Announcing: eLearning Inside’s Op-Ed Section

It has been so inspiring to see hardworking distance educators not only continue their great work but go above and beyond to offer their time and advice to other education stakeholders making an effort to maintain instructional continuity. The best part about editing for eLearning Inside—in times of health or pandemic—has always been hearing from the amazing, hard-working people who teach, code, develop, deploy, organize, and learn with education technology.

A wealth of #instructionalcontinuity resources are available for you. 3 main categories: #TeachingOnline, developing #continuity plans and comprehensive resource lists here: https://t.co/yfql3qPWZi #highereducation pic.twitter.com/c7dnVVcjRJ

— The Online Learning Consortium (@OLCToday) March 16, 2020

Our bandwidth, unfortunately, is never as big as we would like, and we inevitably need to turn down interviews and coverage involving worthy and interesting news. For that reason, we’re excited to announce the launch of a new Op-Ed section on our site. Starting today, we will be accepting submitted opinion articles from eLearning and edtech stakeholders.

We plan to give initial priority to opinion pieces involving coronavirus, but feel free to submit on any subject. Please keep reading for a description of what we’re looking for. Stay healthy, stay safe, and best of luck maintaining instructional continuity.

Best,

Henry Kronk

A shot of the New York Times' opinion section. — Leonardo Santamaria

eLearning Inside’s Op-Ed Section

For our Op-Ed section, we’re going to follow the model the New York Times set when they first launched their page in 1970. At the time, their editors wrote:

The purpose of the Op. Ed. page is neither to reinforce nor to counterbalance The Times’s own editorial position. The objective is rather to afford greater opportunity for exploration of issues and presentation of new insights and new ideas by writers and thinkers who have no institutional connection with The Times and whose views will very frequently be completely divergent from our own.

Who can submit?

We plan to accept (and hope to receive) Op-Ed submissions from anyone who has a stake in education technology and eLearning initiatives. Maybe you’re the CEO of an established edtech development company. Maybe you’re a 9th grade student with a unique take on your history teacher’s use of your school’s LMS. Maybe you’re a parent, teacher, edtech researcher, administrator, IT expert, community organizer, or non-profit leader. If you have interacted with education technology in some way, we want to hear from you.

What does an ideal Op-Ed look like?

We’re looking for opinion pieces that:

Take a strong stance on a relevant topic relating to edtech or eLearning
Back up this strong stance with some form of reliable evidence
Are between 500 and 1,000 words in length
Prioritize opinion over self-promotion*

*We’ll be happy to include links to sites and initiatives (and we would love it if you linked to our post as well) but these articles should first and foremost engage with ideas, topics, trends, and the edtech community.