Technology Plans
Many schools and school districts have already
produced ‘Tech Plans’ which address the main issues involved in
computer education. These plans are central to the development of
computer use in schools and in many cases are requirements linked to the
provision of funding and/or other resources.
Typically a Tech Plan will include the following
elements:
-
A
statement of Learning Goals (linked to State and Federal Technology
goals)
-
Strategies
for assessment and evaluation
-
A
staff development strategy
-
Hardware,
Networking and Telecommunications
-
Software
-
Support
Systems
-
Funding
In simple terms The Tech Plan describes:
-
What
children should know, understand or be able to do.
-
How
a school will know if successful teaching and learning has taken
place.
-
The
infrastructure required to make this possible.
|
Kimball
Kindergarten |
Kimball
school staff and students will use technology to support
lifelong learning and to meet academic standards. All members of
the Kimball community will use technology for researching
information, producing and presenting projects and communicating
with the wider world.”
From
the Kimball Elementary School Tech Plan
|
Schools and Districts had access to a great deal
of advice and guidance to help them prepare their tech plans. In Kelso
District for example a development group had been formed to produce a
plan which in turn would inform school plans. The group included class
teachers, school principals, technology specialists and senior members
of the District’s management team including representatives with
responsibilities for finance, buildings and equipment. This was a very
effective mix as it guaranteed that all aspects required for the
successful implementation of computer education could be addressed in a
co-ordinated way. The inclusion of school-based staff also resulted in
some very excellent staff development and certainly facilitated the
creation of tech plans in the schools represented.
Educational
Service District 112 offered Kelso schools considerable support via
courses, consultancy and documentary guidance. Much of this had been
posted on the Internet in a variety of formats such as Powerpoint
presentations, template files and Adobe Acrobat documents (.pdf files).
An online database had been created to record any school’s inventory
of hardware. This is managed at District level and schools are only
required to complete and then maintain an existing data set.
Video-Conferencing was also used regularly as a means of communication.
I was most impressed by one conference between the Service District and
26 School districts – high-quality information presented with
excellent technical quality and no technical glitches!!
Tech plans are designed to clarify learning goals
and the infrastructure required to deliver these. They also communicate
very clearly the expectations and obligations of each level of the
system. Scottish schools would certainly benefit from such an integrated
approach.
Funding
ICT is funded in a wide variety of ways:
-
Federal
Funding: the United States Department of Education funds ICT via
a range of national programmes such as Technology Innovation
Challenge Grants, the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund and
Learning Anytime Anywhere Partnerships. A national budget for these
programmes of almost $3 billion was set for 2000. Washington
State’s share of this was $33.6 million.
-
State
Funding: core funding for schools related to student roll is
provided by the State and ICT receives a portion of this. In
addition Washington State has introduced a range of specific
programmes such as the Teldec
Grant programme. (see Appendix
5)
-
District
Funding: a school district has the right to raise extra money
for schools via a local levy which is added to local taxes.
-
Private
Funding: a great many grants are available from organisations
such as The
Gates Foundation.
In addition to the above there are a variety of
ways in which funding is provided in kind. These include:
-
‘e-rate’:
schools enjoy cheap internet access because of the e-rate where up
to $2.25 billion annually is available to provide a discounted
telecommunications services to schools and libraries. Discounts
range from 20% to 90%, depending on economic need and location. The
level of discount is based upon the percentage of students eligible
for participation in the federal free and reduced price school lunch
programme. Each school district must have an approved Tech Plan to
be able to access e-rate.
-
Donated
Computers Scheme: this scheme
encourages businesses and industry to donate used computers to
schools. Considerable concern was expressed by a number of
school-based staff about this initiative as they felt that the
computers concerned were often older and less powerful than new
models.
-
Other
Donated Technology: a number of
companies also donated other materials and equipment. For example,
Hewlett Packard had given approximately 35 palettes of donated items
to schools in the ESD 112 area over a six-month period. This had an
estimated value of $2,646,000 and included items such as ink
cartridges, transparencies and printer paper.
-
Other
Services: schools received free or at
reduced cost a variety of services such as technical support,
repairs and training from School Districts and Educational Service
Districts. Washington State had also negotiated a number of
contracts with hardware and software suppliers to provide discounted
hardware and software to schools.
Hardware
All schools I visited had similar arrangements
for hardware provision:
-
Most
computers in each school were networked and had Internet access.
-
Nearly
all schools had at least one computer lab with about 30 machines.
-
Most
schools had a library with a number of computers available for use
by children.
-
Other
computers were dispersed in classrooms throughout the school.
-
Most
schools had a mixture of PC and Apple Macintosh computers. These
co-existed quite happily although there were issues surrounding file
compatibility, software provision and training.
There was considerable diversity in the age and
models of computers. These ranged from brand new Pentium 3 PCs to 10
year old Apple LCIIs. It was interesting to note that older Apple
computers had borne the test of time rather better than their PC
counterparts!
Classroom Computers
Some classrooms where the class teacher had been
awarded a grant were exceptionally well resourced. Grants had been
awarded mainly by the Gates Foundation and TELDEC (Technology and
the Essential Learnings Developing Effective
Classrooms). For more details of Gates and TELDEC grants see
Appendices 5 & 6.
A typical Gates Grant or Teldec classroom will
receive 1 computer per four children, a laptop computer for teacher use,
a software bundle, a digital camera, a digital video camera, a scanner,
an inkjet printer, a zip drive, a floppy drive, a data projector, a
document camera/reader, VCR and monitor.
However this created significantly different
levels of provision within any school. It was not unusual for children
to transfer from a grant classroom with a very high level of provision
to another with a single computer. This issue had been recognised and at
all levels there were considerable efforts being made to redress this
imbalance both via additional resource provision and by providing a
range of training and pedagogical support for teachers in classrooms
with limited hardware.
This diversity also challenged some of my
assumptions about pupil/computer ratios. These ratios are normally based
on a simple sum ie the number of pupils in the school divided by the
number of ‘countable’ machines. The result may sound attractive but
it is only a notional ratio as many of a school’s computers are not
accessible to all pupils all the time. Children only have limited access
to teachers’ machines and communal machines (eg in the library or
computer lab) yet these machines are invariably counted in the overall
ratio. This is unhelpful as it can disguise very differing levels of
access within any school.
Many classrooms were not ideally suited to
accommodate computers. Room size and suitability of furniture were major
issues. Many teachers had not considered aspects such as ideal location,
the height of computer furniture and cable management. In most cases
computers were placed together in a group at one end of the room.
Technical Support, Repairs and Maintenance
Arrangements for this area were rather ad hoc and
schools relied heavily on support from their own tech specialists and
from district staff. In one Seattle school a student from the University
of Washington had been appointed on a part-time basis.
Training
Training is provided at State, Service District
and School District levels. A wide variety of types of training was
available ranging from skills-based training in specific packages to the
application of ICT in the curriculum. Although many different courses
were available these fell into 4 main categories:
-
Integrating
Technology in the Curriculum
-
Internet-related
training eg accessing the Internet, creating web pages, using e-mail
-
Multimedia
applications eg Powerpoint, Hyperstudio, Kidpix
-
Skills-based
training in specific applications eg Word, Excel
Tech Specialists in schools provided some
training for other staff. This often took place in after-school
sessions. Longer courses were offered by school districts and service
districts. Summer Schools were also available.
Training was also delivered via many
of the grants which were available. See Appendix
5: The TELDEC Grant for more information.
Continue..............
 |
