Teacher Rights and Responsibilities

1. Voluntary

• The unique challenge of teaching over interactive television requires that every effort be made to use volunteer teachers. Those with exceptional teaching techniques are encouraged to consider teaching over video conferencing.

2. Teachers shall personalize the interactive classes

• Teachers should and are encouraged to visit and teach from the remote sites once each semester. The cost of substitute pay and transportation for the teacher's visit is the responsibility of the home school site.

• The teacher should:

  • Follow the procedure in the home school for teacher leave.

  • Contact the remote site for permission to visit.

  • Notify the administrator at the home site as soon as possible if the visit needs to be cancelled or postponed.

• Teachers should schedule opportunities to gather all students involved in an interactive class. (Field trips, pizza party, etc.) Each local school district will assume transportation costs, responsibility for liability, and cost of its students.

• Teachers should schedule opportunities for private conferences and other necessary visits to remote sites.

• Teachers should develop effective teaching techniques that encourage cooperative participation of all students as a whole unit, rather than as separate site units.

3. Teachers shall schedule parent-teacher conferences for all students.

• Parent-Teacher conferences should be held via the interactive system in order to expose parents to the technology that is being used to instruct their child, unless the parent feels uncomfortable with it, then other arrangements would need to be made.

• Conferences may be scheduled over the telephone or at a common site as necessary and agreed upon by both the parent and teacher.

• Teachers are responsible for scheduling conferences as they determine necessary.

4. Teachers shall establish procedures for completing lab work for courses requiring laboratory experiments.

• Teachers shall provide advance written guidelines for remote sites for accomplishment of these objectives.

• Responsibility for expense and supervision of these activities will be assumed by each local district participating.

5. Teacher Training

• Teachers new on the two-way interactive system will be provided training prior to teaching students. This training will be the responsibility of the sending site and will consist of the following:

  • A. Introduction to the two-way interactive system

  • B. Equipment

    • (1) Identification and placement

    • (2) Operation

  • C. Procedures/Network Policies

  • D. Instructional Guides

  • E. User tips

6. Teacher Evaluation

• Teachers hired to teach over the two-way interactive network will be evaluated by the administration of the sending site. The evaluation instrument used will be determined by the sending site.

• The sending site administration is free to utilize input toward evaluation from network administration from receiving sites.

7. Time and Compensation

• Any release time or additional compensation for instructors teaching over the interactive network for training and/or class preparation will be determined by the originating site school district.

8. Time Management

• To maximize time on task, schedules must be coordinated. Each site should synchronize their bell system to allow the interactive class to function efficiently. When teachers are aware of a discrepancy in the bell system, they should contact the appropriate administrators to make the necessary adjustments.

• Weekly bulletins announcing daily schedule changes should be provided to sending and receiving sites in a timely fashion.