While the governor and others want to take on other issues, such as strengthening DUI laws, there is less likelihood that non-budget issues will get much attention unless they are tied directly to the budget.

The House and Senate budgets are separated by about $1.3 billion, with the House at the higher amount.  The House and Senate budget both add about $1.2 billion to K-12 education to respond to the McCleary decision.  But they spend that $1.2 billion differently.

The House budget for higher education is better than the Senate’s , although the Senate has no tuition increases in its budget compared to a 3-5% tuition increase in the House version.  The House version is also more specific regarding computer science and engineering, spending approximately $37 million specifically on computer science and engineering at UW, WSU and WWU.

The House budget assumes approximately $900 million in various tax increases and the closing of tax preferences, including the B&O credit and sales tax deferral for R&D, which are widely used by the IT and life sciences sectors.

WTIA and our Information Technology Coalition, http://www.washingtontechnology.org/advocacy/coalition.aspx are working to keep the R&D incentives in place (some changes may be necessary).  If these valuable incentives are repealed, it would increase the cost of doing R&D in Washington.  Companies would not be able to take a B&O credit against their R&D spending, nor could they defer sales tax on R&D labs and facilities.

If this happens, Washington will see its competitveness as a state drop.  44 states have some kind of tax incentives for R&D.  Washington would stick out like a sore thumb if these are repealed.

The argument used to repeal and close the R&D incentives is that money will be used to pay for more STEM degrees.  This is a fallacious argument.  It is the legislature’s job to pay for higher education and to make it a higher priority since it is obvious that the economy is demanding higher level degrees.  Those with bachelor’s degree, generally, have much lower unemployment and higher wages.  It is not as if the state’s tech based industries haven’t been growing and hiring–they have been for years.  Other than the dot-com blip in 2001-03, IT employment in Washington has grown steadily since the early 90′s.

If this argument is taken further, then that means the hospitals should pay for medical and nursing degrees, the banking industry should pay for finance degrees and art galleries should pay for arts majors.  It doesn’t make sense.

WTIA and our members are pefectly willing to discuss changes to the R&D incentives that make sense.  The largest tech companies might be willing to trade some tax benefit for more computer science majors.  But repeal does not make sense for either the state or for companies.  The competition is real from other states and regions and from companies located elsewhere.

The tech industry pays hundreds of millions in B&O taxes and many millions more in sales, property and other taxes.  Tech industry employees generate about $500 million in state and local taxes through their own spending.  Not to mention the substantial multiplier effect of computer science and engineering jobs.  The bottom line is that the state’s tech industry is a huge contributor to the state of Washington.  Smart public policy suggests that our education system be geared to the realities of the 21st century world, which means a greater emphasis on having more people educated and skilled for the economy of today, which is a technology based one.

if you are concerned about the direction of the state, higher education or the tech industry, please take our call to action: http://www.capwiz.com/techvoice/wa/home/

The state’s tech industry sympathizes with our legislators who have a very difficult job balancing all the needs and desires of a wide range of constituencies.  However, we are asking them to be cautious when adopting tax policies that are counterproductive.

It became clear to me after the first 30 minutes that this was not going to be straight forward. Social business in many ways is more of a concept than an actual specific set of activities or strategies. As such, I felt it only prudent to do some more research and actually look up definitions of social business. Thanks to various sources (and of course Wikipedia!!) this is what I uncovered:

• Social business (as a term) was first defined by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Prof. Muhammad Yunus and is described in his books – “Creating a world without poverty” , “Social Business and the future of capitalism” and “Building Social Business”
• The objective of social business is to expand the company’s reach, improve the product or service, and to subsidize the social mission.
• Yunus postulates a new world of business in which profit-maximizing enterprises and social-benefit-maximizing enterprises coexist.

So… as I was getting prepared to learn about how Linkedin, Facebook, and Twitter impact ROI, I instead was hit with a bunch of esoteric theory around how social causes and maximizing shareholder wealth can actually complement each other.

At first, this completely threw me off but, as I started to think about it more, Yunus’ definition really resonated with me and actually reinforced why I was having such a difficult time evaluating social business. Consider the following illustration:

This is a traditional view that links social business activities with company performance. In this example, all of the social business activities are trending in a positive fashion yet the financial and operating performance of the company has regressed. The next logical step for most organizations (marketing functions) is to do a deep dive as to what activities had the most correlation with outcomes and why the positive activity trends didn’t translate financially.

