Who Are We?  Why Did We Create This Site?

This site was created by Michael Cain (michaelp.cain@dcdsb.ca) and Brian Chen (brian.chen@dcdsb.ca).  Michael and Brian are Technology Consultants for the Durham Catholic District School Board.

Over the past few years, Brian and Michael have become increasing concerned over the prevalence of free apps and freeware in the world of education.  When something is free, it ultimately means that you are the product.  In the context of education, this means that educators using freeware are unwittingly turning their students into products.

This site is an effort to provide educators with the knowledge and resources necessary for navigating the world of “Free”

This work rests on the following beliefs:

1. Technology enabled teaching and learning has a positive impact on student achievement, engagement and well being.
2. Digital technology and the Global Competencies are not mutually exclusive.  Students require opportunities to use digital technology in order to be prepare for living and working in the 21st Century.
3. Educators want to provide students the digital tools and resources needed to prepare students for our rapidly changing world, however limited resources result in educators using free apps and freeware. These free tools may:
   1. Gather and sell student data
   2. Expose students targeted advertising
4. The past, governments and school boards have been hesitant to provided educators with the guidelines, tools and training required to navigate the world of “Free”.

www.nothingisfree.ca evolved from 21st Century Shepherds: Stewards of Student Data, a writing project commissioned by the Catholic Curriculum Corporation.  21st Century Shepherds is a self-directed online course and can be found here: www.catholiccurriculumcorp.org/

A big thank you to the CCC for letting us use the Digital Checklist tool and the Who Owns the Data module from their 21st Century Shepherds course.

To Hear About the Potential Dangers of Exposing Student Data Click on the Presentation Below

The Cost of Free:

Use the arrows in the bottom right corner to navigate the slides and the play button in the bottom left corner to play each slide.