Generation Y - Overview, Philosophy, and History

Overview The Company Philosophy History

Generation Y Overview � A Mature, Proven, School-wide Model for Technology Infusion

NWREL Final Evaluation

"Through this model, participating educators receive individualized support as they strengthen their use and integration of new technologies. Students learn technology, communication, collaboration, and project management skills in an authentic, personally meaningful context, and many go on to further extend their skills through advanced school or community service projects."

Introduction
Generation Y (Gen Y) began as a Technology Innovation Challenge Grant in the Olympia school district in Washington State in 1996. The vision was to include students in the effort to infuse technology into curriculum and schools. After 6 years, the program is not only still going strong in Olympia, but also has also spread to hundreds of schools throughout the country.

The Model
The heart of the program is a Gen Y class. Each student in this class is paired with a partner-teacher at the school. Each of these student-teacher teams then decides what lesson plan, curriculum unit, or other school need will be addressed by a collaborative, technology-enriched curriculum project, which the partner-teacher and the Gen Y student produce together. In the Gen Y class, the student not only learns the technology skills necessary to complete the project, but also �soft� skills, such as planning and collaboration, necessary to complete these authentic long-term projects. As the project comes together, the partner-teacher gets technology support they need when and where they need it � in their classroom.

The result is authentic project-based learning for the students and sustainable technology professional development for the teachers. This powerful model has been refined and proven in real classrooms around the world.

Only Generation Y Offers:

• Proven Results - The Generation Y model has been implemented in hundreds of schools in 44 states � and continues to expand.
• Exemplary Model � The U.S. Department of Education�s Expert Panel on Educational Technology has rated only one model of professional development as exemplary � Generation Y
• Supported by Scientific Research � Generation Y is one of the most well-researched educational technology programs in history. The Northwest Regional Education Laboratory (NWREL) has provided six years of external evaluation.
• Rigorous Technology Skills � Gen Y students in grades 3 to 12 learn technology skills aligned both to the ISTE NETS for Students and Texas TEKS standards.
• Standards Alignment � Each student participating in a Gen Y class produces and delivers a technology infused lesson aligned to local and state standards.
• Student Empowerment � The Generation Y model is the only model of professional development that involves students as equal partners in their own learning.

Flexible
For six years, Generation Y has been delivered in almost any conceivable school setting. From Native American villages in Alaska and Washington to all secondary schools in the Virgin Islands, to remote towns in Wyoming to urban schools in empowerment zones in Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Los Angeles, and Washington DC. Generation YES staff members can work with your unique school situation to help you successfully implement the Gen Y model.

• Grades 3-12
• Works with your existing hardware, network, and software
• Extensive resources meet your unique needs

Cost Effective
More for your Money - Online courses, teacher workshops, and college courses can be expensive while the results of such training have never produced the desired level of technology use among teaching staff. Generation Y is a �train the trainer� model that trains students to provide onsite, immediate and context sensitive training to teachers. As part of the training students receive, they collaborate with teachers to produce REAL lessons that are assessed and improved upon for future use. As Generation Y graduates multiply in your school and district they become a powerful force for change.

Return on Investment (ROI) - Implementing a Generation Y program in your school will build a community of technology users at the school site level. This can save the district technology budget for more important training and support needs.

One License Fee - Generation YES provides all the pieces of the program for one low price. Comparable to the cost of a one-day workshop for 30 teachers, this program provides authentic, sustainable professional development for 30 teachers for a full year, plus student technology training.

• Consultation with your school to tailor the program to your unique situation
• Gen Y teacher training
• All student and teacher materials
• Access to the online reporting and project management tools
• Toll-free phone and online access to Gen Y experts and teacher mentors
• Pre and post-evaluation summary reports
• EVERY project is evaluated by Gen YES experts to maximize project effectiveness

Perfect Match to No Child Left Behind Title II D (EETT) Funding

• Emphasis on Proven Projects � No other model of technology infusion and professional development has been show to be more effective than Gen Y.
• Emphasis on Professional Development � 25% of allocated funds must be used for professional development activities. Generation Y is primarily a professional development model.
• Aligned to Standards � Generation Y students learn technology skills aligned to the ISTE NETS for Students and Gen Y projects are all aligned to state and local academic standards.

Generation YES - A Unique Company
Generation YES is not a subsidiary of a large company. We care about students, teachers, and learning - not our stock price. Generation YES exists to provide services to schools to tap into the power of their own students to provide solutions to problems facing them as they infuse technology to improve student learning.