What is missed in this traditional analysis, according to Yunis, is the alignment and relationship between financial and social outcomes. This analysis contains no evaluation of desired social outcomes and, therefore, implies that an increase in social engagement is an effective proxy for a desired social outcome, which it is not.

Consider this: I can offer a free car promotion for the first 20,000 people who sign up for a WTIA Twitter account. That might be a very effective strategy to increase my Twitter subscriber base, however, most folks who would sign up would be doing it because of the car, not because of their support and deep belief in the underlying mission of the WTIA.

In taking Yunus’ theory and applying to the above analysis, a “new model” for evaluating social business may look something like this:

This more comprehensive analysis attempts to measure the “social-mission driven” outcomes that occurred over the period. The “social KPI’s” in my example tell a much different story, indicating that there were macro-economic factors related to an unfavorable political environment that impacted company specific (WTIA’s) performance. The WTIA’s mission of helping technology companies prosper is directly impacted by good or bad changes in the Washington State political landscape.

The inclusion of social outputs in this analysis also helps to explain the disconnect between the positive activity trends and negative financial results. It is very conceivable that professionals would increase their social engagement in matters that impact the tech industry and political landscape without directly having the time, bandwidth or financial resources to financially invest in the WTIA.

Conclusion:

The good news? This is an illustrative example and does not imply that the political landscape got worse for technology companies during the FY 13 Washington State legislative session. Also, the WTIA is doing well and thanks for your continued support!

With that disclosure now out of the way, Yunus hit on something that is hugely profound and I absolutely drank the Kool-Aide: We are in a new era where profit-maximizing and social-benefit-maximizing enterprises not only will complement each other but, in my view, will create a competitive advantage for companies that can align these two objectives.

Executives will have to be more thoughtful when constructing and evaluating the company’s social objectives and desired impact in the community. For those of you with marketing and analysis roles, I suggest that you schedule some extra time as the meeting will likely run long!

If you’re measuring every dime spent on social media and expecting a clear ROI, you’re doing it wrong.

Social media doesn’t generate near-term ROI. It fixes rattles and makes people happy. By doing that, it helps you secure long-term ROI.

Cars, rattles and social media

I bought a new car three weeks ago for an embarrassing, midlife crisis amount of money. Shortly after that, I heard a funny rattle in the right front of the car. Not much, but it was enough to bring on accelerated buyer’s remorse.

The manufacturer fixed the rattle, and cured my malaise. An engineer probably spent 20 hours going over the car, piece by piece, until they found the rattle and squashed it like the middle-aged joy-crusher it was.

In terms of ROI they never should have done the work. It was a terrible deal for the car dealer and the manufacturer. They could have said “Turn up the radio and you won’t hear the rattle.” It’s not like I could get a refund. I’d already paid for it. It wasn’t a safety issue. I’m sure this didn’t exactly fall under lemon law statutes, either.

So doing this work didn’t increase their near-term ROI. It hurt it. There is no data-driven reason for them to do what they did.

Of course, common sense dictates fixing the problem. If you’re a manufacturer and you sell someone a premium sports sedan, you want them to be happy. If they’re unhappy, you’ve gained a serious detractor who will:

• Never buy from you again;
• Do everything they can to steer others away from you and your brand;
• Spread negativity around your brand like manure on a spring flower bed.

Turning a potential detractor into a fan doesn’t provide a measurable return. It just makes sense, because it builds long-term ROI.

Social media just makes sense, too

Social media works exactly the same way, except you have the opportunity to influence conversations around your brand before someone becomes a potential detractor.

Companies try to measure social media’s near-term ROI. And, with a few notable exceptions, social media campaigns lose money. We measured results across 100 client accounts and found that social media investment – in monitoring, having experts answer questions, and generally pay attention – broke even or lost money in the near term 85% of the time. Eighty. Five. Percent.

We don’t make that much money from social media services, either. We have little incentive to get clients using it, even if we were just trying to squeeze budget dollars out of accounts. Of all the services we offer, it’s the lowest earner.

Why keep using it?

