No More Teachers' Dirty Looks

Jeff Utrecht, The Thinking Stick, recently blogged about virtual high school initiatives in Washington, Oregon and Idaho. Very enlightening in view of what else I've been reading about advances in school architecture designed to be more in line with new pedagogies and collaborative environments. The blog also got me to envisioning the complete disappearance of schools--not schooling, but the physical buildings, and local, even state educational bureaucracies. Not only will the walls come down but political/educational boundaries will be eliminated and students will no longer be grouped, by age or otherwise. Initially, the new schooling systems may be commercial and competitive under the auspices of a federal department of curriculum compliance and assessment. How will students, parents, teachers and bureaucrats know when a student is ready to what? Matriculate? Graduate? What? Or could we leave the "what?" up to the business employment market? How could we handle social activities like sports, plays and concerts? Interesting.