This is part 4 of the series in eJewishPhilanthropy, Continuing Conversations on Leveraging Educational Technology to Advance Jewish Learning. The series is a project of Jewish Funders Network, the Jim Joseph Foundation, and the William Davidson Foundation. For an in-depth look at opportunities in Jewish Ed Tech and digital engagement, read Smart Money: Recommendations for an Educational Technology and Digital Engagement Investment Strategy. Later this year, Jewish Funders Network will launch a new website to help advance the field of Jewish educational technology.

There are many professions that require practitioners to participate in ongoing professional development, and rightfully so. After all, for example, we would not want a patient to be treated by an oncologist using 15 year old technologies. Similarly, we should expect our teachers to approach their students with the latest knowledge of learning theories, best practices, and relevant technologies. Yet, professional development is often under-funded and uninspired in our schools.

This reality begs the question: Why is professional development not sufficiently valued in many segments of the world of education? We can surmise that the people responsible for teacher development are often disappointed by the results of these efforts. It is not uncommon for teachers returning from a PD workshop to maintain their previous methods of instruction, even while feigning to adopt new technologies. Principals, supervisors, school board members, and even teachers often fail to see the clear connection between professional development and student achievement.

“Don’t let the tail wag the dog, select and integrate tech tools that solve your most important problems.” – Matt Heinz, President of Heinz Marketing
“calculator” (CC BY 2.0) by ansik

What is needed is sustained and intensive professional development that takes place in the service of a core vision, not simply around technology for its own sake.

Is there a connection between the professional development of teachers and student achievement? Guskey and Yoon address this question in an excellent article entitled “What Works in Professional Development” (Phi Delta Kappan, March 2009) that presents a meta-analysis on research studies relating to the effectiveness of professional development for teachers. They found that the factors shared in effective PD were:

~Common Characteristics that Promote Student Achievement – All studies showed that a positive relationship between professional development and student learning occurred in workshops or summer institutes that:

1. focused on research-based instructional practice,
2. involved active learning experiences for participants, and
3. provided teachers with opportunities to adapt the practices to their unique classroom situations.

~Potential Involvement of Outside Experts – “Professional development that bring improvements in student learning can be gained through the involvement of outside experts. While school based programs focused on training teacher technology integrators within the school might also have value, the research would suggest that consultation with outside experts would also aid in such efforts.”

~Structured and Sustained Time Commitments with Follow–up – Virtually all of the studies showed that programs leading to positive improvements in student learning included significant time commitments with considerable amounts of structured and sustained follow-up after the main professional development activity.

~Adaptation to a Specific Context – The most effective professional development came not from direct implementation of a particular set of best practices, but from the adaptation of varied practices to specific content, process, and context elements.

The authors pointed out that “no improvement effort has ever succeeded in the absence of thoughtfully planned and well implemented professional development.”

“Teach like Google exists.” – Alice Keeler
Source: https://pixabay.com/p-485611/

The importance of professional development is currently more relevant than ever in the education world. Student learning has transformed with the development and accessibility of the internet. It can also be greatly enriched through the proper use of online tools. Already in 2010, the U. S. Department of Education concluded: “As online learning becomes an increasingly important part of our educational system, it creates both the need for educators who are skilled in online instruction and the demand for greater knowledge of the most effective practices.”

How can we ensure that PD in EdTech is achieving its goals?

I discovered some highlights in Nik Peachey’s “12 Tips for Training Older Teachers to Use Technology.” Three of my favorites were that PD in EdTech has to:

• Solve Classroom Problems
• Do things that can’t be done any other way
• Make their lives easier; provide step by step guides.

In my experience in presenting JETS workshops, I have discovered three types of participants:

1. Good to go: Early Implementers:

After I demonstrate a tool, this group is already implementing, creating samples, asking questions that apply to their learning environment and focusing on specific and predicted challenges to implementation. There is no doubt they will successfully implement this tool with minimal feedback, and they will troubleshoot on their own or seek support quickly. It is not uncommon for me to hear from principals after a PD session with their teachers informing me (often with a sense of astonishment) that some of their teachers have already begun to implement the tools and methods that they learned in their classroom instruction. For example: “The evening training was very useful. We already have several teachers using lino boards in the classroom!”

2. Hold My Hand: Medium Implementers:

These participants carefully consider the pros and cons of the tools, and need to weigh in with the facilitator in both the theory and its practical implementation. If both the dialogue and the experimentation process are met with positive results, there is a high chance of successful implementation. These teachers will be more likely to implement if there is someone who seeks them out and assists them to ensure successful application. It is always gratifying to see when this type of learner puts the pieces together: “I’m finally seeing ways to honor the text and use technology at the same time.”