Because it just makes sense. Social media lets you take care of customers and potential customers. And it builds long-term ROI like no other channel, by letting you:

Answer Questions

You can answer questions. Specialized Bicycle Company does live streaming Q&A sessions with cyclists all over the world. Alaska Airlines uses Facebook to keep customers informed regarding potential delays during the sequester. If that keeps just a handful of customers happy, it pays off:

If you want to do the same, try a tool like inboxQ. You can get a feed of relevant questions from Twitter, filtered and sent directly to your Hootsuite account.

Can you measure the ROI? No. Is it worthwhile? Absolutely.

Make Eye Contact

Bill Marriott blogs regularly about his travel, his business, and current events. He’s not interacting with most Marriott customers, but he’s providing media direct access to his brain. That puts a face on Marriott, and makes it more likely media will contact him with questions. He’s made ‘eye contact’ with the media.

Samsung retweets and answers occasional posts from fans. Again, eye contact. Does that mean Kelly will immediately go out and buy more Samsung products? No. Does it mean she’s more likely to do so later on? Yes.

This kind of interaction humanizes big and small companies. It gives your consumers—whether you’re B2B or B2C—more confidence when making purchase decisions.

You can monitor social media mentions of you and your company using a host of free tools, from Google searches to SocialMention. Or, you can invest in more powerful paid monitoring suites. Either way, it takes 30 seconds to respond to a customer, but they’ll remember it for far longer.

Measure Something Else

When most companies say ‘ROI’ they mean ‘sales, directly generated,’ aka near-term ROI. They can measure that:

1. Take clicks from social media sources © and revenue generated from those clicks®.
2. Calculate r/c.

But even if they focus 100% on near-term ROI, they’ll have to account for:

1. Social media ‘assists,’ where a click from social media was somewhere in the sales cycle, but not first or last.
2. Expanded reach.
3. Reduced cost of acquisition in other channels.
4. Total lifetime value generated by social media.

Marketers can use a host of different formula to mash this all together. And, there’s no lack of tools claiming to accurately measure social media ROI.

But those marketers have an alternative. Skip the near-term stuff. Instead, track things that might generate long-term return: The number of positive contacts via social media. Answer a question, add 1. Help out an existing customer, add 1. Aid a non-customer in need, add 1.  And so on.

They can also track the total number of mentions, retweets, shares, likes, and other interactions their organizations see over a given period.

Correlate each metric to overall Internet revenue. Marketers who do this track long-term ROI, and get better insight into social media’s true value.

Remember those 85% I mentioned earlier? The companies that don’t see a positive near-term ROI? When you test a 30-day period and measure correlation to conversions, where a conversion is any potential revenue-generating action (a lead, a purchase, or other signup), social media is the third most-influential factor. The only factors that beat it: Overall site traffic, and traffic from unpaid or ‘organic’ search results.

Keep Your Eye on the Real Target

The problem with ‘social media ROI’ is that marketers usually attempt to track dollars generated directly from social media. That distracts from the real goal of any social media team: To improve the audience’s overall opinion of your brand.

That has huge implications for growth over time. Marketers need to keep their eye on the target: Use social media to strengthen brand and long-term ROI.  Then measure its effectiveness at doing so. The long-term payoff is huge.

Who is Ian Lurie?

Ian Lurie is one of the world’s top experts on Internet, search and social media marketing. He is founder and CEO of Portent Inc., an Internet marketing agency that has provided Internet marketing, including search, social and analytics services, since 1995.

He co-published Web Marketing All-In-One for Dummies and wrote the sections on SEO, blogging, social media, and web analytics. He also wrote Conversation Marketing: Internet Marketing Strategies. In addition, he writes regularly for the Portent Blog.

Ian has spoken at various marketing conferences, including Ad::Tech, Search Engine Strategies (SES), Search Marketing Expo (SMX), MozCon, Blogworld and Pubcon. He brings humor, deep insight and actionable advice to every event.

Ian was recently elected to the Board of Directors of the Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization (SEMPO). He has a B.A. in History from UC San Diego and a JD degree in Law from UCLA. He has lived in New Jersey and Los Angeles, and currently resides in Seattle with his wife and two kids.

Portent, Inc. is a full-service Internet marketing agency founded in 1995.  Portent helps its clients achieve their digital marketing goals through effective search, social and inbound marketing strategies.  Clients see an average online revenue increase of 30%.

