Education Technology: Where Does It Live?
Education technology does not have “home” in my district, and that is a sad, sorry fact. There is no job description for a District Technology Coordinator, because that position does not exist in my district. They used to have two technology integration specialists, but those positions were eliminated two years ago with budget cuts.
Here is the description of the job duties for a technology coordinator in a district of my size from The Technology Coordinator’s Handbook (p. 23-4),
- a mid-level administrator;
- with a staff of eight instructional technology specialist who provide professional development;
- they focus on instructional aspects of technology, and information technology is handled by other departments;
- their team helps develop technology plans for the district and write grants to secure funding for district initiatives.
Because education technology has been an “orphan” when we had tech specialists, they worked under the head of IT, rather than in curriculum. The problem there was that curriculum is a “power-base” in our district and by being outside of it, education technology was further marginalized. By all rights it should be embedded in the curriculum department, but they see no need for it, so we have a district of 50,000 students in a city of 500,000 (similar to the scenario in the text) with no district-wide vision of how technology can be used to further education goals with our students. We have an approved technology plan, but the reality is that most of the technology initiatives that have occurred in recent years have happened in isolation in individual sites. Meanwhile, neighboring districts have strategic plans that are district-wide and include technology, like integrating technology with IWBs, and have staffing to support training and teacher development. My district’s education technology training, by contrast, is provided solely by classroom teachers in addition to their regular duties for stipend pay.
The team that wrote a three quarters of a million dollar EETT competative grant was made up of myself, a middle-school resource teacher, the district IT Manager with a hired grant writer. That level of “expertise” is not unusual in a smaller district going for smaller grant amounts, but it’s a mighty thin expertise base for that amount of money from a district of our size.
Technology is part of curriculum.
In the end that is the only place it fits. I’m not talking about admin systems, but technology we employ to increase the efficacy of learning.
A district that hires a curriculum head that understands the synthesis of curriculum and tech tools is the most desirous combo.
Too many tech folk are all tech, and too many cirriculum and instruction folk take the same myopic view.
We didn’t have bio-geologists until the two disciplines synthesized.
As long as we have computer class and computer labs – ed technology is just a 21st century mimic of typing class.
The technology needs to be woven into the fabric of the curriculum, just like all the other critical ingredients: RtI, DI, Responsive Classroom, Inquiry-Based Learning etc.
Technology Integration is a popular mantra… buyt I am aiming for ET – educational transformation.
It would be nice to see my job as obsolete, lol. I still don’t sense that we’re heading there. I am fortunate that the IT department is as supportive of the work that I and others do, and don’t “get in the way” which happens in other districts, but you are right, it shouldn’t be that way.
– Job descriptions of ICT co-ordinators, directors, goffers, evangelists, head honchs .. http://www.shambles.net/pages/learning/technician/techjob/
– the trick to integrating anything into a school is to get it into the school development plan … the development plan informs the budget … capital/recurrent …. animal/vegetable/mineral
– the trick to getting into the development plan is to
…. convince the final author/decision maker that the item has the potential to impact on teaching and learning
…. plan it so far ahead that everyone says yes … and let it evolve (difficult with tech)
…. have the power of the community behind you … especially parents.
…. be open and transparent …. and very public
…. keep your sense of humour
— don’t write replies to Blog posts late at bight on a Sunday
We are fortunate to be in this age of transition between the industrial age and the information age …. these tesseracts of time used to be longer than a generations life time … now we are experiencing the whole evolution in our own … and not at the end yet.
If we see this as a headache/battle/frustration … or as an exciting opportunity/challenge to travel through it .. the ups and downs … is completely up to us as individuals.
Drat … I shouldn’t post on Sundays 😉
Have fun
more at http://www.shambles.net/ict
I hear ya about the blog posts on Sunday night, but that part of “how we see it” which implies choosing our attitude, I don’t know if I buy. It will help me, but it won’t change my district’s attitude towards tech, and until that changes, nothing will change. There are many things I can do to leverage change, but my attitude is but one small part.
Technology probably needs a “leading home” and a college apartment. The leading home ought to be in curriculum and learning, since that is what we do. The apartment could be in management/ communications/etc. My experience has been that it is usually the other way round with curriculum and learning stuffed into a very small apartment.
Hmm did you mean ALL of curriculum or the part of ed tech that is curriculum?
Alice,
We are in slightly better shape in Stockton. While we have never had the team of 8 integration specialists, we do have 2, and we are located and integrated with Curriculum. I have been in that role for 5+ years and the other on just about 3. It is critical as you say to be involved in curriculum as we are able to apply, tweak, inject some ed tech where appropriate and the other specialists see the value in what we have to offer as in our Moodle site which is a learning and resource center for teachers. The 2 tech specialists do the majority of the trainings throughout the district as it relates to tech, although we used the model you describe before my moving to Curriculum. We are able to keep a more clear objective and direction as it relates to ed tech purchases, or initiatives. We report directly to our Director of Curriculum as there is no longer a tech coordinator or administrator. The good news though is that our current Director of Curriculum is the former Admin of tech, Media, and Libraries so he has experience and knowledge there.
Frankly, I think the most important thing is having you with the curriculum folks, and having someone in charge there who has that background knowledge is great.
I love the folks in IT in my district, and they have been super supportive, but until curriculum gets it, it’s uphill all the way.
Thanks!