Today’s post comes courtesy of Brendan O’Sullivan, MindLeaders CEO

At the BETT Show in London last week Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Education, admitted that the ICT curriculum in English schools “is in a mess”. In my opinion, this is great news.

The great news is not that the curriculum is “in a mess” but that the Dept. of Education has recognised that ICT educational provision in English schools no longer meets the needs of the modern market.  It is equally important that he has admitted this in public and made the bold move of announcing that the curriculum will be scrapped in September. Proving himself as the leader of an enlightened department, Michael Gove’s speech also makes far more than a nod to the instructive potential of “online materials” that continue to “grow and flourish”. There is indeed a world of elearning waiting to be unleashed in our computer rooms and Mr. Gove seems ready to let teachers open the floodgates.

But it’s also important to acknowledge the investment in ICT up to today that has made this bold vision possible. I worked in the UK ICT-for-schools market for some years and the commitment of the Dept. of Education to the whole area of ICT was and continues to be magnificent.  When Michael Gove says that the ICT curriculum is in a “mess” we must remember that taken as a whole, the ICT area is an advanced “mess”.

Since the battle cry of “Education, Education, Education” rang out and the invention of the “National Grid For Learning” fifteen years ago, the UK government has spent heavily to raise the level of ICT in schools through cash investment and investment in training. In terms of infrastructure, ICT in the UK is a “mess” envied by many other countries’ education systems. In the UK the pupil: PC ratio is excellent, every classroom has an electronic whiteboard, broadband is widespread in schools and ICT is now seen as a right of every child.

Taking the logical next step, Michael Gove and his Department have realised that they must now give the power back to the teacher and invest more in teacher development. In doing so he stands on the shoulders of the giants who laid the foundations by making ICT compulsory in schools and invested in the hardware and software that, whilst it may have become redundant and had to be upgraded, remains the back-bone of an enlightened ICT strategy. Upgrading in the interests of progress is never a wasted investment. Think about how many times you have changed or upgraded your mobile phone or PC technology but didn’t view it as a “wasted investment.”

So this isn’t at all bad “mess” to have to clean up. And clean it up he will, by empowering teachers and freeing them to deliver ICT in the way that they know best, not via a strait-jacketed curriculum. Executed correctly, the plan could elevate ICT in schools to an even higher level, and the winners will be English children and the UK economy.