children can learn. We must create schools with that fundamental premise at the heart of curriculum and assessment. It is our moral obligation to fund education at the level it needs to be funded to give all our country’s children the skill set they need to compete in a global economy.

 Even if we take a more isolationist view and set our sights on graduating students who are equipped to make  high-level contributions just to our own institutions, there is much work to be done to recruit, mentor and keep highly qualified professional teachers - the single most important part of the education equation. We need to create clear, standards-based educational goals and objectives that cross all curriculum and topic areas. We need to make it easier to replace sub-standard teachers with excellent teachers. We need to replace what is no longer working for us in the old institutions with schools and education centers focused on creating a love for learning and critical thinking skills that continue to grow and develop over a lifetime.

Keith Krueger, CEO of Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), tells us that the U.S. Department of Education ranked 55 industry sectors by how they use technology. Guess where education ranked? Dead last. #55. That should shock everyone in this country, no matter what their political affiliation. If there is anything all citizens can agree on it is the need to create strong schools that educate all our children. As Keith said so poignantly:

“We need to make sure that their schools are as technology-rich as their lives outside of school are.”

None of this is news. With some notable exceptions, we have lacked the political stamina to reform our schools. Our world standing particularly in the areas of math, science and technology continues to fall. When will we stop talking about the need for change and make the change?

I’d say the time is now. Barack Obama has a clear vision of what we need to do to change the educational outcomes for our country’s chldren. It’s not incremental change. We’ve been tinkering around the edges for a long time. It is robust and systemic change that we need. To make it happen and to be sustainable and scalable, we need all hands on deck.

Last night I heard the clarion call from a leader who can take us where we need to go. The challenge has gone out. The only question remaining is whether or not we have the political will to make it happen. Are you ready to commit?

Check this out for first-hand convention reports from educators and policy makers. Many thanks to Rita Ferrandino for being a voice for education in Denver this week.

Share This

Posted in: K-12 Education | Comments(5)

Rita Ferrandino, Arc Capital Development partner and Chair of the Sarasota County, FL, democratic party is an official delegate to the convention as well as Executive Director of the Elementary Science Coalition.

A long-time education advocate, Rita has made many trips to Washington, D.C. to lobby for increased attention and funding for elementary science education in U.S. public schools. Rita and her business partner, Kevin Custer, are in Denver this week to “capture key elements of the Democratic Education Platform and responses/reactions from delegates, elected officials, education industry leaders and local voters.”

Rita will be posting convention news, interviews, updates in text and video on her DNC Education 2008 - Education Policy News from the Democratic National Convention blog throughout the week.

With a potential Democratic administration on the horizon, educators and education reformers will be watching how the Democrats’ educational policy agenda further develops during the course of the convention.

Kudos to Rita and her team. She will be featured tomorrow (August 26th) in a video post at the New York Times. Look for her there after you check out her blog.

Share This

Posted in: Educational Publishing | Comments(0)

 
photo credit: zentolos

How long do we have to convey our key messages to prospective customers as they cruise through our websites? Not long at all judging from some of the analytics results I’ve seen on various websites. So what are the industry norms for this metric? It’s logical that different industries would have different metrics, don’t you agree?In the magazine business, we used to have the “10-second rule” which was about the time it took a reader to scan a page, determine if there was anything of interest to read and turn the page to the next spread. I’ve heard that we have as little as 7 seconds per web screen to tell our story before the reader is off to the next click.

Michael Firsikov, Director of IT, VerkkoStadi Technologies Inc. has reviewed the metrics for the large social networking site he manages. As he shared this week in the Target Marketing Magazine webinar on email, Michael found that within 30 seconds, 48% of the audience is gone and within 40 seconds 63% are gone.

The thing that made me sit up and take notice was his assertion that often “Your first impression is your last impression.” It’s probably safe to say that educators looking for solutions to their particular problems are willing to spend a bit more time scanning a website for kernels of help. It’s probably true for most professionals in most markets. But since we may be talking about the difference of nano-seconds, we ignore the customer behavior above at our peril. Even though the examples are based on social consumer behavior, educators are consumers too.

So if our first impression is our last impression, what kind of impression are you making with your website?

Share This

Posted in: Marketing | Comments(0)

Yesterday I participated in a webinar sponsored by Target Marketing Magazine that focused on getting the most out of your emails to customers. The presenters were sharing the results of a study across four vertical markets. I learned some amazing facts such as:

1. 30% of marketers do not send an email to interested prospects within 30 days of the prospect making herself known to the company through a subscribe/send me more information process.
2.  Another 25% do not send the first email within 9 days.
3. 60% do not send welcome messages.
4. 70% collect enough information in the sign-up process to customize messages and then don’t use the information.

I don’t know about your experience, but the educational publishers I have worked with spend enormous amounts of time crafting their email communication with their customers. Although, K-12 publishing was not one of the vertical markets surveyed in this instance, it does make me wonder what kind of waste would we see in our own industry? Read the rest of this entry »

Share This

Posted in: Marketing, Educational Publishing | Comments(0)