GoogleApps E-mail - 3 weeks old

I posted a short survey to the approximately 1,000 e-mail users we have in out district about how they are getting along with the new e-mail system in Google Apps (MAPS Apps, for us). Here is the survey:

After 3 days, I've received 370 responses (36% of all users). Not too shabby. Here are the results...

Some good info here to help direct our future training efforts. The comment section, which I am just starting to look at, is helpful. (Many of the respondents indictated that they answered "no" to some of these skills just because they have not had time or need to try some features.) I will use many of these questions to send out short "How do I ... ?" e-mails this month.

For inquiring minds, I am very happy with this roll-out of GoogleApps for Education so far. We'll give teachers the rest of this month to get more comfortable with the new e-mail/contacts app and then start raising awareness of calendaring and Docs. But at the current time, the change in e-mail systems has just not been that big a deal for many people.

Whew? Knock wood? Send offerings to the technology gods?

CODE77 Rubrics for Administrators 2010 Part 6 of 10

I warned you these were coming.

Self-evaluation Rubrics for Basic Administrative Technology Use (2002) 2010

Our investigations have always contributed more to our amusement than they have to knowledge”
- Will Rogers

VI.  Online Research, and Professional Development, and Personal Learning Networks  (TSSA Standards I.B, I.F, II.A, III.C) NETS-A 2009 (2d, 3b, 3d)

Level One: I do prefer not to use online resources to gather professional information or research nor do I use technology to communciate with my peers to share information.

Level Two:  I can effectively search and extract information from online resources such as educational journal databases, ERIC, and other credible sources on the Internet. I subscribe to electronic journals and newsletters of professional relevance. I subscribe to electronic mailing lists (listservs) and blogs to gather information and problem solve with fellow professionals. I have participated in satellite-delivered educational forums or training delivered via satellite, ITV or online.

Level Three: I understand and can use online interactive communications (chat or messaging) and have taken classes using the Internet or interactive television. I use technology remain actively engaged in a professional learning community of fellow professionals.

Why leaders need technology skills that help them do online searches for find educational research and for professional growth:

A wag once speculated that if H.G. Wells used his time machine to drop into the present day, he would be awed by the changes he saw in hospitals and banks but would feel perfectly at home in the modern school since it has changed so very little in the last 100 years.

As schools are asked that ALL children master not just basic skills but think critically, work independently, and communicate well so that they can find a place in our information-based workforce, schools are looking for new strategies and methods to use. An awareness and understanding of these strategies and methods has never been more critical for all school leaders. And it is very hard increasingly difficult to keep current.

Thankfully there are many electronic resources that allow school leaders to find information about current educational practices.

Educational mailing lists allow practitioners to exchange ideas and questions in an open forum. By subscribing to such lists, a single message sent to the electronic mailing list can go to hundreds or even thousands of other administrators with years of experience. Sources of mailing lists arranged by interest include Yahoo! Groups <groups.yahoo.com> and GoogleGroups <http://groups.google.com/>. Most state professional organizations have an e-mail list that is useful.

General search engines such as Google can provide links to a large number of educational websites. As with all information on the web, it needs to be carefully evaluated for currency, bias and authority. Learning search strategies to narrow the number of returned sites is also imperative.

Commercial full-text periodical database providers such as ProQuest and Ebsco offer packages just for educators. These are resources that require a paid subscription, but are often relatively inexpensive if your district is purchasing full-text databases for student use. Check with your local university to see if you can access its commercial education databases as a student, adjunct or alumnus.

Most educational organizations and many educational journals also have a web presence. Among the most useful include:

• American Association of School Administrators (AASA) <http://www.aasa.org/>
• Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) <http://www.ascd.org>
• Association of School Business Officials International (ASBOI) <http://www.asbointl.org/>
• Education Week on the Web <http://www.edweek.org/>
• Educator's Reference Desk <http://www.eduref.org/>
• eSchool News Online <http://www.eschoolnews.org/>
• International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) <http://www.iste.org/>
• National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP) <http://www.naesp.org/>
• National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) <http://www.principals.org/>
• National Center for Education Statistics <http://nces.ed.gov/>
• National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities (NCEF) <http://www.edfacilities.org/>
• Phi Delta Kappan online < http://www.pdkintl.org/kappan/kappan.htm>
• Public Education Network (PEN) <http://www.publiceducation.org/>

 (URLs checked Janury 2010)

With the advent of Web2.0, another source of useful information has become available to educators - blogs, wikis, Nings, Twitter and other networking tools, professionals are creating "professional learning networks."  A PLN can be defined as a self-created set of experts, colleagues and resources that can be relied upon to meet daily learning needs, usually dependent on networked technology. Given that administrators are often the sole person in that role in their building, a PLN is even more useful to them that to many other positions.

Finding and evaluating information are critical skills leaders need if they are to implement positive changes in their organizations. Increasingly, practitioners are expected to contribute to the conversation as well. Technology makes this possible. Of course for the information that is really tough to find, you may need to turn to your school library media specialist.

Technicians - the unsung heroes

We have a "tech" meeting in our district every other Wednesday morning for 60-90 minutes. Both building and district level technicians attend. The agenda is usually a combination of updates, problems encountered, solutions found, and healthy dose of complaining about any number of things - teachers, librarians, administrators, technologies, policies, the state DOE, and, of course, district technology leadership - that would be me. Overall the meetings are productive, since among all the jobs in the schools, the technicians have one of the toughest, and these joint problem-solving and venting sessions are very helpful.

Under-staffed, under-informed and under-appreciated, these guys and gals are the unsung heroes of making technology "work" in schools. But you see very little written about them in educational technology publications. I extended my appreciation to one of our techs in an old column called The DJ Factor and wrote a short piece in SLJ about keeping one's technicans happy.

Technicians have always been, I believe, one group of workers who are in a perpetual and steep learning curve - or need to be. (Those who are reluctant learners tend to use phrases like "It can't be done" when they really mean "I don't know how.) The shifiting ground of technology impacts techs very suddenly and often without much warning. They are too often impacted by decisions in which they had no input.

While we've not talked directly about it, I am guessing our savvy techs are wondering more than a little what the long-term impact of shifting to GoogleApps for Education will have on their jobs. GoogleApps is just the latest manifestation of the shift from desktop to cloud computing. While it will be some years coming, I envision that the major technology tool for both staff and students will be a personal laptop/netbook/slate/phone that holds a Chrome-like OS/web browser. These will be easily re-imaged, interchangeable, and, hopefully, mostly maintenance-free. Fewer (or no) computer labs to keep running. Less need for printer maintenance. LEDs decreasing projector upkeep. Wireless networks ending running Ethernet cables to new locations.

Might the building technician become the next lonely Maytag repairman???

Today, however, our techs are very busy people and an interesting discussion has been haunting me since our last tech meeting. We brainstormed a little about how one should go about setting job priorities. Whose job do you do first? Some nominees:

• the person who signs your timesheet/does your evaluation
• the person who is always in your face
• the person who brings you doughnuts of appreciation
• the administrator of the building
• the teacher in front of a class depending on the technology
• the student needing to complete an assignment
• first come/first served (chronological)
• quick easy-to-solve problems first; big time consuming ones later

And I suppose you could ask the same question about the person who gets put on the bottom of the work order pile:

• the never-satisfied
• the hopelessly unskilled/uninformed
• the abrasive

How about it? How should technicians prioritize their tasks? Oh, and be a lot more specific than "doing what has the biggest impact on students." I am guessing everyone will argue that what they do has an impact, either direct or indirect.