• Strategic alignment of all WTIA initiatives to four areas of critical importance for our members and for our statewide technology industry as a whole: workforce development; early-stage entrepreneurship support; public policy advocacy for better STEM public education, and continued improved service to member companies.
• Creation of the Information Technology Coalition led by member companies in mobile, gaming, big data, travel, software, cloud and automotive tech.  This ITC is a platform for the technology leaders and enterprises in Washington to raise visibility and enhance advocacy efforts on behalf of our IT sector.
• Development of relevant programming that is focused on current tech topics, and that fosters strong peer-to-peer networking and executive leadership connections. These include our 3^rd Opinion Network of executive roundtables and our Executives in Tech meetings.
• Establishment of a national leadership role for the WTIA in TECNA (Technology Councils of North America), the association for tech trade associations, which gives us a great vantage point into how other innovative regions are working to create a strong economic future.
• Creation of an innovative operating framework for the WTIA board that far surpasses the traditional non-profit board model by enabling the association to leverage the expertise of 40 seasoned tech leaders.

The WTIA has retained the firm of Herd Freed Hartz to assist with the search for our next CEO, and I will stay on with the WTIA until the right leader is found and a successful transition is made.

As for my next steps, I plan to return to this tech industry that I love after taking some extended time off for the first time in my career. My heartfelt thanks goes to everyone who has contributed to the WTIA’s success during my tenure, particularly the WTIA board and staff, who are all absolutely incredible.

By: Susan Sigl, CEO, WTIA

This bill leaves the B&O rate for services at 1.8%, removing the temporary nature of the B&O increase from 2010.  This raises over $500 million in the next two years.  ESHB 2038 requires all the additional tax revenue from the increased B&O to go into K-12 and higher education. 

WTIA members and others in the technology sector are affected by this as most fall into the “service” category for B&O taxation.  In a survey of tax issues that WTIA recently sent out, members provided a somewhat mixed view on the B&O rate extension.  Half of the respondents want it to go back to 1.5% while the other 50% opted for either no position or support for the 1.8%. 

However, another part of ESHB 2038 is even more troubling.  That is the elimination of the tax incentives for R&D.  This tax incentive has two parts:  a B&O credit against “qualified” R&D spending and a sales tax deferral for building R&D facilities.  

Over 500 companies take advantage of the B&O credit, from the top level allowed of $2 million down to $10,000 (or less in a couple of cases).  These are used primarily by IT/software and biotech/life sciences but companies in electronic devices, advanced materials and environmental technology are also eligible. 

The sales tax deferral is used by entities of all types, including non-profit and public institutions.  This helps defray the costs of constructing expensive buildings and labs.  The sales tax deferral for R&D can save entities almost 10% on construction in King County. 

Unfortunately the majority in the state House have been bamboozled by a report from a joint legislative committee called “JLARC” or the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee.  One of their tasks is to review various tax incentives and “preferences” and report to the legislature.  The JLARC did so last summer and fall.  

One of their reviews was on the R&D tax incentives.  You can find that report here: http://www.leg.wa.gov/JLARC/AuditAndStudyReports/2012/Documents/2012TaxPreferenceReviewsProposedFinalReport.pdf

The R&D report starts on page 99.  While the JLARC did a comprehensive job examining the R&D tax incentives, they also tried to quantify how jobs were created “as a result” of the B&O credit.  JLARC ignored the sales tax deferral claiming not enough entities used it to make an analysis. 

By using the standard of “as a result”, JLARC tried to establish “causation” of jobs by tax credits.  This is simply impossible.  Tax credits or tax preferences cannot, in and of themselves, “create” jobs.  They can prepare a foundation, along with other factors, for job creation.  Which is exactly what the R&D incentives have done. 

The JLARC report provides a mixed, incomplete and muddled picture of the effectiveness of the R&D tax incentives.  Too many legislators are glomming on to the negative aspects of the JLARC report while ignoring the positive ones and ignoring JLARC’s own admissions that their economic modeling tools and data collection are faulty and flawed. 

Too many, particularly in the majority in the House, mistakenly believe there will be no negative consequences by raising taxes on companies doing R&D in Washington.  Too many think it’s all about Microsoft and Google. 

While legislators are rightly concerned about education funding, especially in the wake of the McCleary decision, they continue to fail to put K-12 first and higher education second.  The problem with spending isn’t necessarily because of education.  Every year K-12 gets more money.  It is all the other social service and health care spending that is driving the increases in the state budget. 

