The Texas Long Range Plan for Technology has some grand goals in sight for education. Yet, many of the barriers blocking us from reaching these goals are out of educators' hands. So as I looked closely at the four areas of our long range plan in Texas, I decided to choose the one area I am pursuing professionally, Leadership, Administration, & Instructional Support.
As future leaders, it is important to see how administrators shape and influence the use of technology on a campus. Similar to how we model expectations for our students, leaders need to model the use of technology with their staff. I have such an awesome administrator, and I never had stopped to reflect on how often technology is or isn't used in our staff meetings and professional development sessions. However, now that I have gone through the data presented in the STaR Chart and have given some thought on administrative support in the area of technology, I realize this is not a strength on our campus. Having said that, our administrators give us support and empower us in many other ways. I do not want this blog to give the impression that I am critiquing my leaders...I am simply reflecting on the data I have discovered.
When it comes to technology, the Administration & Instructional Support area encompasses vision, planning, instructional support, communication, budgeting, and online learning. State-wide, in 2009-2010, 55% of educators felt their campuses were performing at the Advanced Technology level. This was an increase from the previous two years which shows our administrators are backing technology more and more each year. 2010-2011's results were not posted on-line, so I have no way of following the trend to see if my estimation is correct. In this same year, McKinney ISD also rated themselves Advanced Technology. On our campus, in 2009-2010, Administration & Instructional Support was at its highest with a rating of 18. This is also the year that our administrators gave multiple opportunities for technology training. Unfortunately, the next year proved to have a decline in this area.
In 2010-2011, our campus rated Advanced Technology again, however, we dropped 3 points to a 15, one point from being Developing Tech. Planning, Budgeting, and Online Learning are the areas we dropped. According to the rubric found on the STaR website, our campus lacked confidence in our technology goals and objectives and felt we were not using money in a way that showed a technology focus. That year, our focus turned to critical and authentic reading and writing in all content areas. That is a great focus to have, however, we should not have abandoned digital tools. It should not be a "one or the other" philosophy. The question becomes, "How can we get students to think critically and read and write in all subject areas while integrating technology tools?" It's about working and planning smarter, not harder. Technology is not going anywhere...we must find a way to integrate these tools into everyday teaching. In order for us to improve in this area, we need to shift our thinking. In the article, "Real Projects in a Digital World," Boss and Krauss share a statement about an administrator. "To help them succeed, Tipton (the principal) ensures that her teachers have adequate time for planning, collaboration, and critical review of one another's project plans" (Ross 24). I'm curious what this school's rating would be in the area of Administration & Instructional Support. My guess...Target Tech.
I know technology is a weakness of mine, so I need to attend professional development in order to improve and begin feeling more comfortable using digital tools. As a future leader on a campus, I must make this a priority, so my staff knows the expectation is to integrate technology in our daily lessons. My staff will know this is my expectation because I model integrated technology.
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