Articles
2003
Nov/Dec 2003
Napa Valley's Newest Export
Project-based instruction and an open school culture have made New Technology High SchoolT a celebrated model for replication
Scholastic Administrator
By Lars Kongshem
Technology isn't the first thing that comes to mind when one thinks of California's Napa Valley. Napa's traditional industries—wine making and tourism—are thought of as high-touch, not high-tech. But a successful high-school experiment shows that Napa's future holds more than just a fine Merlot. And the school is fast becoming a model for more than a dozen spin-offs throughout California.
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August 25 - September 1, 2003
Education: Log on and Learn
Newsweek - International Education
by Martha Brandt
Increasingly, the Internet is a cyberteacher outside, as well as inside, the classroom. In the United States, for example, more than 78 percent of kids 12 to 17 go online, according to a 2002 study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Ninety-four percent of those online said they used it for schoolwork.
....Just as California led the world in the technology boom, the state is also at the forefront of education innovation. Two public schools - High Tech High in San Diego and New Tech HighT in Napa - are using technology to completely revamp schooling...
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August 5, 2003
Grades That Mean Something
by Diane Curtis
Grades weren't all that instructive for Heather Riggall before she went to New Technology High SchoolTin California's famed Napa Valley. "At my old high school, if you got 40 out of 50, you didn't really know why you didn't get 50," says Riggall. "Was it because you turned it in late? Was content lacking? Was it because of mechanical errors?"
Then there were the thoughts that a bad grade might be personal. "Especially if you go to a teacher afterward and they won't explain to you why you got a certain grade, you'll be, 'It's because they don't like me. It's because my hair is like this, because I wear these shoes,'" Riggall says.
Read full article here.
July 10, 2003
Technology Reinvents the High School Experience
Edutopia Radio Show Archive
Susan Schilling, CEO and Replication Director, and Paul Curtis, Director of Curriculum, at the New Technology Foundation, and New Tech High School Director Mark Morrison will talk about innovations at the New Technology High SchoolT in Napa County, California, a school rich in technology, using project-based learning to enhance educational opportunities for students. New Tech is a small high school which has received a Gates Foundation grant to create others like it in California.
Go to Edutopia Radio Show Archive. (Broadcast Date: July 10, 2003)
Spring 2003
Transforming Teaching & Learning Through Technology
Carnegie Reporter
by Kathy Seal
Fourteen year-old Will Gomez leans back on his chair, stretching away from the black-framed computer screen in front of him. He wears a blue oxford cloth shirt and khakis, and his light brown hair is gelled up into spikey peaks.
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January 15, 2003
Project-Based Learning: a Primer
Technology & Learning
By Gwen Solomon
When students are challenged to get to work solving real-life problems, the whole world becomes a classroom. Here we offer a guide for getting started.
Walk into team teachers Mike Smith and David Ross's interdisciplinary classroom at Napa New Technology High SchoolT in California and you will see students at work-writing in online journals, doing research on the Internet, meeting in groups to plan and create Web sites and digital media presentations, and evaluating their peers for collaboration and presentation skills. This setting and these types of activities have a name and a purpose. It's called project-based learning, and it's designed to engage students and empower them with responsibility for their own education in ways unheard of in traditional classrooms.
Read full article here.
Project-Based Learning: a Primer (cont'd)
2002
May 29, 2002
High Tech Haven
Education Week
By Rhea R. Borja
At first glance, the 1970s, low-rise stucco building squatting near an animal feed and supply store seems like a typical public school. Only a column painted purple, reaching toward the sky, hints that New Technology High SchoolT may be a little different.
Read full article here.
Spring 2002
Designing, and Making, the New American High School
Technos Quarterly
By Bob Pearlman
Newspapers across the country are filled with stories of high school failure. “More than Half of California 9th Graders Flunk Exit Exam,”a recent headline in Education Week (June 20, 2001), typifies this trend. In the next 10 years we can be sure that there will be high school failure everywhere unless states artificially lower the standards, a real possibility, or schools change the high school experience to engage and motivate students to learn. This author presents the case for the latter event.
Read full article here.
2000
November 14, 2000
New Technology Foundation receives $4.9 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Announcement
Foundation grant to support the development of technology high schools designed to help all students achieve
Napa, Calif. -- The New Technology FoundationT will use a $4.9 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to replicate the New Technology High SchoolT (NTHS) model in 10 northern California communities. The grant was announced this afternoon at a school-wide celebration.
Read full article here.
May 2000
Desktop PCs bring fast times to New Tech High
Government Computer News
By Trudy Walsh
GCN Staff
New Technology High School lies nestled in the sunny valleys of Napa, Calif. But with a 1-to-1 student-to-PC ratio, the school of 220 seems more like a high-tech start-up than a typical California high school, Mark Morrison, the school’s director, said.
The school even looks like a technology think tank. Designed by SGI, the building has deep purple walls, blue carpeting and lots of windows. No bells ring to summon students to the next class.
Read full article here.
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