Congress Expected To Put High Priority on Technology

By Andrew Trotter

Washington

Education technology will figure even more prominently in this year's revamping of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act than it did in the bill's last overhaul, in 1994, according to staff members on Capitol Hill and at the Department of Education.

"The word 'technology' will appear in just about every title in ESEA," predicted Sherry Kaiman, a staff member for the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee.

In addition to being mingled throughout the various sections of the major federal K-12 law, first passed in 1965, technology may keep its own separate title. But there is also some interest by members of Congress and the Clinton administration in consolidating technology grant programs into fewer, broader grants, which would add flexibility to schools'...