TCO entry

Beacon and technology: Do they mix?

Technology at Beacon is a very interesting discussion. First of we are a self-contained K-12 school with emotionally impaired students. Many of the students have dual diagnosis with some sort of learning disability as well. Many of these students would benefit greatly from a technology program. Secondly, we have teachers that have been here for over 25 years that still use pen and paper for grades/attendance and refuse to integrate any technology into their curriculums. Then you have the newer teachers (there are only 2 of us that have been hired in the last 4 years) that really want to use technology to the fullest capacity, however we do not have the necessary equipment or the support to use it. Our tech committee is basically a person who is in charge of trouble-shooting, ordering and adding equipment. She tries her best with what she has available. We also have a computer specialist that does come in twice a week to do maintenance/systems type of updating.

In looking at our tech plan, we have completed and maintained a number of things, like upgrading our system, cords/lines etc. There are still a number of things that have not been addressed. The most considering to me is the professional development hours. We have had very few since I have been at this school. The ones we have are to inform us of a new program they have purchased, with little or no input from staff, and as an introductory hour. The staff presenting the information does not have training on the program and cannot answer questions that are proposed. It makes the PD hours very frustrating. In the article it stated that it takes 30-90 hours of training to become proficient in technology. A few hours of sub-par training does not achieve this goal. If we have a PD, it would be very beneficial to have someone with a large base knowledge on the subject area that can answer questions and help us to implement this type of material into our classrooms.

In looking at Beacon’s TCO, there is a program that they spent over $25,000.00 several years ago to purchase. After asking a number of teachers about the program, a few had never heard of it, a few had heard of it but had no idea how to use it and 2 had actually used it several years ago, but no not currently use it now. I also inquired about using it, but no one it the “tech dept” remembers how to use it or if we were even current on the program. This was very shocking to me. All of this money was spent with out regards to purchasing something that could still be used years later.