3. Not a Chance: Late to Never Implementers:

Resistance is the key word for these educators. Due to a variety of factors (age, fear, habit, prefer to work alone), these participants will spend the majority of the workshop discussing the challenges. A small percentage, with lots of hand holding, will dare to create in a group setting, but there are very small chances that their students will ever hold an iPad or device to use the tool. However, some are eventually willing to try and succeed. One such participant gave me the following advice: “Scaffolding a bit more for “dinosaur” learners like myself.” This person has become a strong advocate for the use of EdTech in her school.

How to turn Category 3 into Category 2, and Category 2 into Category 1 implementers?

I’ve explored a variety of options, and the more you use, the more successful you will be. Consider some of these:

Administrators need to have a plan. What are the EdTech goals this year and how will they be implemented? What are the reasons for promoting these particular tools?
Which measures will be taken to ensure that all teachers are on board? How clear are teachers about the school’s goals? How can teachers add to that conversation?

The school administration needs to provide a lot of support.

How can teachers feel supported?

This can be done by arranging for someone to turn to for troubleshooting and experimentation; either a teacher peer with EdTech experience or by setting meetings with an EdTech director at the school.

Schools should also engage in frequent discussion about the efficacies, as well as the ins and outs of tool usage through school communication, staff meetings, peer mentoring, online communication and the like.

Systems should be put in place to promote feedback among peers and the administration about tool implementation. Schools should consider who is monitoring the implementation, set standards of usage and follow-up, and analyze how teachers are progressing towards those goals.

Care should be taken to validate teachers’ efficacy as educators. Category 3 teachers can and should be excellent teachers; promote their skills as pedagogues and promote how EdTech can enhance that pedagogical approach even further.

“w7 – Picasso goals” (CC BY 2.0) by Sweet Dreamz Design

During professional development days, EdTech experimentation should be explored. Schools can also encourage trial and error and provide peer and administrative support in and out of the school setting. However, PD sessions should be catered to the needs of Category 1, 2, and 3 teachers, and resist whole group sessions that combines all the teachers together. These teachers’ needs and attitudes are very different and PD times should address them at their own level, in their own groups. As a Category 1 educator once mentioned regarding her PD time at her school, “I was in the same room as a colleague who didn’t know how to turn on her iPad.”

The focus of PD time and peer mentoring should be on the practicality of the use of current pedagogies, online tools and methodologies that creatively maximize student engagement, foster social and collaborative learning, and assist educators to adapt tools to their particular needs.

In line with Guskey and Yoon’s findings, I have found that continued support is a very important ingredient in effective EdTech training programs. In particular, in my experience, our professional whatsapp group, our online EdTech Support Center, supplemental webinars, personalized consultation and teacher mentoring (online or face to face) have been invaluable for teachers to go from theory to practice, and from technophobes to implementers.

Discovering and Reaching New Horizons

If PD in EdTech is going to be taken seriously, then serious approaches need to be offered to teachers. Teachers need to feel the need for it, be given the space and time to try it, and have sufficient support to feel successful and empowered.

Source: Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21206694

The good thing about changing PD in EdTech is that once support measures are implemented, it will work like balloons in the movie ‘Up!’ – each empowered teacher will add their string to the shifting realm of education until both students and educators are flying toward previously unseen horizons.

Smadar Goldstein, the founder of JETS, has presented PD workshops on integrating educational technology and related methodologies in Jewish studies instruction to more than 900 educators in nine countries. [email protected].

“Continuing Conversations on Leveraging Educational Technology to Advance Jewish Learning” is a project of Jewish Funders Network, the Jim Joseph Foundation, and the William Davidson Foundation, and is cross-posted in eJewishPhilanthropy. For an in-depth look at opportunities in Jewish Ed Tech and digital engagement, read Smart Money: Recommendations for an Educational Technology and Digital Engagement Investment Strategy. Later this year, Jewish Funders Network will launch a new website to help advance the field of Jewish educational technology.