The leadership in the House is also uncommitted to higher education.  They hold the higher education budget hostage and then tell the tech industry that we have to “give up” R&D tax incentives to get more STEM degrees.  We reject this kind of political gamesmanship.  Kudos to Rep. Larry Seaquist, the House Higher Education chair, for doing his absolute best to make higher education and STEM degrees a priority.  Unfortunately too many of his colleagues do not see it his way. 

With the legislative session coming to an end this Sunday, there will be a lot of pressure on the tech industry to pay more in taxes.  Since the tech industry already pays hundreds of millions in B&O taxes, hundreds of millions more in sales and property taxes, has created tens of thousands of jobs at high wages in the last 10 years, we simply do not see the need to “give up” the one useful economic development tool the state offers. 

WTIA will certainly compromise on the parameters of the R&D incentives but not so much that only the smallest companies can benefit. 

Here is a link to ESHB 2038 and its bill report:

http://apps.leg.wa.gov/documents/billdocs/2013-14/Pdf/Bills/House%20Bills/2038-S.E.pdf  see sections 501 and 502 for the R&D parts.

http://apps.leg.wa.gov/documents/billdocs/2013-14/Pdf/Bill%20Reports/House/2038-S.E%20HBR%20APH%2013.pdf  bill report

JLARC report: http://www.leg.wa.gov/JLARC/AuditAndStudyReports/2012/Documents/2012TaxPreferenceReviewsProposedFinalReport.pdf  R&D section begins on page 99

WA Research Council report on tax preferences: http://www.researchcouncil.org/docs/PDF/WRCTaxes/LevelingPlayingFieldFeb2013.pdf

Washington state legislature:  www.leg.wa.gov

In perusing both House and Senate version of the budgets, there are some significant differences between the two versions.  WTIA tracks the K-12 and higher education budgets, particularly the amounts being spent on Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, or STEM.

In K-12 the issues that relate to the tech industry are around improving math and science achievement by our state’s students.  Washington students are middling at best at math and science.  Improvements are occurring slowly but surely.  Now that high schoolers have to pass a math test (two next year) to graduate, the passage rates are improving.  In science, the standards are weak and new ones are being developed by a consortium of states, which will then inform new curriculum and testing.  Washington students will have to start passing a science test (presumably biology) by 2015 to graduate from high school.

If Washington students get better math and science education at a younger age, their skills will improve and hopefully more students will develop an interest in science majors in college, leading to more computer scientists and engineers, where the jobs are much more plentiful than in many other fields.

WTIA also advocates for more STEM graduates from Washington universities, primarily in the areas of computer science and electrical engineering that drive the state’s technology-based industries.

In both House and Senate versions of the state operating budget, SB 5034, there is $2.442 million for the K-20 network, $712K for LASER and $4 million for the IT Academy—a “public private” partnership between the state and Microsoft to increase teacher and student IT skills.

In the House budget for K-12, the funds to implement HB 1472, AP computer science, are included.  The House puts an additional $1.96 million for school district technology and $2.54 million for career and technical education grants to schools, of which $600K is devoted to FIRST Robotics.

The House spends $17 million more on “education reform” efforts than the Senate; $452 million vs. $435 million.

On the higher education side, the Senate budget is slightly higher than the House’s but assumes a small reduction in tuition, while the House assumes a 3-5% tuition increase.  The House is more intentional than the Senate on STEM degrees, appropriating $16.5 million at UW and $10.39 million at WSU for computer science and engineering.  Western Washington Univ. gets $5.9 million for computer science.  The Senate budget is silent on those STEM specific appropriations.

WTIA will continue to track the state operating budget until it is finalized and voted on.  Hopefully that will come sooner rather than later.

Bill page for operating budget, SB 5034: http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/summary.aspx?bill=5034&year=2013

There are a wide range of provisions to raise money for education, including extending a B&O tax surcharge of 0.3% that was supposed to expire on July 1 is now made permanent.  This affects businesses in the “services” category–about half of the state’s employment base.  These companies including most in the technology industry will keep paying 1.8% B&O instead of going back to 1.5%.

The other very concerning provisions are sections 701 and 702 of HB 2038, which essentially eliminate the tax incentives for R&D that have been on the books since 1994.  The legislature’s desire for more tax revenue can lead them to cut off their to spite their face.  This is one of those cases where their desire to fund K-12 and higher education (a good thing!) will unfortunately come at the expense of high paying family wage jobs going to other states, if these sections become law.

