Breakthrough Learning in a Digital Age, the Cooney Centers Annual Leadership Forum

Forty years after the “War on Poverty” and twenty-five years after “A Nation at Risk,” a new forum was designed to advance a paradigm for learning that harnesses the largely untapped potential of digital media

Breakthrough Learning in a Digital Age is an ongoing forum that convenes thought leaders in science and technology, informal and formal education, entertainment media, research, philanthropy, and policy to create a new strategy for scaling-up effective models of teaching and learning for children. The forum showcases cutting-edge research — proven and promising models that are challenging decision makers in key sectors to help “refresh and reboot” American global leadership in education. Last year’s forum demonstrated two dozen creative projects that have breakthrough potential at a special “technology playground” that was established at the Googleplex. Children from Global Kids, and BAVC participated in the tech playground.

At the forum, the Cooney Center unveiled the Cooney Center Prizes, a national challenge competition designed to encourage innovation in children’s media through digital media. In addition, the Cooney Center released a new white paper on literacy and learning in a new media age, The Digital Promise: Transforming Learning with Innovative Uses of Technology by Michael H. Levine and Jeanne Wellings.

The forum was hosted by Google, Inc., in cooperation with forum founders: the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop, Common Sense Media, and the MacArthur Foundation.

Check out exclusive video interviews and photos.