A Different View

Decisions
With Microsoft Office 365 Personal adds running lately, articles concerning the mining of student data, and the forever debate on which cloud suite to choose, I began reflecting on my district's office suite timeline. Maybe we have traveled a different road than others, but the decisions along the way I feel have been well thought out, even if the timing was not always perfect. Since 1998 we have run on four different platforms of office suites roughly:

Microsoft Office/Exchange: 1998-2000

Sun's Star Office/E-mail: 2000-2002

Open Office/Open Webmail: 2002-2005

Microsoft Office/Exchange: 2005-2009

Google Apps: 2009-Present

This is quick overview of our journey and why I enjoy the ever changing landscape of technology.

Duck and Cover

If you think switching to something other than a Microsoft product now is tough, try doing it back in 2000, we switched top down to Star Office then, departments and all! You would have thought the world was ending, but it really wasn't that tragic when everyone became comfortable and discovered they could still do their job. In those five years we switched email to Open webmail because the Star email went away when Sun pushed star office to the Open office format. Again, a few were upset, but then they realized they could access their e-mail from anywhere with a Internet connection and things were a little better than before. When we went from a distributive server model to a data center and made the move from Linux based servers to a Server 2003 platform, we decided to give the Microsoft horse a ride again. It was ok, and I do love me some Outlook, but the back end maintenance with Exchange was present and the web version of Outlook was not well received. As far as the departments go, they were happy and I do agree that they use Office products unlike most teachers for their jobs (no offense to any teachers who are power users with the Microsoft Office suite). For the ease of our departments daily functions, we will always run Office products for them, but they all have Google apps and Gmail is the districts e-mail client (sidebar, our departments are using Google Apps to collaborate in ways they never have been able to previously).  

To the Cloud

© 2004 Michael Jastremski

When we made the most recent move to Google apps, there were many reasons why and we did look to Office 365, but it was not ready for release and we felt the road map was not there at that time. We have pushed to do everything in the cloud for a number of years and apps fits nice. Teachers were given directions on how to setup their folders for migration to Gmail and that happened without much fuss on our side and that was their biggest concern was losing email, all students k-12 and staff use Gmail. We let teachers know that we would never be upgrading Office and did a survey if they wanted it to remain on their teacher laptops. All departments are running Office and theirs will be the only ones that we will upgrade. Google apps has done more for student/ teacher, student/student collaboration than any other program I have seen in many years. The communication and endless options are what makes cloud based apps a modern day joy....always changing.

Change
For many, all the changing we have done over the years may seem a bit much, but I think it has done a few things for us. One, it has helped staff realize that change is not such a bad thing. In a profession that is usually slow to change, it has helped create a culture that looks at change as something positive that keeps us relevant with the world and our students. Two, it keeps our tech staff always moving forward, innovating, and leading from the middle, which can be very powerful. I don't believe there is a one size fits all, so take the time to decide what fits for you and your district and don't look back.

Guest Post: How are We Using Technology in Classrooms?

Good People
If you look closely at any successful district, school, or business, you will find that the leader has surrounded themselves with amazing people. Those people are the ones that make things happen on a day to day basis, and without those people, one person alone can not make an organization great.

I am very fortunate to have a great team in place that makes the day to day happen in our district. I learn from them weekly and they make my job an easy one. Among our team members is our district Technology Integration Specialist, Tracy Watanabe. I will always credit her for inspiring me to get in the game and start a blog. I would recommend her blog to any teacher K-12 as she does a great job of breaking down technology integration into easy to understand pieces. I wanted to share one of her recent posts as it is relevant for not only teachers but any educator. You can visit her blog or follow her on twitter. Enjoy!


How are We Using Technology in Classrooms?
Technology has changed how we do things in our daily lives such as shopping, banking, communicating, and it has changed how we should do school.

Photo Credit: Reeding Lessons via Compfight cc

When I was a child, I remember spending so much time going through microfiche to find just the right bit of information to share with the teacher. In those days, finding the right information and recollecting that information was the mark of a good student. 