The state’s high-tech industries, inlcuding software, digital media, life sciences, web services, e-commerce, wireless and others have grown dramatically since the early 90′s.  They have grown at a much faster pace overall than any other industries, inclduing aerospace, which has seen some big employment swings.  The tax incentives for R&D (a B&O credit and sales tax deferral) have made Washington more competitive, reduced the high expense of performing R&D and helped attract and retain high-tech companies in Washington.

Much of the underlying reasoning for the elimination of the R&D incentives is due to a flawed report produced by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee (JLARC).  This committee did an exhaustive examination of a large number of tax credits. exemptions and preferential rates.  They did a very good job of examining these tax issues but applied an impossible standard to the R&D incentives in their analyses.  They attempted to show causation between the B&O credit for R&D and jobs created.  Such a link is almost impossible to make since job creation depends on many factors–only one of which is the availability of a tax credit.

At the same time, the committee staff that did the report disclosed that the economic model they used was flawed.  Certain legislators have chosen to ignore that and look at a faulty conclusion instead.  Also ignored is the vast amount of information collected by the Dept. of Revenue submitted by those taking the R&D incentives. 

Here is the link to the JLARC report: http://www.leg.wa.gov/JLARC/AuditAndStudyReports/2012/Documents/2012TaxPreferenceReviewsProposedFinalReport.pdf.  It is quite long and detalied.  the high-tech/R&D section begins on page 99 through 115 (page 95 on the text).

Here is the link to the annual Dept. of Revenue report on tax incentives: http://dor.wa.gov/docs/reports/2012/DescriptiveStatistics2012.pdf Chapters 6 and 9 relate specifically to the two high-tech R&D incentives.

WTIA will be at the hearing Friday morning to oppose the elimination of the R&D incentives.  We are very sympathetic to the state’s desire to fund K-12 and higher education.  The state’s tech industries pay hundreds of millions in B&O taxes and hundreds of millions more in sales and local taxes.  We have grown hundreds of thousands jobs over a long period of time contributing greatly to the state’s prosperity and relevance. 

The state is going to experience about $2 billion in new revenue over the next two years just through organic growth.  It doesn’t seem necessary to eliminate the one good economic development tool for tech-based industries.

Simply put, adaptive learning is an educational method which uses computers and software as interactive teaching devices. The software adapts presentation of material to student needs, driven by responses to questions and tasks – essentially, a digital tutor that can serve learners of every subject, at every age and grade level.

The history of adaptive learning is a long one.  Since the 1960s, educator’s search for low-cost, individualized tutoring has led to the development of many adaptive learning technologies: computer-assisted instruction, adaptive hypermedia, intelligent tutors, computer-supported collaborative learning and individualized learning systems. But nothing was comprehensive enough to be able to truly tutor until now. What’s the next generation version of the technology? Intelligent adaptive learning.

Intelligent adaptive learning is the great leap forward.  The artificial intelligence movement of the 1970s envisaged a system that could adjust to the learner to deliver a better experience, and provided much of the behavioral and scientific research needed. At the time, the sheer cost and size of computers was an insurmountable barrier. Now, tech-enabled learning that combines cognitive modeling, big data augmented by learning analytics with sophisticated devices – intelligent adaptive learning – is here for just about anyone with a computer or other web-enabled device.

How data works to drive instruction, learning and remediation.  Intelligent adaptive learning’s hallmark is that data is continuously collected and the system is ‘learning as the learner learns.’ Continuous, real-time, actionable data that furnishes feedback for the student and the learning guardian, it’s  a  system that isn’t just gathering intelligence, it becomes more intelligent about the individual learner’s abilities and strategies,  and delivers a complex of interwoven benefits:

•             Intelligent analysis of a student’s solutions. The system interacts with the student by analyzing the data from the student’s actions in real-time as he solves problems, explores concepts, and makes decisions.

•             Interactive problem solving support. Extensive, detailed feedback provides prompts to the student that cause him to rethink his strategies and solutions, and ultimately correct misunderstandings or mistakes. Instead of simply “telling” a novice student what the “next step” of an expert’s strategy would be, the system emulates the actions of an effective tutor.

