• School District Superintendent: Manages responsibility for the technology director/department and ensures efficient delivery of information system services and technology resources for users district wide. The Superintendent must guarantee that computers and technology efforts are consistent with the DIP’s goals as they relate to effective delivery of quality educational services for the students, parents, and the community.
• Technology Director: Responsible for the district-wide direction, coordination, integration and implementation of technology.
• Director of Curriculum: Responsible for the implementation and coordination of technology integrated and standards based instructional programs in classrooms, supervision of certificated and classified technology based professional development to ensure the ongoing implementation of high standards of instructional practice, services and assistance.
• Campus Principal: As the instructional leader of the school, facilitates the process through which instructional and technology personnel cooperatively plan and implement the educational program to meet learner needs. This process combines the technology and instructional programs as the school community moves toward common goals.
The principal, as instructional leader, is able to see all aspects of the district’s organizational plan for technology integration. He is able to monitor and assess the use of technology in his campus’s classrooms, library, and computer labs. He is responsible for providing teachers and integration specialists with the time and safe environment needed to collaborate and integrate technology in the classrooms. He is also responsible for ensuring that there is funding for technology, and that his campus is running as efficiently as possible with the resources available. In making this assessment, the campus principal will begin to understand how district policies and procedures are enriching/inhibiting quality instruction in the classroom. He will be able to make suggestions to the superintendent, technology director, and curriculum director to ensure that all parties are working together for student success.
• Technology Assistant/Help desk: Provides technology training and support; perform a variety of clerical duties in support of district technology goals; organize and coordinate office activities and communications.
• Network Administrator: Performs duties relating to the maintenance and support of the Instructional computer networks and related courseware at various school sites; assures maximum operational effectiveness of these networks by assisting in correcting operational problems; and does related work as required.
• District Computer Support Technician: Manage the installation and configuration of campus computer software; coordinate the installation and configuration of personal computer hardware and peripheral devices; perform related work as required.
• Technology Integration Specialist: Provides technology and curriculum just in-time and group support to teachers, students, parents and district support staff in the implementation of technology integration, project–based learning, collaborative instruction, information literacy, etc.
• Data Analyst/Assessment: Inputs, prepares, collects, and verifies data and refines a variety of computer generated reports.
• Campus Computer Technician: Provides first-level hardware and software technical support to school site and administrative personnel including classroom teachers and aides; query staff on various technological problems, analyze the responses and assist with the solution; research hardware and software problems/questions and respond to campus staff; effectively communicate step by step instructions; perform related work as required.
• Librarian: Ensures that students and staff become effective users of ideas and information; helps students acquire an appreciation of literature; works to establish a resource-based learning program in which the students are actively involved in their own learning; collaboratively plans and teaches information literacy skills alongside teachers.
• Attendance Clerk: Prepare and maintain student attendance data. Operate a computer with speed and accuracy to post student-related data and generate required reports. Provide back-up support to school office staff as time permits. Communicate with district staff responsible for other attendance-related functions, such as scheduling, testing, special programs, state reporting, truancy, etc.
• Teachers: Responsible for all aspects of the instructional process to ensure the success of all students. Implement the district curriculum, assess student mastery of concept objectives, and innovate/integrate technology as a way to individualize instruction and meet the needs of 21st century learners.
Part 2: Professional Development Planning
Based on the Week 3 report, it becomes apparent that my Campus Improvement Plan (CIP) is lacking in goals for successful technology integration. Related to this is the fact that my campus STaR chart data from the 2009-2010 school year shows weakness in patterns of classroom use, online learning, access to professional development (including professional development for online learning), and students per computer. In order for the CIP to be successful in improving student learning, it must take all sources of data into consideration including the STaR chart.
To address this issue, the district should develop on online course that can be used to inform all stakeholders in the analysis and use of the most common resources for school performance data. These resources should include AEIS, AYP, and STaR chart reports. Members of the SBDM committee should be required to take this course as a prerequisite for developing the CIP to ensure that state and district technology goals are being addressed at the campus level. In addition, the district should purchase an online professional development system, such as PD360, to further develop and achieve the DIP goal of “Providing seamless integration of technology through just-in-time training and support to all personnel.”
Another DIP goal, which should therefore somehow be included in a CIP, is “to provide 21st century technology tools for teachers and administrators.” As a part of the professional development plan, teachers should be required to complete at least one training in the “technology” domain a year. Again, with a program such as PD360, this type of professional development could be ongoing, collaborative, and relevant to teacher’s individual needs/level of experience. It would also be valuable to develop a campus technology team that consists of teachers who are “digital citizens”. This team could be responsible for identifying useful technology tools and resources for their colleagues, and coach the “digital immigrants” in their implementation. This team should attend educational technology conferences and bring new information back to share with their campus. This team would be responsible for informing the principal of technological needs on the campus and of organizational breakdowns that require immediate attention (such as outdated Acceptable Use Policies).
Before teachers are able to integrate technology tools and use Web 2.0 in their classrooms, they have to possess the necessary hardware. My campus scored very low in this area, as I mentioned before, the student to computer ratio is unacceptable. As I referenced in my report, Dr. Abernathy summed it up when she said in the week 3 round table interview that principals need to fund teacher’s technology ideas. For this reason, I believe that administrators should receive professional development in the area of financial resource gathering and financial data analysis for technology. This training should address related issues including the rapid development of new technology/outdating of old technology, grant writing, and development of local partnerships as a form of gaining technological software and hardware support.
Part 3: Evaluation Planning for Action Plan
At the end of the current school year, the new STaR chart data will be analyzed with the expectation that there will be improvement in the classification areas of patterns of classroom use, online learning, access to professional development (including professional development for online learning), and students per computer. A list of professional development courses offered throughout the year should be gathered and analyzed for courses that are offered online, improve the gathering, analysis, and use of data from a variety of sources, and a professional development plan that maintains technology training requirements for teachers. All campus’s SBDM members must possess certificates proving that they have completed a course on data collection and analysis for campus improvement. The number of professional development opportunities offered online should be at least 25% for the first year, and 50% the second year. Each campus should have a “technology cadre” by the end of the first year. This cadre must provide monthly minutes of topics covered and campus technology issues addressed. These minutes must also be submitted to the principal of each campus. The main responsibility for the technology cadre’s first year of existence will be to develop a comprehensive technology action plan for the campus that aligns with the campus action plan and district technology plan. The principal’s management of technology resources will also be analyzed. Principals will be expected to encourage teachers to write grants for desired classroom technology and to begin to build relationships with community businesses to focus on integrating career based technologies into the classrooms. District policies (including cell phone and acceptable use) must have been reviewed and updated, and continue in this fashion on an annual basis. Achieving each of these goals should result in an increase in AEIS and AYP data, and if nothing else will ensure that 21st century students are receiving more of the type of technology integration that they crave.
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