Today, knowledge and information is at our fingertips. In fact, there is so much information that it's tough to know where to start and what's the best source to use. Therefore, accessing the right information at the right time is more important than just finding information.

Focusing on skills rather than knowledge is a shift in how we do school. It changes what students are taught and how they are taught.

What do these shifts look like in the classroom?
This type of learning is easy to capture because there are artifacts as evidence of learning. I could have gone to any number of AJUSD blogs to look for artifacts, but was able to find a plethora of content to share from Mrs. Hamman's post titled, The End of Another Great Year!

Final thoughts

How we “do school” has changed, and focusing on 21st century learning skills is the shift taking place. We see this shift in the Common Core State Standards, and we see this shift as a necessity to prepare students for college and careers.

Change isn't easy, but it's a necessity. I'm proud of our school district, because we are focused on giving our students 21st century, student-centered classrooms.

• What shifts do you see in how we "do school"?
• Change takes time, and progression occurs one step at a time. What goals have you made to take another step forward this school year?
• What questions or comments do you have regarding this post?

Get Out!

The Best

You have the best staff ever, great relationships, hard working, solid plan, and you see the great things they do on a daily basis. So is there a need to tell the world how great they are...I say yes. Sharing your staff with your district, community, and others helps build relationships. Communicating the accomplishments and hard work that is going on everyday in my department also helps generate conversation with stakeholders and allows an opportunity to hear their thoughts and ideas that provides another perspective. Here are a few ways that I like to share with others what is happening in the AJUSD Technology Department.

The Board
Sharing information with your school board should be top priority for any CIO/CTO/Director. Support from the school board is necessary for just about everything that happens in a school district and building a relationship with them is important. Often it is only the administration that has contact with board members, so sharing your staff and their accomplishments makes that connection. I understand every districts' procedures and communications with their board is different,
but suggesting a little time at a board meeting to your superintendent may be a start.

Social Media
A little over a year ago I wrote about the "Social Hurricane" and how this medium of communication can be overwhelming, but worth the effort to get into the game. With little surprise, social media has continued to grow, and as a leader you can not ignore the importance of an online presence. The great thing about sites such as Facebook and Twitter is the ability to not only share what your staff is doing, but showcase what the entire district staff is up to. Many districts however are still nervous about jumping into the social media scene, but this is where your influence as a CIO/CTO/Director can lead from the middle. Take the time to research what other districts are doing and present examples to your administrative team. Discuss how social media will allow their schools to quickly disseminate information and promote just how great their staff is by sharing classroom and school events!

#1 Resource
Good leaders know how important their people are to a successful organization, many leaders have stated in a variety of ways that people are a leaders number one resource. One principal that I work with in AJUSD, Larry LaPrise, has a gift for promoting his staff in a variety of ways. Mr. LaPrise is always speaking of his staff and their successes on his campus, he is very aware that employees often leave their jobs not because they aren't happy with their pay, but the lack of recognition. So get out there and talk up your staff today!

Time To Reflect

Time Time Time

Time is one of those things that we never seem to have enough of and it flies by like a supersonic jet! Each school year seems to be getting shorter and shorter or maybe it is because I am getting older, I mean wiser. At any rate, reflection is a very important piece of our daily lives and critical to our success. This past school year there has been a number of experiences that I have reflected upon and would like to share a couple. Please feel free to provide feedback on your experiences also, it helps to read about how others are processing and dealing with similar situations.

www.ajusd.org/ccjh

There are many exciting initiatives going on in my district, but finishing the first complete school year in which our 7th and 8th graders were taking their devices to and from school has brought mixed emotions for me. Educationally, our teachers and students have done an amazing job with the transition and I am looking forward to reviewing this years test scores when they are made available. On the technical side of things, there were a few bumps and even though our local area network connections are robust, our Internet connection is a bit lacking. But those things can be worked on and the 1:1 technician, Mr. Frahm, has done a great job. Not only has he kept the student devices in running order, but the students all know just how important it is to have a great technician on campus to assist them when needed.

