Kansas University’s School of Education appears to be making strides related to technology that perhaps other schools should emulate.

It was announced last week that KU’s Edwards Campus would begin offering, through the School of Education, a new master’s degree program in educational technology, taking advantage of partial support from the Johnson County Education Research Triangle sales tax.

The new program is intended to help professionals gain skills in writing and designing online resources for organizational training and education, and enables students to choose among multidisciplinary offerings in education, communications, engineering and other fields, although the core feature will be technological specialization, KU officials said.

“Technology is infecting all aspects of our culture. Businesses have a need for people who understand the technology,” said Rick Ginsberg, dean of the education school, in explaining the decision to offer the new master’s program.

The school, which also offers degrees in educational technology on Mount Oread, is itself using technology, in addition to teaching about its use. Its highly regarded special education department is moving rapidly into an online delivery model and will be the first to offer a special education program online.

With the help of Illinois-based educational technology company Everspring,

KU will begin offering an online master’s degree in special education this coming spring. The partnership with Everspring eventually will produce 15 new online graduate degree and certificate programs, all within the School of Education. KU Online currently offers just two fully Web-based programs.

“We’re positioning ourselves to move to the front of a pack that we haven’t been in the front of before,” Ginsberg told the Journal-World earlier.

Ginsberg said launching the expansion with graduate-level education programs makes sense because they are geared toward educators who often work full time.

Congratulations to Ginsberg and his colleagues for their enthusiasm and vision and their determination not to be complacent even about the special education master’s program, which U.S. News & World Report ranked No. 1 among public U.S. colleges and No. 2 overall in 2013.