China’s National Educational “Informatization” Plan represents its version of a national education technology plan, such as the one developed by the Office of Educational Technology in the US. Of course, many other countries (but not all) have developed their own national level educational technology plans.
Over the past two years, SITE has developed a productive relationship with the National Engineering Research Center for E-Learning (NERCEL), located in Wuhan, Hubei Province. NERCEL is guided by the steady leadership of Dr. Yang ZongKai, who also serves as president of Central China Normal University, located in Wuhan. NERCEL is the organization, under the directive of the Ministry of Education in Beijing, that developed China’s ten-year “informatization” plan.
In appreciation of the developing relationship between SITE and NERCEL, Dr. Yang sent two colleagues to the SITE 2012 Conference in Austin to “unveil” China’s national educational technology plan. As SITE President, I was honored to reciprocate Dr. Yang’s gesture by arranging a meeting between him and then US Director of the Office of Education Technology, Karen Cator, at Kean University, where I teach. At this meeting, the representative plans from the two countries were exchanged, followed by a fascinating discussion.
While many educators and policy makers, from across the world, are familiar with the US’s National Educational Technology Plan, they may not be familiar with China’s plan, which can be found here. SITE is pleased to have played a role in fostering a dialogue between China and the US in the exchange of documents and ideas related to their respective national educational technology plans. As a truly international organization, SITE brings this dialogue to the larger international educational technology community. (In fact, it is in dialogue with other countries about opening discussions on their national plans—an example of that will be presented in another post.)
The respectful and productive relationship between NERCEL and SITE continues. NERCEL once again sent a delegate to the SITE 2013 conference. One item on that mission was to seek feedback on how NERCEL and SITE could work together, even more prodcutively. While our relationship continues to evolve, I am sure it will be a fruitful one, allowing for sustained interactions among educators, researchers and policy makers from across the world. Stayed tuned!
