Annual Celebration of Great Teaching and Effective Use of Technology to Include National Event from Washington, DC, and Hundreds of Local Events Around the Country
WASHINGTON, DC – School leaders and teachers from four innovative school districts will join thousands of teachers in Washington, DC, for the fourth annual Digital Learning Day on Friday, March 13, the Alliance for Excellent Education announced today. Concurrently, tens of thousands of teachers, librarians, and administrators in all fifty states and the District of Columbia will celebrate and showcase their best uses of technology for learning through hundreds of local events in their own schools and classrooms.
“Digital Learning Day is as much about great teaching as it is about technology,” said Bob Wise, president of the Alliance for Excellent Education, which created Digital Learning Day in 2012. “It’s about how technology can empower and support teachers, personalize learning for students, and ensure that all students have the great teaching—and great tools—they need to succeed in today’s hyper-connected world.”
The four districts selected—Baltimore County Public Schools, Houston Independent School District, Huntsville School District (AR), and Vista Unified School District (CA)—represent different sizes and types of districts, but each brings a compelling story of how a vision for improved student learning led to the effective use of technology and improved educational outcomes for traditionally underserved students.
“From small, rural districts like Huntsville to very large urban ones like Houston, these districts offer excellent examples of how digital learning is engaging students and empowering teachers across the nation,” said Wise. “The Alliance for Excellent Education created Digital Learning Day to highlight what is working in schools and encourage greater adoption of high-quality digital learning to ensure that all youth have access to those opportunities regardless of where they live.”
For the first time, the Alliance will hold Digital Learning Day in conjunction with the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards’s “Teaching & Learning” conference. As part of the partnership, the Alliance will host Digital Learning Day Live!, a one-hour live broadcast from the Teaching & Learning conference in Washington, DC, to an in-person audience of more than 3,000 teachers and administrators from all fifty states and the District of Columbia who attend the conference, as well as hundreds of thousands of educators who will be watching online. Digital Learning Day Live! will feature national leaders in education technology, as well as representatives from the four innovative school districts selected.
“Like Digital Learning Day, the Teaching & Learning conference is about highlighting effective educators and others involved in pre-K through twelfth-grade education and spreading effective teaching practices to those on the front lines of education reform, making it a natural fit,” said Ronald Thorpe, president and chief executive officer of the National Board.
Educators nationwide are welcome to celebrate and participate in Digital Learning Day and can learn more about how to get involved at www.DigitalLearningDay.org. The website includes toolkits and sample digital lessons for teachers, video profiles of digital learning in action, and other activities and ideas on how to participate.
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The Alliance for Excellent Education is a Washington, DC–based national policy and advocacy organization dedicated to ensuring all students, particularly those traditionally underserved, graduate from high school ready for success in college, work, and citizenship. www.all4ed.org
