BFTP: Why all tech directors should have once been classroom teachers

There was a conversation once on our state tech directors' listserv about how tech departments deal with damaged staff computers. Do we forgive? Do we charge? The "teachers should pay" and the "district should pay" policies for broken screens, sodden keyboards, and missing chargers seems pretty evenly divided.

I fall firmly in the "just fix the damn things out of the district repair budget" camp. The $100 screen replacement is not worth the $1000 of enmity that making the teacher pay would incur. Now were this the 3rd screen in as many months, I might change my opinion, but in my experience, seriously careless teachers are about as common as chickens needing braces. Required tools used in the commission of one's job should be expected to need repair and it should be up to the district to make those repairs - not the user.

My stand on this and a good many policy-type questions is guided by my own, now ancient, experiences as a classroom teacher. I taught English, drama, speech, reading, and journalism for seven years from 1976-1984. During my first two years, I generally had 6 different preps for 7 classes. I also sponsored the yearbook, the newspaper, class plays, and speech contest. Oh, and I had a part time job at a gas station on the weekends to make ends meet. I slacked off the other five years as a half time librarian and half time reading/language arts teacher. Not so many extra-curriculars, but I did work the night shift at a local motel to supplement my income.

From what I remember of those days when I had far more energy and optimism than I do now:

• I would rather correct papers and plan lessons at the kitchen table than at my desk in the classroom. I was tired at the end of the day and papers seemed more interesting after a couple beers. As teacher work has become digital, I understand the need/desire for taking a laptop home - and the associated risk of damage in transport.
• I was always poor. I drove old cars. I took very modest trips. I was paying off student debt. I lived in old farmhouses that were drafty. Had I needed to pay for a repair to a computer, it would have hurt.
• I was always busy to point of being overwhelmed. I don't remember being physically tired as much as mentally exhausted each and every day. After my first two years of teaching, my biggest desire was for a job that required no thinking at all. (I got one working in a hospital while in grad school.) While this does not speak to computer damage, it has framed how I think about asking teachers to take on new tasks, learn new skills. They had better be worth it. Period.

Good technology decision-makers cannot look solely through the lens of technology. Whether through experience or other means, need for a direct connection to the realities of working in the classroom cannot be over-valued.

Original post 2/18/19