Archive for the ‘Shirky’ tag
Second-hand Reflection on NECC 2008
I’m filching my comment on Will Richardson’s NECC reflection and putting it below for whatever weird archival reasons:
NECC is pretty far away from Korea (and air travel for a tech conference is a wildly ironic eco-no-no anyway, but I digress), and I was moving into a new apartment the very days it was held, and so couldn’t even attend online, but I had the feeling it would generate weird vibes from all the hype preceding it and the massive size (and also from a lot of generally weird social snarkiness in the eblogger boomtown in the past few months).
If I have anything to add to this thread, it’s this:
1. Tools don’t fix a rotten building. Maybe Shirky’s “platform” should be entertained as a replacement for schools, and the idea of schools themselves abandoned. I’d be much keener to contribute to wikis and networks to those ends than to devoutly schoolish ones. (To switch metaphors, you don’t waste a good defibrillator on a long-dead corpse. Let Lazarus lie.)
2. Whether tools are used in classrooms is pretty unimportant, compared to what type of learning is expected in the classroom. Most classroom learning doesn’t deserve the budget outlay for increased technology. Extra cash would be better spent on redefining what’s worthwhile for the young to learn. I’m a techie too, somewhat, but find educational philosophy far more vital than technology.
3. Is it me, or is the silent majority in education even more invisible this year than last, in all of these NECC talks? I mean the end-users - the students. There has to be an army of educational malcontents, volumes of witness testimonials to the farce of current schooling, and brigades of compelling material witnesses in high school student bodies around the world - all untapped. 18,000 adults at NECC is good - but 18,000 students on YouTube would be better, IMHO. Why is it so difficult to see student-centered educational activism, when it’s talked about so easily? Or am I missing something?
(I’m closing comments to this post to keep Will’s thread from splintering. Please comment there, if you’re so moved.)
If you like this post, please spread it: 
(But don't tag it "education." That will bury it.)
