Technology Standards for School Administrators
Technology Lessons from the Central Office
Leading Curriculum and Technology Use
Curriculum Director Rick Tan rises early in the morning and checks his
personal digital assistant (PDA) for the calendar of the day's events
and appointments. He logs on and checks email and then syncs his computer
to his PDA. Upon arriving in the office he moves his work to his office
workstation, checks voice mail and email, and responds. His first appointment
is an 8:30 a.m. budget meeting with some staff physically present and
others connected via compressed video. The department budget is projected,
and changes are made simultaneously on the screen and on the server via
wireless connectivity. Participants interact via voice and video and by
sharing data and text using a collaborative software package. Everyone
leaves the meeting with new budget figures at their fingertips whether
on a laptop or PDA.
After a quick calendar check, Mr. Tan proceeds down the hall to his next
scheduled appointment, a district accountability meeting. District program
leaders, participating at local and remote sites, download district performance
reports, analyze the data in smaller focus groups, and report out areas
of acute district concern. As participants brainstorm various plans of
action to address areas of identified need, Rick uses concept-mapping
software to construct an organizing framework for the ideas generated.
Following the meeting, he posts the plans for review and comment on the
district intranet within an online discussion area prepared earlier in
the week.
On the way back to his office, Rick checks for new email. As he prepares
for a lunch meeting with the association of local realtors, Mr. Tan reviews
his presentation summarizing recently published school performance data
and highlighting the newly adopted district reading program. Curriculum
Director Tan uses multimedia and presentation software to present a brief
program overview and to introduce the new reading standards Web page.
The presentation also includes a live link back to a first grade classroom
for a peek at a demonstration lesson.
On the way to his office, Rick stops for an initial meeting with university
personnel to plan graduate-level Master's Degree offerings delivered from
local school sites and distributed via compressed video and Web-based
courses. He logs on and shares with university personnel several model
online programs he has researched during the previous week.
Upon returning to the office, Mr. Tan meets with the P-12 Curriculum
Committee to discuss the progress of the student assessment/electronic
portfolio project. He uses his own prepared Web pages to show examples
of student portfolios gathered from other districts, and he invites the
committee to browse these at their leisure.
Meeting with a group of middle school teachers after school, Rick joins
the review of model standards-based lessons developed to demonstrate the
use of technology to better address district curriculum priorities. The
lessons have been posted temporarily on a password-protected district
intranet site. Mr. Tan facilitates the group's selection of a committee
to “jury” proposed lessons for posting on the district intranet, and the
meeting adjourns.
Rick returns to his office and sends email to all district principals
with an attached announcement of next week's principals' meeting and a
private Web site address through which principals are to submit next year's
professional development plans for review and approval. Before he leaves
for the day, he logs on to the district intranet and digitally approves
purchase orders received that day for curriculum support materials.
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