One of the difficult pieces for me personally has been the number of devices that have been dropped over the last year. When comparing numbers with other 1:1 programs our overall device loss is within reason, but damage due to dropping seems higher than I would prefer. Here is where I would appreciate some feedback, the devices are not being dropped at school, it is when they are outside the campus. We know this because when at school, the rule is the device stays in the provided carrying case when opened. Little plug for Higher Ground cases, they can pop open the case in seconds and the device never has to be removed, protecting it from a fall. So the question is how to continue working on educating the students to care for their device when away from school?

Collaboration Coaches

Earlier this month a new group of teachers met and began their journey together as the third new group of AJUSD collaboration coaches. Our district's Technology Integration Specialist, Tracy Watanabe, has done an amazing job with building our collaboration coaching program and in my opinion, coaches are key to a successful campus. Watanabe does a great job of explaining how collaboration coaches have worked together in our district to bring 21st century learning skills into our classrooms, click here. A bit of reflection on this topic makes on thing clear to me, I need to spend more time in the coaches classrooms and sitting in on collaboration meetings this fall. Experiencing the relationship building and the sharing of ideas among these professionals is truly inspiring.

                                                                      

Thanks to gbuffet

Take A Moment
Often we become so consumed with planning for the summer or that next big project, we forget to reflect on what we have already done, what worked well, what failed, how we can incorporate prior knowledge into future planning. I only shared two of many experiences that I needed to reflect upon before the busy summer months began, unfortunately time often flies by like that jet I mentioned earlier. Being focused is important, but so is reflection, take a moment, find a quiet place for some inward thinking and call it a day.

The Administrator Superhighway

I wrote this article for the ISTE Sig-Admin Winter Newsletter, and thought I would put it in my blog as well.

Have you ever driven on a freeway system that is so confusing due to the complex looping off-ramps, the over and under, and super high speed lanes that require exotic foreign sports car to navigate? Even with GPS I seem to add a few extra miles onto each destination when I venture out of AZ and into other states with more freeway twists and turns than I am accustomed to. As an administrator in today’s K-12 environment, there are many different off-ramps and high speed lanes to choose from when considering your leadership goals and how it will influence your organization.

Visionary Leadership ISTE NETS for Administrators (NETS•A): Educational Administrators inspire and lead development and implementation of a shared vision for comprehensive integration of technology to promote excellence and support transformation throughout the organization.

Sounds simple enough, right? Any successful organization probably has a leader that can inspire, create vision and put practices in place to reach a goal, but how many other “leaders” are influencing that person? In my position as Director of Technology, in the Apache Junction USD, I feel the Superintendent has created an environment that allows departments, school staff, and students to collaborate, share, and influence the direction of the organization. Let’s take a closer look at a few areas that support the road to visionary leadership.

Fear of Failing
There are a number reasons why people are afraid to change, try new things, and influence others around them. Two specific reasons that come to mind are:

• The fear of failure itself
• Staff members are not encouraged to fail

The end result of the fear of failure can lead to a stale environment and innovation will be put aside for sustaining old practices. Learning how to fail while maintaining the confidence to adjust and move forward is essential to creating a successful learning environment. I want to share an experience that Tracy Watanabe, Technology Integration Specialist for the Apache Junction USD, shared with me about failing.

“Early last summer, I was asked to do a presentation in a short webinar. I had never been involved in a webinar before, but figured it would not be very different from all of the professional developments I facilitated every week. Boy was I wrong. My computer froze 10 minutes before I was supposed to start, and my backup computer did the same. I was so nervous by the time my computer was rebooted, that I didn't remember what I said, how fast/slow I was talking, and couldn't read my audience, which is something I rely strongly on. I felt like I let everyone down. I was ready to write off webinars as something that was not for me. Luckily, I'm surrounded by others who believe that failing is just a milestone on the path of improvement Fail, Learn, Try Again. When I shared my webinar experience with my boss, and other peers, their feedback was encouraging and inspired me to try again. Recently I facilitated a webinar as part of the Edublogs Serendipity webinars. It wasn't perfect, but that didn't seem to bother anyone, including myself because it's part of the learning process. Next time is an opportunity for improvement. Isn't that what it's about? You see, to grow and improve is like a journey. Failures along the way are just milestones on that journey. Failures aren't the destination, and a journey without failures means you're not traveling far from the safe zone. It takes venturing out of the safe zone to grow and improve. “

Good Teaching vs. Shiny Object

Digital-Age Learning Culture ISTE NETS for Administrators (NETS•A): Educational Administrators create, promote, and sustain a dynamic, digital-age learning culture that provides a rigorous, relevant, and engaging education for all students.

