Three education technology associations – the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) and the State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA) – hosted the ninth annual Washington Education Technology Summit. Bringing together educators representing 23 states and nearly every region of the country, the summit provided participants with an opportunity to stress to Congress the increasingly urgent need to restore federal support for education technology, particularly in the face of across the board budget cuts and in advance of online assessments to measure Common Core standards in 2014.
Summit participants urged Members of Congress to restore funding for the Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) program to at least $100 million in FY13 appropriations. In addition, they pressed for the inclusion of the Achievement Through Technology and Innovation Act (S. 1178 and H.R. 3614), which would revamp EETT, in the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, as well as the meaningful infusion of education technology into all pertinent federal education programs. Participants also advocated for the passage of legislation that would permanently exempt from the Anti-Deficiency Act all universal service programs and the E-Rate.
