{"id":937,"date":"2011-08-23T15:02:03","date_gmt":"2011-08-23T19:02:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/?p=937"},"modified":"2011-08-23T15:02:03","modified_gmt":"2011-08-23T19:02:03","slug":"can-technology-solve-school-funding","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2011\/08\/23\/can-technology-solve-school-funding\/","title":{"rendered":"Can Technology Solve School Funding?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_942\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 150px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Florida State Rep. Jeff Brandes, a Republican from St. Petersburg.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2011\/08\/brandes.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-942\" title=\"brandes\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2011\/08\/brandes.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"200\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Florida House of Representatives<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Florida State Rep. Jeff Brandes, a St. Petersburg Republican.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Technology could provide low-cost solutions for school districts struggling with tight budgets.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s what Pinellas County state <a href=\"http:\/\/www.myfloridahouse.gov\/Sections\/Representatives\/details.aspx?MemberId=4506&amp;SessionId=70\">Rep. Jeff Brandes<\/a>, a Republican, said at a taping of WUSF&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wusf.usf.edu\/news\/program\/florida_matters\">Florida Matters<\/a> this week. The show is looking at school issues as students head back to class.<\/p>\n<p>Brandes believes schools can use technology to stretch their budgets. New revenue is unlikely because a tax increase is off the table, he said, and the economy is still slowly recovering from the Great Recession.<\/p>\n<p>Brandes sits on the policy-setting <a href=\"http:\/\/www.myfloridahouse.gov\/Sections\/Committees\/committeesdetail.aspx?SessionId=70&amp;CommitteeId=2591\">House education committee<\/a>, and said he favored both virtual charter schools and more widespread use of Apple iPads.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->Some Florida districts are already using the $500 iPads <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/news\/local\/florida\/os-ipads-lake-minneola-20110727,0,3594240.story\">in place of textbooks<\/a>. Virtual charter schools would allow private and non-profit firms to operate online schools. Students taking virtual classes cost <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2011\/08\/22\/virtual-schools-expand-students-network\/\">23 percent less<\/a> than those in traditional brick and mortar schools, according to one estimate.<\/p>\n<p>Brandes believes the devices will drop in price and become more affordable, and that providers might be willing to provide wireless Internet connections to schools or students.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We need to be pushing the envelope of innovation,&#8221; Brandes said.<\/p>\n<p>What do you think are the possibilities? What other technology should schools consider? Does this ignore larger questions about school funding?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Technology could provide low-cost solutions for school districts struggling with tight budgets. That&#8217;s what Pinellas County state Rep. Jeff Brandes, a Republican, said at a taping of WUSF&#8217;s Florida Matters this week. The show is looking at school issues as students head back to class. Brandes believes schools can use technology to stretch their budgets. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[1036,1028,1050],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=937"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":947,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937\/revisions\/947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}