March 2006 - 8,306 subscribers
To celebrate the tenth anniversary of the GenYES model, we are giving out the presents! We will award 10 Generation YES licenses to 10 deserving schools in July - good for the entire 06/07 school year. Schools can apply for these awards online (www.genyes.com/about/contest.php) by filling out a short application. We are looking for schools that believe in their students and the ability of all youth to participate fully in school improvement. We will be announcing the winner at our anniversary party at NECC in San Diego in July.
Join us in celebrating our 10th anniversary by saying thanks to every student, teacher and administrator who says "YES" to students taking a leading role in education reform.
I look forward to ten more years of YES - Youth and Educators Succeeding.
Forward...Dennis
What's New at Generation YES
EETT Grants Awarded to Five California GenYES Partnerships
Former GenYES Teacher Receives Doctorate on Student Voice Research
Liberian Renaissance School Receives Presidential Endorsement
Student Showcase
Washington State School Completes Tenth Year of GenYES
MySpace in GenYES Online Collaboration Network (OCN)
News You Can Use
Emerging Technologies in Education
Conexiones
Enhances Communication Through Technology
Tech Tips Plus
Free Copyright Comic Book
Keeping Tech Support In Step With Technology
TakingITGlobal Provides Educators With Collaboration Tools
That's All For This Issue of the Generation YES Express
First MCI California TechYES School Completes Certification
MCI has funded TechYES - Student Technology Literacy Certification for 10,000 seventh-grade students in 45 California middle schools (www.geny.org/mci). Keyes to Learning School in Keyes California (near Modesto) became the first school to certify all their seventh graders as literate in technology ... 44 more schools to go!
Five EETT grants were awarded to more than 20 schools to implement GenYES. School districts in Shasta, Chico, Sacramento, Woodland, and Davis will administer these large GenYES Title II D grants.
Sheila Seitz taught GenYES in Olympia Washington for three years before moving to Cincinnati. Her GenYES experiences influenced her doctoral dissertation "Educational Reform in A Technology Age: Considering Student Voice". Check it out at www.ohiolink.edu/etd/view.cgi?ucin1132234546
Dennis Harper will return to Liberia for two weeks in April to continue the global efforts to build the Liberian Renaissance School in Monrovia, Liberia (www.GenY.org). Liberia's new President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has enthusiastically endorsed this high-tech school that will symbolize and serve the re-building of the country after years of unrest.
Generation TECH Students Present at California CUE Conference
Borrego Springs High School sent Generation TECH teachers and students to the California Computer Using Educators (CUE) conference to present a session called, "Help! I Need More Tech Support." They will do an encore performance at NECC in San Diego in July. (www.genyes.com/news/cue06)
Jefferson Middle School in Olympia Washington was one of the first original six schools that began GenYES (then called Gen www.Y) in 1996. During this ten-year period more than 350 students have collaborated with teacher partners at Jefferson to create thousands of technology-infused lessons. Congratulations go to GenYES teacher Anne Marie Ratliff and principal Michael Cimino for their ongoing commitment to include students in the continuing effort to improve education with technology.
Adam Fletcher, our director of Customer Support was recently moderating the GenYES OCN, and read the following student post under the topic "MySpace":
"MySpace is just a website. The entire reason why a majority of teenagers go onto the site is because their parents have pretty much barred them from outside contact, so they need another sanctuary to express themselves. We are social animals. What you need to understand, though, is that the Internet is the same as the outside world."
Is that true, false, dangerously naive, common sense, or what? The Generation YES philosophy focuses on posing critical thinking questions to students, challenging assumptions, opening a discussion, and engaging them in creating projects that address the value and credibility of online resources like MySpace. Here are some resources that we provide students and teachers to start the learning conversation.
Popular Social Networks
Lesson Resources
Looking for Funds for Your School?
You'll find them at Grant Wrangler, a free grants and awards listing service for teachers and schools.
www.Grantwrangler.com
Generation YES's own Sylvia Martinez was on a panel on Emerging Technologies at the Consortium for School Networking's annual K-12 conference. Sylvia and other ed tech leaders on the panel explored a number of issues including how podcasts, blogs and other social networking tools can be used in education. www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryts.cfm?ArticleID=6186
Many Generation YES programs are delivered in schools serving migrant students. The Conexiones program creates technology-infused educational spaces for young learners to master technology in order to become proficient media content users and developers.
www.conexiones.asu.edu/.
Free, Safe Blogs for Education
Gaggle.Net has just announced Gaggle Blogs -- a safe blogging solution for teachers and students. Teachers decide if access to the student blogs will be restricted to just the class, school or district, or be open to the outside world. Teachers can control who can comment on the blogs, hide full names and email addresses, create filters and more.
Gaggle.net is a long-time Generation YES partner, and our schools report great satisfaction with their free, safe email service for students. Extending their safety and control features to blogs is a great idea! www.gaggle.net
Free from the Duke Law School, this comic book offers a graphically compelling and fun way to learn about copyright. Teaching students the ins and outs of copyright law and fair use can be a frustrating task, given the rapidly changing laws and technology.
www.law.duke.edu/cspd/comics/
Sylvia Martinez of Generation YES contributed to this THE Journal article about building a reliable base of technology infrastructure and support.
www.thejournal.com/articles/17610/
TakingITGlobal has launched new project-based global education tools - check out www.tiged.org. These tools offer a virtual space for blogs, galleries, links and collaboration projects to support educators who involve students in global collaboration projects.
We hope you've enjoyed this email newsletter. If you have stories to share or news clips about technology in education, student empowerment, or funding for technology, please send them our way and you might see them in the next issue! https://www.genyes.org/about/contact
