District Technology Plan

My district does not have a published technology plan so I used the plan of a neighboring district. The technology plan is focused on continual improvement, the plan will be reviewed quarterly the district level, and yearly on the campus level. There is money budgeted specifically for changing technology and addressing needs that are not foreseeable. Staff development will not be static, but directed by the reviews and consistent with the needs of staff, students and other stakeholders. Continual assessment of needs will allow for a quick response to changes. The plan was non-specific on staff development; this reflects their willingness to address the latest technologies. The plan has a detailed plan for appropriately grouped grade levels which follows the TEKS for each grade level so that the 8th graders are prepared to take the technology assessment prescribed. The district implemented a budget that will allow it to: “refresh” the infrastructure, provide for staff development; equipment, purchase new technologies, and provide for the proper implementation of current and future technologies. The plan is focused on student. The campuses are aligned vertically and the campuses are given the power to move assets based on need of the campuses with their group. I think the overall plan is specific enough to provide structure, but flexible enough to address what is an ever-changing landscape in real-time. The district has empowered its technology leaders to lead the district into the future.

Department of Educational Technology Plan

The technology plan is focused on two goals, ensuring all students graduate from high school prepared for college or careers and increase the college graduation rate. There are five key areas, learning, assessment, teaching, infrastructure and productivity. In a shift from traditional educational philosophy learning is the first area addressed which equates to planning with end in mind. The learning is student centered, each student should be presented with a core set of competencies, beyond that the student is empowered to control their own learning, and the learning is focused on 21st century capabilities. The assessment piece of this plan is focused on a continuous improvement loop to continually shift the learning based on the needs of individual students. Teaching shifts from sharing information to connected team teaching where the educator as a professional is connected to the data and resources necessary to provide the appropriate learning opportunities for all students, assessment of teacher competencies and professional development opportunities will be key. In order for this plan to work an infrastructure that supports this 24/7 connected learning must be present. This plan calls for education to be “redesigned” to fit the productivity model, many long held educational beliefs will have to be re-shaped to fit 21st century realities, productivity in the educational realm is not much different from business, using your resources wisely to produce the best product. The focus on learning in this plan is impressive; unfortunately, I question whether the system can be redesigned to accommodate all the recommendations.

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Assessing Teachers

Goal setting can be divided into four main parts, identify the need, develop a plan, implement the plan, and finally evaluate the plan.  Each of the four steps is vital to the plans success.  Although assessment is often thought of as a dirty word it is essential, how do we know if our plan is successful if we do not evaluate?  Teachers in the State of Texas are expected to meet the SBEC standards regarding technology, in order to know if they have meet them an assessment is necessary.   When one looks at the Standards it becomes apparent that assessment will need to be administered in a variety of formats, both formal and informal.  The STaR chart is an assessment of both the school and the teacher’s current level of performance in reference to technology; this is a tool that could be used as part of the assessment process.  Additionally, teachers should have at least the knowledge that he students exiting 8^th grade are expected to possess, teachers could take the 8^th grade technology assessment to measure this.  I think it would take a battery of assessments to evaluate individual teacher’s current level of performance accurately.  When the data is collected then the real work would begin, how do we address any needs that are identified?   There should be campus technology leadership in place to implement a plan of ongoing technology education and integration.   Since technology changes every day, the evaluation process of teachers, students and other assets should be ongoing.