Key Concept 8: Equity

I crafted my Funding Paper and Technology Planning Paper to address a very specific equity in technology issue for my school. Since the time period when I started the Education Technology program, our school moved back into a newly renovated building. Part of that renovation included a technology package which included integrated smart boards with projectors and AV systems in the classrooms and instructional art spaces. Desktop computers were installed for teacher use in all of these spaces, but only two new laptop carts, bringing our total number of laptop carts to eight, for a total of 240 student use laptops with a student population of 575. While the district provided all of this new hardware, they provided no training to the staff on how to use the basic functions of the equipment, or how to incorporate it instructionally into our content areas. Technology without training is both a waste of money and an equity issue for our students who deserve to use the technology that has been provided for them.

My internship plan as laid out in my Technology Planning Paper focuses on the training that the district did not provide, and the Funding Paper seeks out grant opportunities that would provide multiyear support for longer term professional development. By training teachers to use the technology we do have, as well as how to leverage the devices that students are already bringing to school, we can move beyond the vision of technology as only for testing. Our district only provides enough student technology to cover the ever increasing required number of electronic assessments. We run the risk of students and teachers, and more dangerously administration, as viewing technology in the classroom as something to be used for testing purposes, or preparation for testing. Not only is this not what researchers know to be the best utilization of technology for learning, but this would never deemed acceptable by students, staff and families of wealthier public and private schools.