Well this has been an eye-opening semester into the world of technology at the county level. Some things I expected to learn, but others were quite unexpected. It is amazing to see how much our technology department does with so few people working within the department. It was very interesting to be a part of the decision-making process for adopting new web-hosting software. Our group has learned a lot about a variety of products, and it is hard to begin to express exactly what we have learned. We learned that sometimes the industry leader is the industry leader because it had a good innovative product 10 years ago, and is still reaping the rewards of contractual agreements with school systems. Sometimes it is just too difficult to change to a new system, whether it be course management software or web-hosting software or some other major product, simply because so many people are already use to it, and it will take a lot of training to get everyone proficient at using the new product. Many systems stick with what they've got simply for that fact, even though they could get a more usable product for less money.
I admire our county for going through this process of evaluating the major options available, and moving forward to improve the technology that will in turn positively impact learning in the county. This internship has helped me to see that the technology department has a tremendous responsibility when choosing a new technology. Some of these technologies have annual contracts that greatly increase in monetary responsiblity each year. Our group did not even consider that as a factor when we first started this project, but now I will always look at the possiblity of drastic rate increases when I evaluate licensing agreements with annual fees.
After looking at all the different products, evaluating some individually, attending sales presentations, and discussing with other members of the group, I realized that stand-alone software is not always the best choice at the district level. When I am shopping for myself, I simply have to choose the best software for my needs and tastes. Then I can buy a bunch of individual pieces of software and use them as needed. Doing this at the district level becomes way too expensive. Even when there is a less expensive stand-alone solution for a particular application, that functionality is often duplicated in another package of products that has to be purchased for the entire county. With that said, it is still unfeasible to purchase products that meet all the needs of the county without duplicating some of the functionality. Our group worked to make recommendations that limit duplication as much as possible.
In the end, after comparing and contrasting the different strengths and weaknesses of these products, we narrowed it down to three main contenders, and gave rationale for favoring one of these products over the others. That information can be seen in our spreadsheet and our Internship Presentation in Teleplace. As of this writing, the county has not made a final decision yet, but is considering our recommendation when they make the final decision. It feels good to be a part of making this decision. In the future I will also recommend that teachers play a larger role in technology adoption decisions.
In addition to making recommendations for technology adoption, our group also got to look into some of the policies in place at the county level. The assignment for our planning class was to revise an existing policy, and this seemed to integrate with what we were looking at during this internship. Therefore, our group made recommendations for revising the student acceptable use of technology policy. We wanted the introduction of the policy to focus on the positives of using technology in education, but after researching other county policies across the state and nation, we also felt like our policy lacked some critical disciplinary action pieces as well as some other key points. The details of our suggested revision can be seen in Teleplace as well.
Overall, I think I learned a lot while participating in this internship, but more than that, I think I will be looking at future decisions through a wider lens than just how it affects me and my fellow science teachers in the classroom. I think that this experience will be invaluable to me when I move outside of the classroom at some point in my career.