Read all the blogs in the series below:

Ubiquity, Access, & Availability: How EdTech Can Transform Schools, Homes, & Anywhere In Between, Michael Cohen, The Tech Rabbi

Jewish EdTech: If You Build It, Will They Come?, Jarred Myers and Nicky Newfield

Augmented Reality in Jewish Day Schools, Rabbi Moshe Rosenberg

Building Jewish Identity Through Engaging Video: A Developer’s Perspective, Sarah Lefton

Open is a Winning Strategy for Technology Investment, Brett Lockspeiser

Questions for Funders – Nurturing an Ecosystem to Embrace Technological Advances for Jewish Education, Jarred Myers and Nicky Newfield

Scale-Up Nation, Jarred Myers and Nicky Newfield

EdTech Training: Up, Up and Away, Smadar Goldstein with Stan Peerless

Digital Promise: Learning Jewish, Online, Chana German

A History of the “Future of Jewish Education,” Russel Neiss

Procuring the Proper Software, Hardware and Teacher Training for Successful Educational Technology Integration – A Funder’s Perspective, Amy Amiel

Making the most of technology in Jewish education, Lewis J. Bernstein and Shira Ackerman (originally in JTA)

Introducing “Smart Money: Recommendations for an Educational Technology and Digital Engagement Investment Strategy,” Kari Alterman and Josh Miller

This is part 3 of the series in eJewishPhilanthropy, Continuing Conversations on Leveraging Educational Technology to Advance Jewish Learning. The series is a project of Jewish Funders Network, the Jim Joseph Foundation, and the William Davidson Foundation. For an in-depth look at opportunities in Jewish Ed Tech and digital engagement, read Smart Money: Recommendations for an Educational Technology and Digital Engagement Investment Strategy. Later this year, Jewish Funders Network will launch a new website to help advance the field of Jewish educational technology.

A century ago, when my bubbe sat in her fifth grade classroom in a Chicago public school, with 30+ classmates sitting row after row, listening to her teacher lecture, it would have been hard, probably impossible, for her to envision learning today. Learning now, as we all know, is everywhere. On a Wikipedia page, a YouTube TED talk, and your Twitter feed. The combination of your digital device and your experience powers up your learning, wherever you are. Curious about something? Look it up. Want to measure something? Go for it. Need to verify something? Check it out. Document something for the world? We’re waiting.

Within this context, it is easy to understand how more than 2.5 million students from public and private schools enroll in online classes annually. Among them are several thousand Jewish students who take Jewish studies courses online. Online learning, both formal courses and more informal learning “experiences,” has the potential to disrupt the Jewish educational framework as we know it.

There are several reasons why online learning turns traditional Jewish education on its head: its accessibility means that Jewish learning is not limited to classrooms, camps, or big cities; its pedagogy means that learning is personalized with multiple pathways and there is no “settling”; its digital nature means that it is familiar and always current; its price tag means it is affordable for families and communities; and its place in the Web makes Jewish connections – across city, state, and country lines – not only possible but probable.

Online learning can take on many forms: formal (courses) or informal (experiences), fully online (with an online facilitator), or blended (with a face-to-face element). It can have asynchronous (non-live) elements and synchronous (live) elements, be self-paced or calendar-paced, designed for individuals or groups, and integrate social media, multimedia, and games, or not. The creation of meaningful and effective online learning environments begins with understanding the centrality of the learner. To be engaging, online learning needs to activate learners from the outset, so that they are creating, thinking, sharing, and working with their peers, driving the experience. If they are passive consumers, there is no in-depth learning happening. Ideally, they are online and offline, completing authentic tasks, reflecting on their learning, producing prototypes and artifacts in constant dialogue with peers and their facilitator.

When we create courses at Lookstein Virtual Jewish Academy, our first critical ingredient is intentional design. Form should always follow function. Is content learning the number one priority, or are social connections and community? The two need not to be mutually exclusive, but answering this question helps determine the structure. For instance, for a formal course, there will be assessments of some kind, whereas a course designed to be a social experience, will focus on collaborative activities. It will also point to the right balance between asynchronous and synchronous elements. Asynchronous learning is excellent for relaying information, encouraging learner reflection, and supporting a range of voices. But is academic achievement our only objective? There are always those “aha” moments in education, but just as important is the magic of children together, talking, doing, learning, and having fun. The opportunity for Jewish students to meet and work with other Jewish students from other cities and states cannot be understated.

Then specific learning objectives are delineated. Do we want participants to know how to light Shabbat candles? Study a chapter in a Biblical text? Break some kind of Jewish record (the largest virtual challah bake-off, perhaps?) Whatever the objective, we curate or create the supports and materials that they need to achieve their goals. If they need to meet Hillel, the Talmudic sage, we make sure that will happen (via avator) or, if they are in need of a trip to Tel Aviv to understand how modern Israel came into being, we produce the video. Perhaps they need to dig into their family history and interview their great-aunt about her experiences in the 1940s but need a hand crafting the questions, or want to speak to a peer about her family’s traditions on Rosh Hashana, but are in need of a module on active listening.

