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In 2000, Chris Friberg left her tech support job at a large, financial services firm in the Boston area to get a master鈥檚 degree in teaching middle school math. Four years later, Friberg completed her student-teaching assignment at Alfred W. Coolidge Middle School, located in Reading, Mass., about 15 miles north of Boston. Friberg loved the energetic atmosphere of the school and the district. Coincidentally, just as she was wrapping up her student-teaching assignment, a teaching position opened up in the school鈥檚 math department for the fall. She leapt at the job. 鈥淭he culture here and the leadership in this district and everything that I found out about it while I was student teaching was exciting and what I was looking for,鈥� she says.

Friberg is not alone in her enthusiasm for the district鈥檚 culture of learning. Last fall, the Cambridge, Mass.-based , launched a study to determine the level of support for 21st-century learning among superintendents and principals in the state. In the process, researchers at Rennie, a non-partisan organization dedicated to education reform in the state of Massachusetts, isolated Reading for its 鈥渉ighly integrated approach to 21st-century skills鈥濃�攁 path that began with a visionary leader.

In 2003, then-Superintendent Patrick Schenttini began an aggressive campaign to modernize the district鈥檚 curriculum, including initiating district-wide committees on technology, building-level committees for teachers to discuss new ways to deliver content, and even meeting with town officials. 鈥淗e created a vision: We need to prepare students for 21st-century global learning,鈥� current Superintendent John Doherty says of Schenttini.

Marcia Grant, who teaches computer electives at Coolidge, emphasizes Schenttini鈥檚 role in integrating technology into the district鈥檚 curriculum. 鈥淸Schenttini鈥檚] focus was on 21st-century learning and providing information to teachers so that they could focus on it as well. Before that, we were getting the hardware, but were we really using it to enhance or change our curriculum?鈥�

Sixteen years ago, when Grant arrived in the district, every middle school teacher received a computer. She recalls that over time teachers were e-mailing each other and drawing up lesson plans on their computers. Teachers were supposed to integrate technology into their curriculum, but, in many instances, they didn鈥檛 have the skill level, couldn鈥檛 see how it would benefit the curriculum, or were intimidated.

Grant also credits Schenttini with stressing globalization and its probable impact on students, their future jobs, and their careers to bring about the 鈥渂ig shift鈥� in the district: 鈥淗ow do we educate our students to what their world is really going to look like? What kind of professional development would teachers need? We鈥檙e trying to prepare students for a whole different world than what we were prepared for, so what are the skills that they need to be successful in this global community?鈥�

Today, 90 percent of the classrooms in the 4,400-student district are outfitted with SMART Boards, the student-to-computer ratio averages three-to-one, and 60 percent of the district鈥檚 schools are wireless鈥攊ncluding Coolidge鈥檚 entire building. 鈥淲e built up our infrastructure,鈥� says Doherty, who was appointed superintendent for the district in January of this year, shortly after Schenttini passed away from cancer.

鈥楨xpanding the Boundaries鈥�

During a site visit to the Reading district, Rennie Center policy analyst Michael Bennett noted 鈥渁 universal belief that focusing on content by standards is not enough for kids to be set for society.鈥� He also noted the highly collaborative atmosphere among students, teachers, and administrators, which he understood had been shaped by Schenttini and by a six-credit, graduate-level course for district educators taught by Doherty. Offered to teachers and administrators for free, the course鈥斺�淓xpanding the Boundaries of Teaching and Learning鈥濃�攊s now in its third year. It provides a guidepost as the district pursues 21st-century skills instruction, and 鈥渁 common understanding, a common language, and a shared network,鈥� says Bennett.

For Doherty, the course, which starts at the end of August and ends in April, is an opportunity to put technology in the hands of teachers. According to Doherty, 90 educators have taken the course in the 360-teacher district. He believes it is helping teachers and administrators to integrate 21st-century skills into content areas. Doherty describes the course, which meets online as well as face-to-face, as 鈥渋ntense and rigorous.鈥� Teachers who take it receive a laptop, a projector for their classrooms, and wireless Internet access, if their school isn鈥檛 already completely hooked up鈥攏ecessary tools, Doherty believes, to establish Web literacy in the classroom.

