Feds promote online learning

National Education Technology Plan

Increasing the use of educational technology could bring about a golden age in American education, according to an Education Department report released today.

The report recommends that states, districts and schools give every student access to online learning and, if necessary, reallocate funds so that more money is available for educational technology.

It suggests that administrators consider a systematic restructuring of budgets to pay for educational technology, including high-quality digital content and adequate technical support for maintaining computer networks.

Billed as a national education technology plan, the report recommends that educators consider ways to provide broadband Internet access to every student computer, develop technology-based methods for assessing individual student performance and use those assessments to tailor instruction to each child.

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 called for a national education technology plan, and the agency's report, "Toward a New Golden Age in American Education: How the Internet, the Law and Today's Students are Revolutionizing Expectations," provides the broad outlines of that plan.