Avatar of Hillel from Online Jewish Studies Course

The other critical ingredient is facilitation, no mean feat. While excellent classroom teachers or informal educators may become excellent online facilitators, online learning depends on an additional (and sometimes) different skill set. Many classroom teachers are used to being the source of knowledge for their students. Facilitation, especially in an online medium, implies something different. Because the content is already constructed, the facilitator has time for what really matters: working with individuals and groups to collaborate, bringing out the wisdom of the group, asking (and modeling) thoughtful questions, guiding them towards discovery. Doing this in a face-to-face environment is challenging enough. All online facilitators should go through rigorous training, and if possible, work with a mentor until they incorporate best practices.

Once trained, a warm and energetic facilitator is vital, but so is a significant time commitment. In an online learning environment, participants are online when it works for them – early mornings, late afternoons, or perhaps the middle of the night, but early enthusiasm will wane if the participant feels unnoticed and ignored. The facilitator needs to foster a welcoming and inclusive culture, inviting participants first to participate, and then to lead the experience. This translates into dozens of IMs, emails, videos, and meetings via web conference. As participants begin to lead their own conversations and activities, the facilitator pulls back, always ready to encourage, correct, or probe students, if needed.

Because of the vast amount of data we can cull in online learning platforms, and the quantity of feedback from participants who are eager to share, it is relatively easy to determine what works and what does not. We know, for instance, that studies in K-12 education indicate that there is “no significant difference” between online and face-to-face education in terms of student outcomes (for further research look here, here, and here). That is, students learn effectively in both environments. In Jewish schools too, principals and students echo that the environment does not matter, as long as students are given the instructional and technological support needed to thrive. We also know that participants are enthusiastic about directing their Jewish learning, wherever it leads. They love meeting and collaborating virtually with other Jewish teenagers outside their locale, and reflecting about Jewish ideas, texts, and practice. But even with what we know, we can barely imagine what can be. The possibilities are endless. All we need to do is experiment. My bubbe – yours too – would expect no less.

Chana German ([email protected]) is founder and director of Lookstein Virtual Jewish Academy, a project of The Lookstein Center, Bar-Ilan University. Lookstein Virtual is an award-winning online school of Jewish Studies, which enrolls more than 500 teenagers from Jewish and public schools every year.

Four years ago, Effective Strategies for Educating and Engaging Jewish Teens was released, a report that brought to the fore promising models and practical ways for communities to engage teens in Jewish experiences that enrich their lives and help them grow. On the heels of the report, national and local funders representing ten communities took action, coming together to study the findings, commission additional groundbreaking reports, and to design responsive local teen engagement initiatives. Ultimately, the group evolved into a robust community: the Jewish Teen Education and Engagement Funder Collaborative.

The Funder Collaborative is an innovative philanthropic experiment – a network of funders working together to develop, fund, support and grow new teen initiatives that draw on the collective strength of local organizations. Co-funded by the Jim Joseph Foundation, the community-based initiatives are multi-faceted approaches designed to reverse the trend of teens opting out of Jewish life in their high school years. Members have become valuable peer resources, each of whom are at different points in their initiative process.

Concurrent to the community-based education and engagement initiatives, the Funder Collaborative embarked on a process of enhanced research into teen Jewish engagement, learning and education. Outcomes for experiential and immersive Jewish education, as well as other research, informs our view of programming toward the whole teen. With a commitment to openness and transparency, the Funder Collaborative shares its hard-won lessons with others to increase knowledge and tools which may advance the entire field of Jewish teen education and engagement.

Today marks the launch of a new website designed to become a vital resource for anyone seeking to benefit from these lessons, models and research: teenfundercollaborative.com. Here we will share highlights of the work in each of our communities, as well as the deep research and rigorous evaluation that helps shape our efforts. We will also house detailed model documentation on specific initiatives exploring the structures, partnerships, risks, and more that have led to successes and “fail forward” moments for learning.

Learnings from the Funder Collaborative

While we are excited to share these resources, we also recognize we don’t hold all the answers to the challenging and complex issues surrounding meaningful Jewish teen engagement. Yet together – as we learn from and build on the knowledge of those who been active in this space before us – we are charting a positive course forward, helping to amplify and expand upon the important work of others.

