Barbara Ridgway is the library services coordinator for Helena School District #1. Ms. Ridgway believes that school as we know it will be dramatically transformed with the rapid changes introduced by technology. "We, as educators, will have to adapt to these changes, and we will also have to ensure that all children are prepared to live with a new literacy," she says. Ms. Ridgway would like to develop a multimedia facility to assist teachers, students, and parents in acquiring technological fluency. "There is a very real need," she says, "to help teachers become familiar with the impact technologies can have on the design and delivery of their curriculum." Ms. Ridgway believes that educators must learn how to tap into students' receptivity towards technology. "Students today," she adds, "live in a very different world from the one many educators grew up in." Disregard for technological knowledge, she fears, will create a new kind of illiteracy - a world of "haves and have-nots. My dream," she says, "is to create an environment that is open to all - not just the 'haves'."
Western Montana College, B.A.
