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Microsoft kicked off the expanded Innovative Schools program in
The Innovative Schools program will apply and refine lessons learned from the two-year, 12-school Innovative Schools Pilot Program launched last year by Microsoft to study efforts to use technology to help drive change across diverse educational settings. The pilot study spans urban, suburban and rural schools -- economically challenged and wealthy alike -- ranging in size from 70 to 1,500 students across 12 nations. Microsoft announced the release today of a report and two white papers detailing the latest findings from the pilot project and outlining essential action steps schools can take to ensure that students receive the education they need to succeed in the 21st-century knowledge economy.
Today's announcements build on Microsoft's long-standing track record, as part of the Partners in Learning program, of working closely with international educational leaders to advance information and communication technology (ICT)-enabled school change that supports the emerging needs of 21st-century learning.
"Our three-year partnership with Microsoft provided us with new
opportunities to have a positive impact on schools in the U.K. and abroad,"
said
The Innovative Schools program is a key component of the Partners in Learning program. With this investment, Microsoft is making a long-term commitment to working with governments, education officials, development organizations, teachers, students and parents globally to increase schools' access to technology and improve its use in the classroom to empower teachers, enrich instruction and enhance learning outcomes for students. Partners in Learning is an integral part of the Microsoft Unlimited Potential program, the company's commitment to bringing the benefits of technology to people around the world.
Since its inception in 2003, Partners in Learning has positively impacted
the lives of more than 121 million students and more than 5.5 million
educators, and these numbers continue to grow. In
"With Partners in Learning, we're taking a realistic approach to education
transformation that encompasses all of the key stakeholders and moves beyond
abstract theory by putting innovative ideas into practice," said
Also today, Microsoft announced a partnership between the Microsoft
Schools Technology Center Brussels and the Lumiar Institute, a groundbreaking
educational nonprofit started by Brazilian industrialist and best-selling
management thinker
"We're delighted to be joining forces with Microsoft on this important pioneering initiative," said Semler, president of Semco SA and author of the international business bestsellers "Maverick" and "The Seven-Day Weekend." "Aligning education with the needs of the emerging global knowledge economy is one of the most pressing challenges facing the world today. Microsoft brings invaluable vision, expertise, passion and entrepreneurial flair to the table in helping advance this objective."
The Innovative Schools program will bring participating schools together through a global digital forum, enabling them to discuss innovation models, disseminate best practices, exchange smart ideas with their peers worldwide, support one other and access professional development resources. The digital network will be part of the next version of Microsoft's Innovative Teachers Network, which today connects more than 1.6 million teachers worldwide. It will be supplemented by a roster of global symposia and workshops that will spotlight individual school initiatives and tackle specific reform issues affecting individual schools.
In addition to the expansion of the program to 72,000 schools, Microsoft will select a group of 345 "developer schools" to work closely with the company, which includes 45 "mentor schools" that will help guide clusters of other innovative schools in their regions.
The Innovative Schools program seeks to foster improved global understanding of how schools can help students acquire the skills required for success in the global knowledge economy. To this end, Microsoft works with schools to examine how they can marshal technology to meet the educational imperatives of the 21st century and how technological innovation can underpin a comprehensive "whole school" approach to reform, spanning instruction, assessment, curricula, teacher training, school leadership and learning-space design.
"Participating schools benefit from Microsoft's long-term commitment to education and exposure to insights captured from thousands of learning environments worldwide," Young said. "It's tremendous to see the bold, fresh thinking by local schools and, in turn, offer them the help and support of Microsoft and our partner network to design and deploy great technology that creates opportunities for their students, educators and communities."
By design, the 12 schools taking part in the Innovative Schools Pilot Program constitute a representative cross-section of the diversity found in schools worldwide, which helps identify the universal challenges schools face plus those specific to particular countries. The ultimate goal is to generate viable, benchmarked and proven learning models for 21st-century education that can be cost-effectively replicated across entire school systems and easily adapted to local conditions, to underpin wide-scale education transformation.
The report being issued today will distill key insights gleaned from the first year of the Innovative Schools Pilot Program, including the following:
-- The importance of strong school leadership and a collaborative professional teacher community as part of a common commitment to goal-setting and innovation
-- The value of technology in support of innovative teaching practices, which involve students in higher-level thinking and regulating of their own learning
The separate white papers walk schools through the 6i process, a road map for envisioning, implementing and managing ICT-driven change, and the School Innovation Framework, which gives school leaders a guide to effecting educational change based on proven approaches, respectively.
In addition, this week Microsoft is hosting a two-day Innovative Schools
Conference on
"Technology allows us to rethink how we educate children by opening up
possibilities that simply didn't exist before," said
More Information
Additional background on the events occurring this week, including case studies, fact sheets, executive biographies and other materials supporting Microsoft's goal of enabling access to high-quality educational experiences, is available at http://www.microsoft.com/emea/presscentre/EducationVPR/default.mspx.
About Unlimited Potential
Microsoft, through its Unlimited Potential vision, is committed to making technology more affordable, relevant and accessible for the 5 billion people around the world who do not yet enjoy its benefits. The company aims to do so by helping to transform education and foster a culture of innovation, and through these means enable better jobs and opportunities. By working with governments, intergovernmental organizations, nongovernmental organizations and industry partners, Microsoft hopes to reach its first major milestone -- to reach the next 1 billion people who are not yet realizing the benefits of technology -- by 2015.
About Microsoft
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.
SOURCE Microsoft Corp.