•             Curriculum sequencing. The system sequences the student’s progression through the modularized curriculum by providing the optimal planned sequence of curriculum units as the student demonstrates readiness.

•             Multiple learning experiences. The intelligent adaptive learning system provides multiple pedagogical approaches to teach each concept. Tasks are meaningful, at an optimal level of difficulty for the student, and contextualized in ways that enable students to build schemas so they can make sense of the concept within the world around them.

•             Customized presentation and pace. Diagnostic, adaptive assessments are embedded within each lesson to assess mastery in a fluid, transparent way that doesn’t create anxiety for students. As a student progresses through the system, his pace is determined by how quickly he demonstrates mastery of a concept, thus pace varies across learners.

Research shows accelerated learning velocity. There is ongoing research in intelligent adaptive learning, and so far, studies show that results from computer-based learning systems approximate those from human tutoring and increased learning in shorter periods of time compared to traditional teaching. For research, further information, and sources, take a look at this recent white paper: Intelligent Adaptive Learning.

Leveling the playing field. One of the exciting things about intelligent adaptive learning is that it provides a new paradigm for learning. It has a democratizing effect – it doesn’t matter what your zip code is, your background, whether English is your second language, or whether you’re an advanced or challenged student in the subject being learned. The system adapts to the individual learner and advances them in a way that is appropriate and non-threatening, and if the system is well designed, it should make learning fresh, fun and stimulating.

Intelligent adaptive learning now and in the future. For those who have already adopted intelligent adaptive learning systems, they have a diagnostic tool, a learning resource, and a source of valuable data that can be used on a variety of devices to optimize learning. Schools whose budgets are stretched, who struggle with class size, and are looking for ways to do more with less in these challenging times have reason to be optimistic. Every day, more research is being done and even greater advances made – there have been recent technologies released that use eye-tracking to inform intelligent adaptive learning systems – the future looks bright.

About the author:

Jessie Woolley-Wilson
President, CEO, & Chairman of the Board

Jessie Woolley-Wilson is Chair, President and CEO of DreamBox Learning®, the company heralded as a “game changer” in the eLearning sector by nationally renowned academic and technology pundits.  Before joining DreamBox Learning, Jessie was President of the K–12 Group at Blackboard where she led the company’s growth and development for the virtual and blended online learning market.  Prior to Blackboard, she was President of LeapFrog SchoolHouse. Jessie has also served on the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Technology and Education.  In 2012, she was named to the Forbes “Impact 15” list for being a disruptor of education and honored as a “Woman of Influence” by The Puget Sound Business Journal for making an impact in the education technology industry as well as the community.  In 2011, she was spotlighted as a “Best Leaders to Watch” in EdNET’s “Best for 2011,” a peer recognition program. Jessie received her MBA from Harvard Business School and her BA in English from the University of Virginia.  She is a 2007 Henry Crown Fellow of the Aspen Institute.

About DreamBox Learning

DreamBox Learning was founded in 2006 in Bellevue, Washington and launched its first online learning product in January 2009. The platform has won more than 20 top education and technology industry awards and is in use in all 50 states. DreamBox Learning Math offers a groundbreaking combination of intelligent adaptive learning, rigorous elementary mathematics curriculum, and motivating learning environment. The innovative DreamBox platform captures every decision a student makes while working in the program and adjusts the student’s learning path appropriately, providing millions of individualized learning paths, each one tailored to a student’s unique needs.

Take a look at sections 942 – 946 in the House of Representatives version of SB 5034, the operating budget bill.

http://apps.leg.wa.gov/documents/billdocs/2013-14/Pdf/Amendments/House/5034-S.E%20AMH%20ENGR%20H2378.E.pdf

Section 942 of the budget deals with public employee compensation.  This section gives most public employees a 1% raise if the state collects $200 million more in Feb. 2014 over Sept. 2012.  This is not listed in any of the particular state agency budgets but could cost millions if implemented.  Of course, if it is implemented it means that the state economy is doing well.

Sections 943-946 deal with information technology purchasing, acquisition, spending and IT security.  Section 943 spends over $41 million on various technology related state projects.  Much of this IT spend will occur in the state and WTIA members and others will get IT business from the state.  Most of this IT spending is required by statute or to implement new federal and state requirements.

