Power Failure in the Age of Technology

There is nothing more frightening in the 'Age of Technology' then the loss of power. We had a power outage last night that lasted for more than an hour. Other than reading a book on my iPhone I did not know what to do with my time? My kids where happy playing their DS's and iPods, bouncing back and forth with no pause. I was thinking alright How do I cook dinner without a microwave and an electric stove? I know I will go out to dinner, opps the power is out there too. Lucky for me the power came on before me electricity addiction killed me. But the ramifications didn't end there.

When I got to school the next day I had to deal with the entire network that crashed and was not coming up. Telling the teachers around the school that the network would be down for awhile drew stares of hate and horror that I haven't seen since my last visit to the dentist office. Has our society and education in particular become so attached to computers and the internet that they have a hard time working with out them? I grew up in the transition point where computer technology began to make in roads into education about the time I graduated from high school. Now 25 years latter education cannot function without computer technology. Don't believe me teachers? Try spending a week without using any technology.

I wouldn't even try, and not because it is my job, but because I have realized I have fallen behind the technology curve and would fall even more buy just losing a week. Your laughing at me now and calling me an over-reactor. I thought I was ahead of the curve with an IT Masters and working with IT everyday, but just attending ASTE this spring, a conference I haven't attended in 5 years, showed me how far I am behind. What is really scary is the speed at which society is changing. In less then 5 years I have gone from being on the curve to falling off the wave and so have all the teacher at my school.

Mt. Edgecumbe is a good school and promotes technology as one of strengths that makes it a good school. We have an overabundance of computers at our school, about 500 for 400 students, but they are only really being used for word processing and Internet research. Only one or two teachers have a web page, My Space is their enemy in class and not their friend, and most have never used Google Reader or Twitter as a research tool. BUT THE KIDS HAVE!!!! and they have been using them for several years. I feel like a drowning man on his third gasping breath drowning on the tidal wave of technology.

Question for the audience: Am I just getting old or is technology really advancing that quickly? Are we so dependent know that we could never go back? Is technology more addicting that heroin? Let me know.