Doherty鈥檚 syllabus includes Thomas Friedman鈥檚 , Daniel Pink鈥檚 , Will Richardson鈥檚 , and two selections by edu-tech authority Alan November, including . Participants must create a (frequently updated) blog, a Wikipedia entry, and a podcast, and throughout the course, they must collaborate with each other and deconstruct what a 21st-century classroom should look like. Once teachers complete the course, they are encouraged to go back to their schools and share their knowledge with their colleagues. 鈥淲e鈥檙e using these people to do professional development training. Now we have the capacity,鈥� says Doherty. His goal is to shift the focus in the classroom from the teachers to the students, where the students are the 鈥渒nowledge generators鈥� and the teachers are the 鈥渒nowledge facilitators.鈥�

Last year, 25 percent of the teachers at Reading Memorial High School took Doherty鈥檚 course. Ellie Freedman, who is principal of the district鈥檚 only high school, came to Reading at the start of the last school year, because鈥攍ike Chris Friberg鈥攕he was 鈥渋ntrigued and energized by what they were doing.鈥� In her brief tenure, she has noticed that the atmosphere among her staff is much more collaborative and that they are generally willing to embrace a more evolved curriculum, which she believes has a lot to do with the superintendent鈥檚 course and the district鈥檚 focus on project- and inquiry-based learning. As a result, teachers are working cross-disciplinarily to create better curricula for students, and she says, 鈥淲e鈥檝e been having deeper conversations about how [skills such as critical thinking, communication, and problem solving] are manifested in teaching and how students are engaging in learning. That鈥檚 an essential conversation to have no matter what the century.鈥�

Boosting Student Engagement

When discussing 21st-century learning, Craig Martin, who succeeded John Doherty as principal of Coolidge, echoes a familiar refrain across the district: Computers are a means, not an end, to student learning.

鈥淥ne of the things that鈥檚 been important to me is that I don鈥檛 want people to think of 21st-century learning as [being only about] technology. We see it as a tool. With the [Web literacy] skills that we鈥檙e talking about, kids are able to produce work where the audience is not just the teacher or a classmate. It engages them at a different level,鈥� says Martin.

鈥淎bsolutely. The kids love technology,鈥� says Erica LeBow, a 7th and 8th grade language arts teacher at Coolidge who, like Friberg and Grant, is an alumna of Doherty鈥檚 course. 鈥淕ive them a blog, give them a wiki, and they鈥檒l produce far more work of higher quality.鈥�

In addition to being more engaged, students appear less anxious about sharing their work. With more tools at their disposal and a slightly more anonymous venue in which to express themselves, Martin believes students feel freer to open up. 鈥淲hen I compare it to many years ago when I was an English teacher, I felt I had more kids who were reluctant to communicate,鈥� he says.

Another graduate of Doherty鈥檚 course, Laura Warren, finds that the students in her 7th and 8th grade language-arts classrooms at Coolidge participate more intensely online than they do inside the four walls of her classroom for another reason: time. 鈥淲e have a 50-minute period, so kids might be able to say one thing. If you have a book discussion online, everyone participates鈥攁nd they can process and bounce ideas off each other. The experience lends itself to critical thinking.鈥�

Chris Friberg believes that by ceding some control to her students, they are more likely to engage with each other. In her math classroom, which is a hybrid of online learning and face time, students are using YouTube videos to find a different take on a problem; online video lessons from universities like ; touchpad calculators; and , a classroom-management system that allows them to work at their own pace.

鈥淥ne of the things that sticks out the most,鈥� she explains, 鈥渋s their confidence level in a [discussion] forum. By being able to respond in a forum, in a private setting, students come out of their shells.鈥� Recently, Friberg says, a student posted a problem he couldn鈥檛 solve and a classmate stepped forward online and responded with a suggestion. 鈥淭hat gives me the chills,鈥� she says.

鈥淭hese students are learning collaboration, communication, and presentation skills that are going to be necessary, in addition to knowledge about the curriculum. The day is gone when they just need to know formulas鈥攖hey can look those up,鈥� she adds. 鈥淭hey need to know how to solve problems and work together.鈥