Sections 944-945 lay out policies for IT purchasing and acquisition.  Section 946 deals with IT security and training.  In years past, too many state IT projects have come in over budget and way past due.  The legislature, along with the State CIO have developed new policies and procedures to ensure that state IT projects are on track.  The state CIO is a long time veteran of Washington’s tech sector.  Check their website: http://www.ofm.wa.gov/ocio/default.asp and their February 2012 technology strategy: http://www.ofm.wa.gov/ocio/technology_strategy_022312.pdf

 WTIA is pleased to see attention brought to how the state spends money on IT.  As much as we like Washington based companies to get state business, we are more concerned about a state that spends money on priorities, such as K-12 and higher education.

The Senate budget increases spending by $2.1 billion over the 2011-13 budget, with the bulk of the increase going to K-12 at $1.5 billion and an additional $300 million for higher education.  A few days earlier, Gov. Inslee released his budget “priorities”, which you can find here: http://www.ofm.wa.gov/budget13inslee/full_budgetpriorities.pdf 

Gov. Inslee proposes to spend $34.4 billion and calls for $1.2 billion in new taxes, closing “loopholes” and extending the B&O rate surcharge of .3%, keeping it at 1.8% for service businesses.  

The most ill-advised component of the Governor’s tax package is placing sales tax on custom software.  This was first introduced 3 years ago when the legislature raised taxes to balance the state budget.  WTIA led the charge against it and it was eventually dropped.  We are prepared to again lead the charge if this idea ends up in a legislative bill. 

The House of Representatives, http://www.leg.wa.gov/house/Pages/default.aspx, will introduce its budget on Wednesday, April 10.  It will likely look more like the Governor’s than the Senate’s.  We can anticipate at least $1 billion in new taxes or reducing tax incentives.  We fully expect there will be efforts to end the R&D tax incentives widely used by the IT and life sciences industries. 

There has been a great deal of scrutiny of the R&D tax incentives, especially since the Joint Legislative Audit Review Committee or JLARC, put out its tax preference study that took a very detailed, but flawed, examination of the impact of the R&D incentives.  The study found that the B&O credit, in and of itself, created a mere 454 jobs.  What the study did not do is look at the impact of the $7.7 billion in R&D is done in Washington, how many jobs that created, how much tax revenue was generated from that activity and other spinoff benefits. 

As anyone in economic development will tell you is that tax incentives are only one criteria for attracting and retaining companies and jobs.  While WTIA is certainly willing to entertain changes to the R&D incentives, we will firmly defend them as an important economic development tool that keeps Washington competitive with other states and regions. 

The JLARC report is here:  http://www.leg.wa.gov/JLARC/AuditAndStudyReports/2012/Documents/2012TaxPreferenceReviewsProposedFinalReport.pdf.  The biggest problem is the flawed economic model they used to measure the impact of the B&O credit (the report ignored the impact of the sales tax deferral).  See page 97 and forward for the discussion of the R&D incentives. 

For an alternative view, see the Washington Research Council’s brief on the high-tech industry: http://www.researchcouncil.org/docs/PDF/WRCEconomics/VibrantTechSectorFinal.pdf.  This provides a more comprehenisve view than the narrow JLARC report. 

In other legislative developments, HB 1472, the WTIA-supported AP Computer Science bill, got a favorable vote in the Senate Ways and Means Committee this afternoon.  Unfortunately, the Committee Chair, Sen. Andy Hill, http://www.leg.wa.gov/senate/senators/Pages/hill.aspx, stripped a couple of key sections from the bill relating to grants for schools to expand AP Computer Science and setting up a task force to deal with at the computer science professional shortage. 

We are still very supportive of the bill and appreciative that it is still moving through the legislature but will try to restore those two sections as the bill winds its way through the Senate.  You can read the bill and other information here: http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/summary.aspx?bill=1472. 

Another interesting bill is SB 5211, http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/summary.aspx?bill=5211, dealing with passwords for social networking sites.  The orginal bill prohibited an employer from asking for an employee’s or prospective employee’s social networking site password.  Amendments were sought by the industry for narrow exemptions where an employer was conducting an investigation of a data breach or fraud or potential illegal activity. 

A fair amount of confusion, along with opposition from the ACLU, prevented the amendments from passing, although the bill still passed the House Labor and Workforce Development Committee, http://www.leg.wa.gov/house/committees/LWD/Pages/default.aspx.  WTIA will keep its eye on this bill to make sure it works for both employees and employers.