Breaching the Digital Divide

In response to Morse’s article, “Ensuring Equality of Educational Opportunity in the Digital Age,” I would just like to say a few things:

First, I believe that the so-called 'digital divide' is becoming an increasingly important issue of equity between students in this progressively more technological age. This disparity in access to computers and Internet by various social groups manifests itself in disparities between educational achievement and professional achievement in the greater world. Studies have proven the correlation between higher education, higher-paying jobs and the use of computers at work. That is why the school system must do its part to ensure equal access to current computer technologies, the skills to use them, as well as the appropriate uses for which they can be employed. I believe this is a legal mandate if we are to live up to the ruling issued so long ago in Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, (1954.)

Next, I believe that right now teachers are in a unique position to potentiallly provide more equity in access to computer technologies. Teachers may serve a gate-keeping function to the use of computer technologies in their classrooms, and thus it is up to them to demonstrate appropriate, effective, and equitable uses of technology during instruction. I found it interesting that Morse remarked on the servant/master roles that students may adopt towards computers; either allowing computers to be the controlling agent of passive students learning, or to use it as a tool which they control to actively engage in learning. Teachers should make every effort to use computers to empower their students, especially minorities and the disabled, and to develop higher-order thinking. I think Morse is right that their experiences with computers impact how students view their roles with respect to this technology, which can have long-lasting effects.

Technology is coming to fill many diverse and powerful roles in our society. Likewise, it should be used to address the diverse needs of students, and encourage their greatest potential.