Building and promoting a digital-age learning culture can be difficult with the rapid change of technology. Every week a new shiny device is released and it can become distracting from the educational goals of a district, unless the focus is on good teaching and not the device. The device type will continue to change, but good teaching must remain constant and use whatever tool best meets the needs of their students. Take the time to collaborate and create a foundational plan that will guide good teaching practices that support the learning goals. The “College Readiness for All” is our foundational guide in the Apache Junction USD.

Role of IT
As we continue down the administrator superhighway we have to ask ourselves what role every department and staff member plays in supporting the foundational plan that is guiding good teaching. As a Technology Director, I feel that the Role of IT can have a tremendous impact on a district’s educational plan. IT staff spend many hours in classrooms and cannot make it across a campus without being asked a question by staff and students. The days of IT staff just replacing a video card or upgrading operating systems are becoming a thing of the past. I recently asked my Superintendent what his thoughts were on the role of Technology Directors in the K-12 environment and this was his response.

“The Director of Technology can absolutely play a significant role in helping influence change within the district if he or she assumes the role of instructional leader. Many of today’s school systems are technology-rich, especially compared to just ten years ago. But technology in and of itself won’t improve student achievement. Putting computers, Smart Boards, Doc Cameras, etc., in classrooms without first developing teacher capacity to utilize these tools to create authentic, learning opportunities will do little to change our current school systems.

Great technology, paired with excellent teaching, is what will provide students a better opportunity to learn. This is where the Director of Technology can have a huge influence on change. By being an instructional leader, Directors of Technology can help districts keep a balance on first, good teaching, and then second, how technology can be utilized to provide students with quality learning opportunities. Directors of Technology should be instrumental in shaping professional development opportunities for classroom teachers, focus the conversation about how/what technology should be utilized to support quality teaching, how dollars should be utilized when purchasing technology, how technology fits into a school/district strategic plan, etc. By fulfilling this role, the Director of Technology will absolutely influence change in school districts for the benefit of all.”

Put Me in Coach
Excellence in Professional Practice ISTE NETS for Administrators (NETS•A):
Educational Administrators promote an environment of professional learning and innovation that empowers educators to enhance student learning through the infusion of contemporary technologies and digital resources.

Administrators must model the practices that they want to see happen in the classroom, but who can help support the teachers on a daily basis. One Technology Integration Specialist was not going to be able to support 6 schools by herself in my school district, so we turned to the Microsoft Peer Coaching model developed by the Peer-Ed team. The focus with our collaboration coaches is first on good teaching, aligned to our College Readiness for All plan, with technology embedded in the instruction. If administrators are going to “allocate time, resources, and access to ensure ongoing professional growth in technology fluency and integration” they will need support from departments, staff, and peers to make this happen, peer coaching is an off-ramp worth taking.

The Real Leaders
I hope that you have enjoyed the ride down the road to visionary leadership on the administrative superhighway! The off-ramps I have discussed are few among many that make up the complex K-12 environment in our technology rich world. As long as we keep the real leaders at the center of all decisions, the students, the K-12 landscape will continue to evolve and still be the goal that all others strive to achieve.

Students Speak

Kick It Off
Every year in my district we have a welcome back day for all district staff. It usually consists of some kind of breakfast or lunch, a guest speaker or district admin delivering the welcome back message. It is a difficult couple hours to plan as feedback is always mixed on these type of events, and with tight budgets, outside guest speakers are not an option for us.

