In the 21st century, Americans will continue to embark on a journey of historic change in which new information technologies will renovate and redefine education and society.

The Institute for Learning Technologies, was established in 1986 by Teachers College and Columbia University. It has been at the forefront of the movement to integrate technology in education through innovative projects, and seminal research (under the visionary leadership of Dr. Robert McClintock). The Institute seeks to advance five basic objectives:

·         Policy Formation: ILT aims to sustain public policy initiatives that rally broad coalitions of interested parties from academia, cultural organizations, government and industry groups in order to transform education through the use of information and communications technologies and networks.

·         Formative Research and Evaluation Increasing the use of scientific evidence in decisions about learning technology design and use; develop learning technologies that use the latest technology developments and that are validated by research.

·         Technology Configuration: ILT seeks to configure advanced technologies in everyday educational settings, community and cultural organizations, utilizing technology architecture which allows students and teachers to have direct electronic access to all the resources of their culture and surrounding environment.

·         Professional Development: ILT works to help teachers adapt to a setting in which students will exert increasing control over their educational work, and to help educators develop a pedagogy based on posing powerful questions to students, guiding student inquiry rather than delivering knowledge to students.

·         Curriculum Innovation: In collaboration with diverse scholars, ILT designs projects that advance learning-by-doing, inquiry-based education, project  assessment methodologies, and ways to facilitate autonomous study.