,
11 tweets,
2 min read
Read on Twitter
This Times article "Silicon Valley Courts Brand-Name Teachers, Raising Ethics Issues" makes me want to vomit nyti.ms/2x02IyB THREAD
I'm a former NYC public schools educator. Yes, teachers are grossly underpaid, lack material resources & deserve far greater social status.
But is becoming a "brand-name" teacher a sustainable, ethical, or effective means of addressing systemic inequity in American education? No.
What's motivation to hype the edtech tools & companies as magical panacea that will transform educator practice & student learning? Profits.
Have these "brand-name" teachers questioned how edtech discourses re accessibility, personalization, disruption might exacerbate inequality?
Here are just a few of the many troubling aspects of this article that presume edtech is neutral (if not savior), who uses edtech, and how.
Nearly all of the students & both teachers featured in the article are white. The schools & districts are affluent. This is very problematic
No discussion re who is celebrated as brand-name teacher, how the ethically dubious title is differentially available & viable for just some
Article barely mentions learning, not about pedagogy or encouraging inquiry. This is about edtech as driver for privatization of public edu.
Where's concern for student privacy, data protection, & how edtech is means of student surveillance? Ethical complications are more nuanced.
If this is future of K12 educator agency & the idealized vision for learning tech in public school, then I want nothing to do with it. Fin.
