In February of 2008 I attended a workshop on Web 2.0 tools. Howie DiBlasi was the presenter. He talked about how there are not too many people who are willing to take the risk to make big changes. In fact, he said that only about 1 in 10 people are willing to look for new ways to do things. It is that 10% that are the change agents; the people who will revolutionize education. Cory Plough recently wrote about something similar to this in a blog post called “Can You Influence Change?” At the end of his post he asks his audience what they are doing to influence their environments.

After sitting though Dr. DiBlasi’s presentation it was evident that teachers in my region (western Nebraska) are very far behind where they need to be. Only a handful of people out of the 150 or so even knew what podcasts, wikis, and blogs were. In fact, most of the terms associated with Web 2.0 were all foreign to the vast majority of the audience. At that time I was still fairly new to Web 2.0, but I had at least experimented with podcasting and wikis.

My passion for Web 2.0 was ignited that day. I decided back in February that I was going to become a change agent. I was determined to learn as much as I could and share that knowledge with as many people as possible. Until recently, my only audience was my students. Then we hired three new teachers and I saw a great opportunity to mold them into change agents. I saw my chance to be a leader.

I have learned a hard lesson over the last few weeks. It takes a long time to change the mindset of a traditional classroom teacher. Traditional F2F teachers are comfortable with how they are doing things and they are reluctant to change. Unless they are the “one” out of the one in ten who is truly innovative and looking for change then I am fighting a losing battle. I am happy report that I have seen signs that my colleagues are at least willing to learn.

Over the last couple of weeks I have read so many blog posts that deal directly with how to get teachers to change the status quo and fully embrace technology. I would love to see a paradigm shift in our schools, but the realist in me does not see this change happening for many years. Michelle Baldwin wrote a post the other day about the need to act now to help prepare our students for the world of work. True change is going to have to be mandated at some level if the majority of teachers are ever going to learn to do anything beyond check their email. (Which some still cannot even figure out!!)

Most teachers who are not on board with technology see it as an extra duty. Just one more thing to do! I have seen some teachers who are even proud of the fact they are computer illiterate. They wear the label like a badge of honor! I am not even sure if it is possible for those teachers to cross the digital divide.

So getting back to the ten percent of us who are dedicated to making the changes happen. How are we going to do it? Where do we begin? How do we motivate our colleagues without pushing them over the edge? How are we going to turn our thoughts into actions? I have some ideas, but I am a long way away from having any answers.

Here are what other people are saying about this topic.

• Robin Martin If All the World Could See
• Darren Draper The Most Effective Teachers Have More to Learn
• Jeff Utecht Another Sputnik
• Will Richardson Teachers As Learners Part 27 (from Aug.2006)
• Michelle Baldwin A Call to Act Now
• Cory Plough Meliorate