Secretary's Column
By Dr. Rick Melmer
Department of Education

The world is flat – even in South Dakota!

It seems that everyone in a leadership position has been discussing Thomas Friedman’s book, “The World is Flat.” I recently had a “flattening” experience that I would like to share with you.

In late October, our son was participating in the State Cross Country meet in Rapid City. It was a beautiful day to run, and the AA race featured about 120 runners. We noticed that before the race, each runner was equipped with two computer chips that were to be worn on each shoe. They were attached by having the runner run the chip through a shoelace on each shoe. That allowed the runners to be timed as they began the race and also allowed a computer to record their finishing times as they crossed the finish line. I knew that our world was changing when I no longer saw the coaches and volunteers standing around the finish line with stop watches, eating sunflower seeds and telling lies!

The real revelation came after the race. As we were waiting for the team results, a few Pierre parents were debating whether our team was going to finish 5th or 6th. We knew that we were in a close competition with Sioux Falls Roosevelt for 5th place. About that time, a brother of one of the parents called her from Omaha, Neb. He told her that he was watching the Web site and that Pierre had lost the tiebreaker to Sioux Falls and had in fact finished 6th in the team competition. We all found it a bit amusing (and amazing) that someone in Omaha would know the results of a race before those of us standing at the finish line in Rapid City!

What does this story tell us? It tells us that the world our young people are growing up in is dramatically different than the world we lived in years ago. My son, who is 16, is not at all amazed with much of the technology that surrounds him. Why? Because he doesn’t know the way things used to be – he wasn’t alive in 1975 to experience what I experienced. Our customers – the students in our schools – will expect technology to be available in all facets of their education.

South Dakota has positioned itself well for advancing our technology uses in the future. Many superintendents seem eager to take the next step and initiate major technology purchases in their districts. I applaud these efforts and hope that the state can partner with districts as we attempt to flatten the world for our students.