Class 7 - Public Education and Technology

The most valuable part of the class will not be the grade, but what knowledge and learning you use outside of the class (and perhaps advance your careers). So we warmed up the class with a scenario where you were in the elevator with your boss (or city manager, councilman, mayor, etc). and they ask you the question "What is GIS and how can it be used in our city to better serve out citizens?". The discussion was that a good framework was to describe what the technology is, give an example to help the mayor understand, and give the pros and cons.

The interview assignment is due the last day of class and your opportunity to meet public sector professionals and perhaps broaden your professional network. Group presentations start next week. The "Golden Nuggets" final presentation during the last night of class is individual, about 5-6 Powerpoint slides (no death by Powerpoint please), and highlights your important learning takeaways from our 10 weeks together in the MPA 599: Government and Technology class. Educators are fond of saying "there is no learning without reflection"; "Golden Nuggets" is our opportunity to reflect on what we learned.

Recall that the two primary benefits of this information age are 1) Communication and 2) Information, more than ever and faster than ever. It used to take 3 months to send mail cross country via Pony Express, now we send e-mail around the world it 3 seconds. Our example of this in public sector was the recent public relations fiasco with the fake Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) press conference. Using video clips from You Tube of the fake press conference, we discussed how this kind of behavior, even if it was an error of judgment, erodes the public trust in government. We further discussed how this was different from how information as propaganda to shape public opinion by the selectively shaping and manipulating what is shared and the role of the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights and freedom of the press.

Two examples of how technology has changed the education landscape are the MIT Open Courseware project and the US Army Education Online (http://www.earmyu.com). The MIT Open Courseware project offers all the lecture and class materials online and free for anyone to use. With access to the best curricular content, what is left of value is the instructional piece of teaching. We shared (not naming names) the qualities of the worst teachers you ever had. Then we talked about the qualities of the best teachers. In this case, technology in education can put more of an emphasis on good quality instruction and this benefits students. The US Army Education online was an example of how physical location for classes is no longer important. However, in class discussions and quality of delivery of instruction are important elements in learning. These may be parts of the reasons why we may not see the ability to earn an undergraduate degree completely online offered by MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Cal Poly Pomona.

The education and technology career paths of John Q. Porter, Superintendent of Oklahoma Public Schools and Michael Robbie, President of the University of Indiana system were shared in articles. Both of these public sector professionals started in technology and moved to the highest levels of education leadership.

Chapter 7 of our textbook covered the Citizen Use of E-Government. The advancement of electronic government and better pubic service delivery is being mitigated by the "digital divide". This is our reflection for tonight. The digital divide refers to the have and have nots of technology. Not everyone has a computer. Not everyone has e-mail or Internet access.
So what do we as public sector leaders do?

We concluded by revisiting the Personal Strengths "Strength Deployment Inventory" (SDI) (http://us.personalstrengths.com/sdi.php?id=104), recalling our own Motivational Value System (MVS) or "color" and the skill of Borrowing to use characteristics of other MVS to communicate in a way that resonates with the other person. We discussed Conflict and differences of warranted Goal Conflict and unwarranted Style Conflict. Conflict is a reaction to a perceived threat to one's self worth. Conflict is always a toxic state (even though some may believe they work better while in conflict). We studied our individual conflict sequence and the stages we go through. Awareness of conflict in our selves and others can help us recognize this toxic state and take steps to move out of it, back to our MVS.