Generation YES is led by Dr. Dennis Harper. Dr. Harper has been an international leader in the educational technology field for more than 35 years. He wrote the first college text on computer education, RUN: Computer Education while a faculty member at the University of California. Dr. Harper has taught in universities around the world and has been instrumental in bringing the first computers into schools in numerous countries. These experiences led Dr. Harper to develop the Generation Y model.

YES: Youth and Educators Succeeding � The Generation YES staff is made up of students and teachers who have years of experience with real schools and classrooms. We collaborate with you to find solutions to your schools unique needs and situation.

Common Problem	Solution
Little Time and Money for Professional Development	The Gen Y Program
Mediocre Results from Educational Technology Training	The Gen Y Program
Can�t Figure Out How Your Technology Can Improve Student Learning	The Gen Y Program
Provide Leadership Training for Students	The Gen Did Program
Provide Community Service Opportunities	The Gen Did Program
Balance the Male-Female Ratio in Technology Courses	The Gen GIT Program
Train Students to Help Care for Technology and Network Infrastructure	The Gen Tech Program

Philosophy
Students represent more than 90% of the K�12 education population, and they likely possess 95% of the technology expertise in the school. Unquestionably, they are 100% of the reason that schools exist. However, they are often left out of the equation when we plan, discuss and implement educational reforms. The technology innovations of the last several decades have unquestionably not been integrated into most schools in a way that anyone is satisfied with. Why is this so? We believe that it is because the largest group of stakeholders in the process has been ignored - the students.

The question is how to harness the students' technology expertise and at the same time, expand their learning opportunities. This scaffolding method, of taking what a student already knows, and building on it, is one of the basic tenets of educational theory, and has been proven time and again in research and in practice. How to take this theory and make a real working model out of it was the heart of a Technology Challenge Grant application submitted in 1995 by Dr. Dennis Harper, the Technology Director of the Olympia Washington School District.

Having students help out with technology is not a new idea. However, the goal of this grant was to document and prove that students could do more than just provide free labor and fix computers. Student projects could be authentic, meaningful improvements to the school technology goals - if the students understood what the school technology plan was, and were taught about pedagogy and learning. These projects could empower the student to participate in their own learning, and impact the learning of other students. Students could be part of the school-wide goals of infusing technology into the school, and therefore become full stakeholders in the process.

Around the same time, the realization was setting in that traditional methods of professional development were not working for technology in the school setting. After-school workshops and in-services promised great things, powerful hardware could be purchased, and endless new versions of software could be upgraded, but rarely was there adequate support when teachers actually tried to use the technology.

Putting together the immense need for on-site, just-in-time technology support with the untapped resource of students who need authentic projects is the basis for the Generation Y program today.

History
In 1995, the federal government funded the Technology Challenge Grant program. The goals of these grants were to fulfill the promise of technology in education. One hundred initial grants were funded, including Generation Y. The model was named, "Generation www.Y", to signify the inclusion of a new generation in the technology infusion process. To begin, a student-teacher pair would form a collaborative team to create authentic projects for the classroom.

• The students would use their technology knowledge to help the teacher build a project that the teacher could use in their classroom.
• The student would provide the expertise, energy, and time to learn the technology and build the project.
• The teacher would provide the knowledge of education, class needs, and lesson planning to guide the project.
• The teacher would learn how to use the technology side-by-side with the student in a just-in-time fashion, getting the support they needed in their classroom, when they needed it.
• The student would learn valuable real world skills - project planning, collaboration, and time management in addition to the technology.

In short, traditional professional development models have teachers learning technology skills with the hope of improving student learning. Generation Y set out to prove the reverse is much more effective - training students with technology and pedagogical skills will help improve teacher's teaching and therefore student learning.

Over the 6 years, the model was refined and improved based on evaluation studies and feedback from the teachers and students involved.

• The curriculum was written, revised, and expanded to the 236 page guide and CD-ROM that exists today.
• An extensive online tool set was created to support teachers and students as they worked through their projects.
• The model was tested and revised to accommodate different school settings, grade levels, and classroom profiles. This program has been run successfully in urban, suburban and rural settings, in elementary, middle, high school and vocational schools. All the experience and methods that were successful have been incorporated back into the model and materials.
• The support system was designed and modified successive times to provide the most support for students and teachers throughout the life of the project. The Gen Y program now includes a consultant who provides the student-teacher team with feedback and recommendations for their project. Having a subject and grade-level expert review EVERY project is now a part of the model that helps ensure rigor and success for every participant.
• Even with nationwide evaluations and studies, the schools that tested the model found out that they had to prove it to themselves - their local administrators, school boards, and districts. We designed a survey and report summary process that generates reports and summaries that schools can use to justify the "unusual" model of Generation Y.

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