Education among the nations is key for their success among other economies. The United States under the Obama administration it seems that it has focused on two goals:
•We will raise the proportion of college graduates from where it now stands [39%] so that 60% of our population holds a 2-year or 4-year degree.
• We will close the achievement gap so that all students – regardless of race, income, or neighborhood – graduate from high school ready to succeed in college and careers.
(http://www.ed.gov/sites/default/files/NETP-2010-final-report.pdf page V)
The plan uses continue improvement plan to make education more productive. It is looking to transform education based on technology infrastructure, learning resources, to lead the education to the 21st century and beyond.
It is interesting how these goals were established, These looks pretty aggressive goals, in times where there is budget cuts and where populations have changed. I see these college graduates so low, because a big part of the population can not simply get into college, because they are illegal citizens. That population has increased as they are looking for the American dream.
Another fact is the budget crisis that has been happening over the past days, if the Obama administration don't prioritize education in this budget crisis as a lead for reducing their debt in the future, students would have a hard time graduating from collegue.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Spring Branch ISD Technology plan
The Spring Branch ISD technology plan is a well detailed plan. It shows the pre-analysis they did in order to understand where the district was at in terms of technology. The district noticed some of their laptops were old and had different versions of the operating systems on them, they setup a target on proving teachers new equipment with the same operating system among them, in order to standardize.
They set up some goals, strategies and objectives in short, middle and long term to fulfill the term of 3 years for this technology plan. One of the things I noticed is the technology needs are focused in 4 different sections (Teaching and learning, educator preparation development, leadership, administration and support services, infrastructure for technology) aligned to STaR.
As Activ-classrooms are getting to the schools the need of improving the infrastructure, for providing a stable internet service, they are increasing it's bandwidth to support these new equipment as well as (VoIP among the district, Web 2.0technologies, Smart boards,etc). Due to all of these changes training and staff development is a need to integrate it to classroom. They will include staff development that is also aligned to SBEC.
I noticed it also mentions different types of evaluations some on going, in order to examine the districts success in the new implementations. Such as STaR results, Annual surveys, informal staff interviews, technology rich lesson plans, etc.
After reading their plan I can imagine where the district is heading and with clear vision, budget allocated, resources, etc.
Regards
Eduardo A.
______
Spring Branch ISD technology plan 2008-2011. Plan last edited 3/30/2008. retrieved 4/24/2011
Source http://www.springbranchisd.com/admin/ts/techplan/techplan0811.htm
They set up some goals, strategies and objectives in short, middle and long term to fulfill the term of 3 years for this technology plan. One of the things I noticed is the technology needs are focused in 4 different sections (Teaching and learning, educator preparation development, leadership, administration and support services, infrastructure for technology) aligned to STaR.
As Activ-classrooms are getting to the schools the need of improving the infrastructure, for providing a stable internet service, they are increasing it's bandwidth to support these new equipment as well as (VoIP among the district, Web 2.0technologies, Smart boards,etc). Due to all of these changes training and staff development is a need to integrate it to classroom. They will include staff development that is also aligned to SBEC.
I noticed it also mentions different types of evaluations some on going, in order to examine the districts success in the new implementations. Such as STaR results, Annual surveys, informal staff interviews, technology rich lesson plans, etc.
After reading their plan I can imagine where the district is heading and with clear vision, budget allocated, resources, etc.
Regards
Eduardo A.
______
Spring Branch ISD technology plan 2008-2011. Plan last edited 3/30/2008. retrieved 4/24/2011
Source http://www.springbranchisd.com/admin/ts/techplan/techplan0811.htm
Technology Assesments
Texas has committed to put technology in classrooms. Whenever you are implementing something you need to have a way to measure it and in this case, this will be STaR. Districts should know how their teachers are in terms of proficiency with the tools available. A way to do this is by providing a small question survey at the beginning of the year. I think its also important to have the survey be anonymous, this way teachers will feel more comfortable in responding it, leading to a better accuracy on the results.
I believe this survey should be based on basic technology skills as well as getting deep in specific details of the technology resources available. Once the results come the technology department, could focus on staff development on the areas where its needed, always focusing on how teachers will implement it in the classrooms? How to enrich students learning based in technology?
