Doing well in interviews

The best indicator of future performance is past performance.

In yesterday's e-mail:

Hi Doug,

I have an interview for the position of Information and Technology Manager in the _____________ District here in (state named deleted but it is known for its cheese production). Any advice? Its going to be a real marathon...40 minutes of writing, 40 with admin, 40 with staff and 40 with parents.

N________________

Hi N________,

Congratulations! Good luck with the interview. Sounds like a grueling process! Here is my standard advice for librarians that perhaps you can use a bit of: http://www.doug-johnson.com/dougwri/getting-the-job-you-deserve.html

As I think back on a being on the interviewer, rather than interviewee, I think I pretty much look for these things:

1. A track record of past successes. Tell me about some exciting thing that you did in your former positions and I will be thinking that I'd like you to have done these exciting things here.
2. Some passion for the field. Somehow you need to convey that this is not just a job, but that you are genuinely excited about what your would be doing.
3. Lack of weirdness. OK, this is one is tough since I don't think weird people actually know they are weird. But everyone else does. Perhaps describing collaborative projects might be the best way to diffuse most weird vibes.
4. Not being too techie. My sense is that you would be better explaining tech terms in layman's language than trying to baffle anyone with a mastery of TLAs (three letter acronyms).
5. Good questions about the job. I'd be prepared with some good questions for the interviewers (not just what's the salary). Ask about the district's recent tech initiatives. Staff development in tech areas. Resources on which you can draw. What is the support staffing? Is there a technology skills curriculum? The district ought to be selling itself to you too. (And there are jobs you really don't want!)

Don't know if this helps, but good luck and let me know how the interview goes and if you take the job!

I am sure you will be outstanding!

Doug

A better question?

…technology is an accelerator of greatness already in place, never the principal cause of greatness or decline. – Newsweek, April 29, 2002

At a conference last week, Mark Weston from Dell computing stated that asking the question, "Does technology improve student learning?" is the wrong question.

The question should be, "Does technology support the practices that improve student learning?"

Is this a semantic trifle or is it actually profound? What are the implications for technology deployment and evaluation? What drives your tech planning? Should it be initiatives like these?

The direct link between information technologies and learning does not exist anymore than the direct link between a good stove and a good meal; a good automobile and a good vacation; a good word processor and a good book; or a good camera and good art.

This view, of course, has been expressed many times, in many ways. My own Tech Upgrade is one way; my advocacy for looking at best practices in the content areas, another. But I rather liked the simplicty of of Weston's alternate question.

Now if educators could only agree on what actual practices contribute to student learning, it would make the tech director's job a good deal easier.

And shouldn't all educators' efforts be bent toward that sole purpose?

Mobile devices and more reading - two reports

A couple of interesting reports I've stumbled across yesterday...

Pockets of Potential: Using Mobile Technologies to Promote Children’s Learning by Carley Shuler was published this month by the same folks who bring us Sesame Street. The executive summary does a good job of summarizing research and the state of using mobile devices in education. I liked this:

The report highlights five opportunities to seize mobile learning’s unique attributes to improve education:

1. Encourage “anywhere, anytime” learning Mobile devices allow students to gather, access, and process information outside the classroom. They can encourage learning in a real-world context, and help bridge school, afterschool, and home environments.
2. Reach underserved children Because of their relatively low cost and accessibility in low-income communities, handheld devices can help advance digital equity, reaching and inspiring populations “at the edges” — children from economically disadvantaged communities and those from developing countries.
3. Improve 21st-century social interactions Mobile technologies have the power to promote and foster collaboration and communication, which are deemed essential for 21st-century success.
4. Fit with learning environments Mobile devices can help overcome many of the challenges associated with larger technologies, as they fit more naturally within various learning environments.
5. Enable a personalized learning experience Not all children are alike; instruction should be adaptable to individual and diverse learners. There are significant opportunities for genuinely supporting differentiated, autonomous, and individualized learning through mobile devices.

I am particularly excited by the last observation. Education has simply not tapped the huge potential for individualizing instruction for all students - every child needs the same attention paid to an IEP that our special needs children now have. Isn't every child a special needs child?

_________________________

As the old joke and the just released NEA study Reading on the Rise goes, "I have some good news and I have some bad news." I'm guessing you want to hear the good news first.

Yes, for the first time in years, the percentage of Americans reading "literary" materials is going up. Now slightly more than half of us read fiction, poetry, plays, etc. This slight upward trend is evident among nearly all demographic groups and the NEA takes credit for the rise since it alerted the public to declining reading rates and society has promoted reading.

The report credits materials being read on electronic devices as well as in print. (So reading on my Kindle and iPod now "count."

What the NEA Report buries, but an AP article pulls out, is that there is less voluntary reading being done:

But the preface does not mention a countertrend: a drop among people not obligated to read. Adults who read books of any kind — fiction or nonfiction, online or on paper — that were not assigned by a teacher or employer dropped from 56.6 percent of adults in 2002 to 54.3 percent last year. The fall was greatest among those younger than 55.

And while the number of adults who say they read a non-required book is 3.5 million higher than in 2002, the report notes that that the total adult population increased by 19 million, meaning an increase in the number of people who didn't voluntarily read books of 15.5 million, a huge disparity confirmed by NEA research director Sunil Iyengar.

Gioia [outgoing NEA chair] believes the NEA report is essentially positive — if only because good news about reading is so rare — but says that "we're still in a culture in which all kinds of reading are under pressure" from other forms of leisure and entertainment.

OK, readers, Johnson's definition of postliteracy again?

...the postliterate as those who can read, but chose to meet their primary information and recreational needs through audio, video, graphics and gaming.

Are our schools and especially our libraries preparing for a postliterate society?