We hope, too, to make some new discoveries which contribute to the field. Already we are poised to share the early results of interventions and other evidence-based understandings of:

• the urgent need to address the whole teen, recognizing that teens often do not delineate between one’s Jewish and “secular” identity;
• the paradigm of relationship-based engagement that places the teen at the center where we contribute and respond to them, not vice versa;
• the critical role of developing the talented professionals and adult volunteers who engage teens and who advocate for supporting teens’ increased involvement in Jewish life and learning;
• local communities’ role in weaving and publicizing a tapestry of meaningful opportunities for teens;
• and the desire of teens to feel empowered to create experiences for themselves for their peers, and to grow through leadership and skill development.

Two new publications from Rosov Consulting also released today highlight key learnings and encouraging results from this new form of collaboration.

1.) INITIAL OUTCOMES ACROSS COMMUNITIES: First Fruits from the Jewish Teen Education and Engagement Funder Collaborative

The Funder Collaborative invests heavily in evaluation: each local initiative engages independent consultants and, importantly, a Cross-Community Evaluation enables us to analyze outcomes across communities and identify the most promising practices. The insights we glean can have wide-ranging implications for any community engaged in this work.

The CCE presents an honest and rich picture of early learnings of four of the initiatives, as well as the challenges of attempting to evaluate varied approaches, programs, partnerships and staffing structures. Results show we are beginning to “move the needle” in important ways.

Many communities attribute early programmatic successes to their participation in the collaborative and its steadfast commitment to knowledge-sharing. The evolution of the collaborative itself is central to creating an environment that fosters risk-taking, experimentation and ongoing reflection.

2) PREPARING TO DEEPEN ACTION: A Funder Collaborative Finds Its Way is the second installment in a series of case studies documenting the collaborative (the first released in 2015) and the result of 15 months of observations and interviews. It offers an informative and pragmatic examination for any organization considering the merits and challenges of such large-scale collaboration.

“Being part of something bigger than our community, to have the national support, intelligence and research and show that we are trying to change the conversation has helped me to justify and validate what we are doing.” – Local Funder

The Collaborative has evolved into a healthy mix of local and national funders and implementers who continue to come together to discuss, dissect and address shared areas of interest. In fact, this model of creating space for a Community of Practice across communities is echoed within many of the local initiatives, which themselves seed and nurture a thriving ecosystem of educators and youth-serving professionals to strengthen and sustain their models.

The Future of the Funder Collaborative

Now, around the country teens are benefiting from new and diverse models of meaningful learning and engagement that address the ‘whole teen’; communities employ better prepared and more well-trained and connected youth professionals; and there is a rising sense that teens themselves hold a special place on our communal agenda.

We invite you to be a part of this growth; to explore what we share; and to question, learn and experiment with us. Please be in touch ([email protected]) with your thoughts and feedback, and visit teenfundercollaborative.com to sign up for our quarterly newsletter.

Sara Allen is Director of the Jewish Teen Education and Engagement Funder Collaborative.

This blog appeared originally in eJewishPhilanthropy.com.

You’ve seen the advertisements: A fit young woman pedals a stationary bicycle while an instructor on a video screen shouts encouragement. The company, Peloton, promises “fitness at your fingertips,” and both “live and on demand” spin classes and “world class instructors,” all from the comfort of your own home.

What does a stationary bike company have to do with Jewish education?

We believe that Judaism, a 4,000-year-old endeavor, has something important and timeless to say about building character and values; about dignity, persistence and survival skills; about humor, art and joy — all necessary attributes to build that better future. And we believe that media and technology have a place in this process to engage, model and teach.

An Israeli working with campers at the Union for Reform Judaism’s 6 Points Sci-Tech Academy in New Jersey. (URJ 6 Points Sci-Tech Academy)

What if Jewish funders and educators were to adapt the Peloton model to Jewish learning, offering long-distance classes as well as opportunities for in-person connections and interactions? Such a combined model could provide opportunities for learning and community building, for families with young children or college-age students, building on already existing physical institutions such as JCCs.

The Peloton model is only one of dozens we explore in a new report, Smart Money: Recommendations for an Educational Technology and Digital Engagement Investment Strategy. Together with several colleagues, all who work in the world of secular education and entertainment media, we advised the Jim Joseph and William Davidson foundations on the potential of ed tech and digital engagement to help the foundations’ missions to create meaningful Jewish learning experiences — for people on the margins of Jewish life and those deeply immersed — and vibrant Jewish communities.