The Green Light
Our Superintendent, Dr. Chad Wilson, is a dynamic public speaker, he does a great job communicating his expectations for the district and recognizing successes. One element that I thought would be beneficial for this years welcome back, would be to hear from our students, listen to what they feel is working and what they hope to see this school year. With the go ahead from Dr. Wilson, I set off to figure out how to make this happen. With help from Tracy Watanabe, we gathered a group of students from across K-12, and invited them in for a short two question interview. Their responses were not prompted or edited for effect, just honest.



Coming Together
With all the negativity around public education right now I think it is important to share the good things that are happening out there while not losing sight of the high expectations we must hold ourselves too as educators. Our welcome back day this year had a different feel to it than previous years and hearing from our students and teachers (see Reflections video below), things are coming together. We have a ways to go before all students are college ready by the time they leave us, but we are off to a great start.



Thank You
I want to thank all the AJUSD students and parents for taking the time and allowing their children to share their thoughts with us. They were amazing! I would also like to thank Tracy Watanabe for all her assistance with the project and Dr. Wilson for always allowing us to run with our ideas.

Blogging at ISTE!

Part I

My first visit to an ISTE conference was in 2009, in Washington DC. Not only was the conference amazing for a number of reasons, but it was also my first trip to the nation's capital. I was able to take part in a number of great sessions, listen to amazing keynote speakers, and also get in a little sight seeing as well. Seeing the capital for the first time and meeting the Obama's at the conference, you can see from the picture below I was a little nervous, was a great experience.

Part II

I was not able to attend the conference in 2010, but will be attending this year in Philadelphia in just a few short days. I am again excited for the trip and what makes this trip more special than the first is we are able to take a small group of teachers along! I can't wait for them to experience the week and have them bring back their experience to other teachers in our district, sharing resources, ideas, and general conversation will benefit each of our schools. I have also decided to use the conference planner this year, novel idea right, and should be able to cram in almost everything that I want to attend.

Blog Away
I am going to give it my best shot to blog my experiences throughout the week while attending the conference. Here is my disclaimer, I am not quite sure what kind of random thoughts, resources, or experiences I will end up sharing, but going to try and capture the experience and not just session by session type of info. So check back during the week and enjoy!

Change Can Happen

Setup
Recently I wrote about professional development and my district's "Summer Academy" activities. There were a number of district participants and presenters, one being Tracy Watanabe, AJUSD's Technology Integration Specialist. She spent one of her days working with the teachers at CCJH, the district's Jr. High, where we have just finished the first year of a 1:1 program with the 7th grade. Next year the incoming 7th graders will step right into the 1:1 environment and the school will be 1:1 all the way through.

The Growth
There have been a number of amazing transformations take place at CCJH during the year and worth noting, but one of Tracy's activities just grabbed my attention. She had small groups of teachers take the district's "College Readiness for All" plan and make the connection to the

ISTE NETS-S. There was great collaboration between the groups and the way they chose to share their information was also very impressive. They had little time to complete the task and the three groups below all chose different forms of multimedia for sharing.

Culture Change
One short year ago this activity would have not yielded the same results. Not sure how many teachers would have known what the NETS were and sharing would have probably been on a piece of butcher paper or maybe a powerpoint. The culture at CCJH has changed and there are a number of reasons, great teachers, principal, support staff, district support, board support, that can be attributed to this. The overall point that I guess I'm trying to make is, things can change in the K-12 education setting, you just need to be willing.

Great PD or Waste of Time?

Don't Waste My Time
What is the first thing that you think of when you hear the words professional development? I have heard different things from teachers like:

• training for the latest trends
• required
• waste of time
  
• I didn't learn anything
• another top down activity
• how will this help me become a better teacher

All these points are valid and make great questions when planning professional development activities. If we are going to ask teachers to give up their time, professional development should be aligned to district/site goals, based on teacher needs, and ultimately have an impact on student learning.

Great Week of PD
For quite some time now we have provided a summer academy in our district the following week school is out for break. The week has been well received and the feedback provided has always been positive for the most part. This year's summer academy is coming to an end and there has been many amazing sessions that has allowed teachers to work with their colleagues from around the district. There were 77 individual sessions offered over the course of 4 days and 65 of those were technology based. Ongoing professional development for the 1:1 program at CCJH continued with Tracy Watanabe and Nick Sauers and the first 1:1 training for AJHS was also conducted by these two amazing individuals.

