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#FreeTheStandards--David's take

July 14, 2009 The AASL forum discussion continues.  In case you don't subscribe, I wanted to make sure you all had the opportunity to read David Loertscher's take on the two possible business models our organization might adopt. (Shared here with David's permission and blessing.)

I have appreciated all the comments about the restrictions imposed by AASL on the new standards documents. In a meeting at ALA of all the editors of magazines and book publishers of the field, great concern was expressed.

There is a major principle of business at work here.  It is called Return on Investment.

There are currently two major models at work. The first is to maximize immediately as much revenue as you can from a product. This is the policy that AASL has adopted with the standards and notice that Allison said that this policy would not change.  Do the math. With the prospect of a sale of the standards and the accompanying documents being at least 100,000 over the next decade times $40.00, you can see the kind of return that AASL will reap from the free contribution of intellectual content from its volunteer members. Now, if you declare as many references, excerpts, and presentations as derivative content, then you try to maximize the dollars retrieved. For example, all the for-profit magazines of the field have already published articles about the new standards. There have been comparative articles, explanatory articles, reviews, and interpretive articles, already in the Journal.

Under the current policy, AASL owns all these references and can assess any amount it wishes.

If you are going to write a book for the field and publish it with any of the major publishers of the field, then even the mere mention of the standards in your book can be declared as derivative by AASL and assessed a fee.

If you are making a presentation at a conference and you were given a stipend for presenting or you were doing it for free, AASL can, under the current policy assess you a fee.

If you are a consultant to a school or school district, and even mention the standards, you are owned by AASL and can be assessed a fee.

Fear of such mentions, excerpts discourages the presenter from even mentioning the AASL work and instead just talking about 21st century learning skills as outlined by other organizations.

There is a second model at work about Return on Investment. This idea is to try to go viral with your intellectual property. This means that you try to spread the word as much as you possibly can, in every medium, in every publication, in every venue. Your hope is that the entire educational community will take note of your contribution. Your hope is that every educational journal will be touting what the teacher librarian is doing to push academic achievement. You push the limits of fair use over nickel and diming everyone you can find.

Thousands of articles, publications, presentations and other promotions were done for Information Power. The return on investment was getting the word out. Because Information power was a joint publication between AECT and AASL and ALA, the money was split three ways. Now the money comes to AASL.

While we appreciate the assurance that some quick fixes might be possible, but the policy is not going to change, I have a suggestion. Send Allison an email asking for permission for every document you have already made for your school or school district, every speech you have given about the document and every planned mention. When we get, in writing, an interpretation of the policy that outlines guidelines in the most common uses of the standards, then we will have an idea of how we can assist the organization in getting the word out or whether we should all just ignore the standards.

In case you have not noticed, we are competing for attention in the educational world with many other documents such as those issued by the Partnership for 21st century Learning, the ISTE NETS standards, Understanding by Design; Habits of Mind, The ASCD Whole Child Initiative, the issuance of national technology for education standards, new national education standards, a new edition of standards for geography education and dozens of national documents/reports/policy statements that I tweet about. Suppose David Warlick mentioned the standards or Jamie McKenzie, Alan November, Stephen Hepple, David Perkins, orany of a number of major speakers?

How can our voice get heard? Are we insular or promotional? Are we a business or a professional organization? A reminder, the intellectual content of the standards was given freely by volunteers. What is our intent? We certainly need more clarification.

Which model do you prefer?

Posted by Joyce Valenza Ph.D on July 14, 2009 | Comments (8)