During that training period, staff should be able to get involved in technology, test the tools, play a little with them, at the end. Is how they will be proficient in the new skills, at the end of each staff development, including a small survey based on the skills learned. If for any reason there is no enough equipment for them to test it on that day, the survey could take place a week after. This way if teachers still have questions, the technology department could reinforce what was taught, either with and additional training, or in an email, web page, FAQ's questions sent, etc.
Regards
Eduardo
I believe this survey should be based on basic technology skills as well as getting deep in specific details of the technology resources available. Once the results come the technology department, could focus on staff development on the areas where its needed, always focusing on how teachers will implement it in the classrooms? How to enrich students learning based in technology?
During that training period, staff should be able to get involved in technology, test the tools, play a little with them, at the end. Is how they will be proficient in the new skills, at the end of each staff development, including a small survey based on the skills learned. If for any reason there is no enough equipment for them to test it on that day, the survey could take place a week after. This way if teachers still have questions, the technology department could reinforce what was taught, either with and additional training, or in an email, web page, FAQ's questions sent, etc.
Regards
Eduardo
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Webconference 4/20/2011
Hello again .!!
Yesterday, I had a conference online as part of my master. The conference reminded me when I used to work for a technology company. As part of my role I had to have a lot of web conferences, you met people from our the world (India, Argentina, US, etc). It was exciting as a fact!! You were able to make new relationships just with the use of the technology.
There are different ways to have a web conference, some people use Skype, other use net meeting or like yesterday we use Adobe. The idea stills the same, but these still have a room for improvement. I wonder how many years would it take to have a 3D conference like in the movie star wars? even when some conferences today had some connectivity problems.
These technology has a lot of benefits, makes a company save a lot of money in travel expenses, or can help a family feel closer. I remember last Christmas we had a Skype video conference with my family in Mexico, even when we were not able to be there in person we still were able to view the Christmas presents exchange through this technology.
I'm thinking when is technology going to change our lives again?
Until next time
Eduardo A.
Yesterday, I had a conference online as part of my master. The conference reminded me when I used to work for a technology company. As part of my role I had to have a lot of web conferences, you met people from our the world (India, Argentina, US, etc). It was exciting as a fact!! You were able to make new relationships just with the use of the technology.
There are different ways to have a web conference, some people use Skype, other use net meeting or like yesterday we use Adobe. The idea stills the same, but these still have a room for improvement. I wonder how many years would it take to have a 3D conference like in the movie star wars? even when some conferences today had some connectivity problems.
These technology has a lot of benefits, makes a company save a lot of money in travel expenses, or can help a family feel closer. I remember last Christmas we had a Skype video conference with my family in Mexico, even when we were not able to be there in person we still were able to view the Christmas presents exchange through this technology.
I'm thinking when is technology going to change our lives again?
Until next time
Eduardo A.
Hello to this blog!!
Hello world,
I remember when Facebook, Twitter, wikipedia and all these new technologies came out. I was kind of reluctant to be a part of that world... publishing my ideas, my thoughts... kind of making my private life, public. I really thought I could stay away from them until it has become part of my masters. I'm not sure yet if I like this idea of getting my ideas public or not.
If you write an email, you at least know who are you writing it to, pretty different than having something on the web where almost everyone can see it. Yes, I know that some of you might say "well check your settings and use the highest security possible". The thing is that one you put it on the web, its visible to almost everyone. Your co-workers, known people, colleges, bosses or future bosses, etc.
Being said that I hope this tool, really works for a good purpose. My intentions with this blog are:
1)Continue my preparation in my masters. 2) Build a tool that will help the sharing for best practices in teachers (websites, tools, tips, etc).
Thank you
Eduardo A.
I remember when Facebook, Twitter, wikipedia and all these new technologies came out. I was kind of reluctant to be a part of that world... publishing my ideas, my thoughts... kind of making my private life, public. I really thought I could stay away from them until it has become part of my masters. I'm not sure yet if I like this idea of getting my ideas public or not.
If you write an email, you at least know who are you writing it to, pretty different than having something on the web where almost everyone can see it. Yes, I know that some of you might say "well check your settings and use the highest security possible". The thing is that one you put it on the web, its visible to almost everyone. Your co-workers, known people, colleges, bosses or future bosses, etc.
Being said that I hope this tool, really works for a good purpose. My intentions with this blog are:
1)Continue my preparation in my masters. 2) Build a tool that will help the sharing for best practices in teachers (websites, tools, tips, etc).
Thank you
Eduardo A.
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