How might the tech backlash change American education?
Reducing screen time in classrooms will not be simple
More than a decade ago, U.S. schools started putting Chromebooks and iPads in the hands of young students. Now a tech backlash is here, with parents demanding less screen time and more pen-and-paper work for their algorithm-addled kids. The movement could partially undo the tech revolution in the classroom.
Los Angeles parents are “fed up with schools loading up students with laptops and tablets,” said The New York Times. The LA school board last week passed new rules to “eliminate digital devices entirely through first grade and develop screen time limits for higher grades,” a major development in “escalating national reckoning for the powerful classroom technology industry.” New York parents are asking for ChatGPT limits in schools, while Utah last month passed a law to let parents monitor their kids’ screen time on school devices. “Big Tech” is “encroaching into our public schools,” said Schools Beyond Screens’ Anya Meksin to the outlet.
Reducing screen time “isn’t as simple as hitting an off switch,” said Education Week. Tech is “infused into nearly every part” of K-12 education. Federally required reading and math assessments are “largely digital” and digital learning management systems “are now staples for school districts.” Educators do not want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Technology can “be misused” in the classroom, North Carolina educator Casey Rimmer said to the outlet, but when used thoughtfully it “has a lot of power” to enhance education.
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What did the commentators say?
Technology is “not the answer or the problem,” Matthew Yglesias said at Slow Boring. Companies once “were making a lot of unrealistic utopian promises” about the promise of iPads in education, but those promises have fallen short. To educate students well, schools need “solid standards” and a curriculum “aligned with those standards.” Technology works when it is also “aligned with those standards.” Schools have too often “signed up for too many apps” without a plan to “integrate them with each other or a curriculum.”
Schools should “take stock, set goals and develop strategy around learning-tech use,” Meredith Coffey said at Education Next. Educators frequently buy hardware and software “regardless of its relevance to their students’ needs.” They should instead “pursue solutions, not shiny objects” by focusing on “evidence-based tools that align with defined goals.” Administrators and educators largely agree that lessons should be “device-based only when it provides a clear advantage.” That will allow for “more face-to-face time” with teachers and kids while still letting students build “those 21st Century Skills we keep hearing about.”
What next?
Education debates can often turn partisan, but conservative parents and liberal teachers unions have “become unlikely allies” to fight back tech in schools, said NBC News. The tech backlash “cuts across partisan lines in a way that I haven’t seen in a long time,” The Heritage Foundation’s Corey DeAngelis said to the outlet. Both sides “really want the best for our kids,” said Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers.
