Technology Professional Development

Overall, my district does an adequate job of providing development in technology; however, my school does a poor job of providing development.

There are several areas in which I believe my district excels in professional development for technology. First, Euclid schedules one district-wide inservice day every other year that focuses only on technology. Teachers sign up for small group sessions that are conducted by colleagues from throughout the district. Workshops and presentations are available, so that we can see the success that our peers have using technology in their classrooms. In addition, the district has provided each teacher with his or her own laptop. A user manual and training sessions were mandated with the laptops to ensure that we were knowledgable in our usage of the computers. In addition, there are areas in which Euclid is achieving technology integration through professional development. Many workshops are offered throughout the school year and summer that focus on integrating technology in the classroom. However, these workshops are not always advertised, so many teachers don't know what's available to them.

As a school, I believe Forest Park is slumping and failing with professional development in technology. No in-service days are ever used to train teachers to use smartboards, I-pods, cameras/editing programs, or any of the other available technology. Once a year, an administrator from the district conducts a twenty minute review on how to input grades on web based grading system. In addition, the past few years my school has purchased the Study Island website. We received one forty five minute training session over the phone for that program.

In conclusion, professional development is offered, but not made convenient nor widely available to most teachers. It is not surprising that technology is available in my district, but not as prevalently utilized as it should be.