Back in January, I offered a post concerning the Department of Ed’s attempt to improve the quality of research focused on classroom software. On a lark, I emailed one of the researchers and received assurance that the report (based on research conducted in 2005) would be available in 6 weeks. OK – Jan, Feb. Mar, Apr – and counting.
Today I receive my copy of eSchool news and note that an eSN “exclusive” has now targeted the same issue. Among the many disappointing comments in the eSN article is the revelation that findings will not be broken out by software program but reported as an aggregate. I thought the idea of determining which of the targeted programs worked and which did not was the purpose of this $10 mill mandated study. So, we won’t end up finding out which programs are effective (I guess this removes the concern that EETT money if it is still available will have to be spent on effective software). I also wonder whether the software used in 2004-2005 continues to exist in the format that was evaluated.
