Education 2006 Conference and Exhibition
Education 2006 – Education & Skills for the Future, held at the Birmingham International Conference Centre on 29th September 2006, gave a valuable insight into how education has and will be changing in order to enable future generations to compete in an increasingly technological world.
The conference, which was organised by McMillan-Scott, provided delegates with the opportunity to network with leading lights within the sector as well as the chance to learn about the latest developments in the industry through attending seminars, speeches and an exhibition. The event was chaired by Simon Moores, a technology columnist and broadcaster, whose introduction raised important points about the purpose of education in modern society. Moores explained how he could see a new “digital tension” in the UK. He also posed a challenge to all those involved in the education sector saying that it was their “role to transform society and to make it more competitive.”
A programme aiming to enable teachers and headteachers to do this, by using ICT to enhance learning in schools, is SLICT and Martin Blows, a Consultant, talked about the developments being made in the area, including the pilot of a new Primary Subject Leader SLICT. Martin stressed the need for well thought out ICT learning.
Another scheme aiming to push the effective use of ICT in schools - the self review process, was described by Richard Hammond from Becta. This scheme intends to measure a school’s progress and resources in ICT with the school gaining an ICT mark at the end of it.
The need for such developments in education was stressed throughout the day and Richard Green, Chief Executive, The Design and Technology Association, talked about the “scary world we are moving into”. This world will continue to keep moving but Richard was optimistic about education’s role, stating that the UK was regarded as a world leader in Design and Technology.
As new programmes push education forward, a new examination system is clearly needed. Jerry Jarvis, Managing Director of Edexcel, told delegates about a scheme to put exam results online for pupils in 2007. This aims to make the exam system more transparent. Bob Penrose, Principal Manager for New Technology, AQA, also described developments set to take place which would allow scripts to be marked online with sections being segmented for different markers.
Although such a move may seem radical for many parents, students who regularly use technology for a range of social and informative activities are sure to embrace such advances. Schools around the UK are using technology as a way of teaching pupils to communicate and present their work. Cathy Morgan, HMI, Specialist Subject Advisor for ICT, told delegates about one school in Aston that was effectively using podcasts to improve pupils’ literacy.
Despite supporting such advances in pupils’ ICT literacy, a common worry was the abuse of and inappropriate use of the internet. Peter Hodgson, Founder and CEO of Telocator Limited, asked the key question of “whose responsibility” it was to monitor responsible usage both at school and at home.
Ray Barker, Director of BESA also contrasted IT use in the home with that at school whilst he posed the question of what a “learning environment” was. He commented that whilst schools were once “an oasis and homes a desert” in relation to learning, it was now the opposite with children doing great technological things at home.
A new suite of qualifications aimed at this generation has just finished its pilot and is set to be officially launched in September called DiDA. Carol Griffiths, Enterprise Manager ICT DiDA, spoke about the all electronic qualifications which can be taken at different levels from year 9 whilst Gavin Byford, a Curriculum Leader of ICT who took part in the DiDA pilot spoke about why he chose to be involved and his pupils’ experiences of enjoying the more practical approaches to ICT. Steve Burnard from Adobe also spoke about Adobe’s involvement and why the course would enable students to work in industry afterwards.
The final speech of the day came from Peter O’Hagan, Director, Serco Learning Solutions and Tim Riley, Link2ICT, about the Schools Interoperability Framework (SIF), a scheme to help manage data so that it can be entered once and used many times for several agents from a central pupil database. This will help schemes like Every Child Matters and save valuable inputting time.
The conference raised many questions about education today but also came up with many solutions on how to equip a new generation of learners with different needs. Simon Moores concluded by telling delegates that education needed to be “tactical and practical at the same time” and that “the burden lies on the shoulders of educators”.