Thank You
I want to thank all that have been involved in making this week a great success and look forward to the continuation of meaningful professional development in AJUSD.

Amazing Technology Staff

Team
Truly great teams are far and few between, sure there have been a few dynasties over the years and every once in awhile you get a team that dominates for one season, but the next year are non-existent. Debating great sport teams always makes for great conversation, but you can simply fall back on their record in my opinion. But how do you pick the greatest tech team of all time....who knew it was a competition? Actually, it's not, I don't need to compare my department to others to know if we are doing a great job or not. Every environment is different and the needs will vary, but I do know that I have an amazing staff in place for a number of reasons.

More Than A Tech
So let me elaborate (brag) a bit on those reasons for a moment. Our district techs have the title of Itinerant Technician, kind of old school terminology, but they do travel from site to site so the title has remain unchanged. These three guys are far more than a geek squad that come in, replace a power supply and then run to the next job. They spend time working with teachers and even students as technology integration is taking place in the classroom. They are not integration specialist (we do have a great one of those also), but they have a level of understanding of our software/hardware that allows them to assist if necessary. They understand that we are here for the students first, and this has allowed the shift from being a repair person to someone who may need to make a repair, but show the student/instructor a few surface layer how to instructions to get them rolling. They definitely need a new job description and title, as do our System and Network Admin. Their job responsibilities extend far beyond hiding in dark offices and they never lose focus of why we are here.

Trust
This is a novel idea, but I believe that Warren Bennis says it best, "trust is the glue that holds organizations together". Trust is something that has allowed our department to grow as a team over the years. Bennis talks more about how trust is earned not given and that is a process that doesn't happen in one day, but over time. I trust each member of our department and know that they communicate with our teachers and staff to provide the best service possible. Their trust for one another allows them to collaborate on issues that one individual may not be able to solve on their own and they push the department as a team to innovate, and work outside of their comfort zone. We are not perfect and continually try to improve, but we shoot for perfection and have fun on the journey.

B's Place
We recently had a get together at Bethany's place to celebrate another great school year together. Bethany Purcell wears a number of hats in the district and one is tech secretary, and also e-rate assistant. She is a shining piece of our team and unfortunately will be taking off her tech hat next year. The good news is she will be close by still and always considered a member of the team! The other good news is Liz Maher will be picking that hat up and bringing her graphic design/webmaster skills to the team, and will be a great fit.

Thank You!
I wanted to take this opportunity to publicly thank every member of the tech department for a great year and look forward to a busy summer in preparation for the 2011-2012 school year. Being part of an amazing team and the ever changing world of technology makes coming to work everyday very easy.

Collaboration Coach Celebration

College Readiness for All
The role of the collaboration coach in AJUSD's "College Readiness for All" plan is of great importance.

If we are going to support the above tiles and allow technology to be a disruptive piece of our district's environment that transforms the way we provide instruction, then we need support. It was very clear to myself and AJUSD's Technology Integration Specialist, Tracy Watanabe, that she would not be able to be all places at all times. Having strong, collaborative, respected teachers at all of our sites would be critical in supporting the College Readiness plan and also assist Tracy with promoting technology integration and the movement toward a student centered classroom.

Year One A Success!
Celebrating the end of the first full school year with the Collaboration coaches is something that I wanted to share. Each of the coaches has done an amazing job with integrating technology into their own classrooms, but more importantly, sharing their knowledge with others at their sites. That is not always an easy thing to do when discussing student centered scenarios and adding disruption to a traditional setting. I applaud them for their efforts as well as Tracy Watanabe for working so closely with the coaches, principals for giving the coaches the time necessary for training and sharing, and all Technology Department members for the technical support. Enjoy a few of the coaches creations below.

Elementary Collaboration Coaches from Shauna Hamman on Vimeo.

To view more of the coaching chronicles click here.