The report provides a detailed roadmap for Jewish funders as they consider investing in this area and look to leverage new technology and media in Jewish learning. Here are some key points:

 Define your mission, a vision of what you want to accomplish.

• Jewish educators and researchers tell us that American Jews have decreasing connections to other Jews, Jewish communities, institutions and Jewish life. Technology provides a means to reach all Jews with Jewish wisdom related to values and character, and “life lessons” on topics such as patience, showing kindness to others and managing emotions. Jewish community building and social interaction are essential, technology cannot replace them — but it can be used to enhance them.
• Balance the need to engage Jews who are uninterested and uninvolved in Jewish life — providing them with authentic learning experiences — with deep educational experiences for those already interested and invested in Jewish learning.

Media is not an end. It is a means, a tool that can reflect reality, but with imagination, can also shape a new reality.

• Nurture young and established talent to experiment fearlessly.
• Insist on quality and dream big.
• Infuse a spirit of innovation into all efforts.
• Be willing to fail and learn from failures.
• Engage and educate through joy, humor and fun.
• Perform research that is formative, iterative and summative.

You can’t teach if you can’t reach. Be market knowledgeable and sensitive.

Create a solid distribution plan: all successful impact is dependent on reach and scale. In fact, it is as important as the quality of the content created.

With these guiding principles, we hope creative minds and funders will consider developing these types of Jewish ed tech opportunities:

A blended Jewish lifelong learning academy

The Khan Academy is an educational organization that produces short video lectures, practice exercises and tools for educators in math, science and the humanities. Envision a Khan Academy-like resource with personalized instruction on Jewish education topics taught through video, and supplemented by virtual and in-person mentoring and community meetings.

Narrative stories to engage audiences and link them to an eco-system of learning and community

Just as masterful storytellers have adapted Shakespearean classics for the stage, film and television, so should Jewish educators and ed tech producers adapt Jewish stories, whether biblical, historical or contemporary, for digital media distribution.

Innovative Israel education and partnerships

Advisers stress an urgent need to address the changing views toward Israel and Zionism. They explain that though it is difficult, ignoring these ideas will be detrimental and lead to a decline in especially young people’s positive feelings for Israel and, by extension, Judaism.

Create partnerships with Israeli tech and media companies, schools and universities for mentorship, exchange programs, virtual courses, joint storytelling and productions, and more.

A “J-Game Lab” that focuses on integrating curricular content into a game format

Experiment with virtual and augmented realities (VR and AR) to teach Jewish history, values and conflict resolution to give a sense of presence and empathy. VR and AR can be used for virtual visits to Israel, important Jewish sites and landmarks, or for virtual interactions with events in Jewish history. They can also be used to build empathy and an understanding of others through virtually walking in someone else’s shoes.

These could serve as stand-alone experiences or supplement others as introductions to or follow-ups for programs such as Birthright Israel, camp or Poland trips.

Empower and appeal to young people’s comfort with creating and using technology

Encourage young Jewish talent by building a pipeline for Jewish college students and graduates to professionally explore new technologies in a variety of ways — for example, by creating a Jewish Imagination Fellows Corps.

Launch community building projects around Jewish and general social activism

Create a Jewish Community Virtual Boomer Corps where retirees virtually mentor younger people and the younger people mentor the boomers, helping to improve their use of technology.

Invest in educator training

Support Jewish learning through training educators, specifically teachers who work in schools. If educators are not well trained, confident and competent in their use of a technology, the technology will not be used.

We are living in a complex world filled with information, accessibility and opportunities on the one hand, and with uncertainty, intolerance, fear and upheaval on the other. The need to empower children and adults to build a better future could not be more dramatic and urgent.

Our vision for this report is to stimulate funding to harness ed tech to transform Jewish learning and engage all Jews, whatever their beliefs and practice, with knowledge about Jewish values, legacy and teachings. How else will we transform this world for the better for our children and grandchildren?

(Dr. Lewis Bernstein had a 40-year career at Sesame Workshop, with roles ranging from executive vice president of the Education, Research and Outreach Division, to serving as the Emmy Award-winning executive producer of the domestic “Sesame Street” series. Shira Ackerman has worked in education, educational technology and media for over 15 years as a teacher, a director of educational technology at a Jewish day school, and at Gonoodle, Scholastic, Amplify and Barnesandnoble.com. They both served as researchers for Smart Money: Recommendations for an Educational Technology and Digital Engagement Investment Strategy.)

originally appeared in JTA