Educator Preparation and Development in the Texas Long Range Plan for Technology, 2006-2020

The area of Educator Preparation and Development in regards to the Texas Long Range Plan for Technology, 2006-2020 is described best as the practical part of putting to practice what has been laid out and made available at the local level. On our campus, we are given multiple opportunities to take online and on-site professional development for technology in the classroom. We have excellent facilitators from the district that are more than willing to assist teachers. Some of the problems that we encounter are that the technology facilitators are not on campus and have to be scheduled to come and assist teachers, along with the lack of adequate computers to implement technology into curriculum on a regular basis. Across the district our campus demonstrates the lowest score among elementary campuses. At the state level, this strand is in the Developing Tech as the highest percent. This area is fairly consistent across the last 3 years on our campus. Any variation is attributed to a change in faculty. My recommendation to see this area improved is to allow more in-class support for teachers by allowing them time to implement and observe other teachers that have been successful in integrating technology into the curriculum. I have maintained that we cannot add technology to what we are already doing, we are going to have to use it to replace the ways we are instructing and assessing students on a day to day basis. If teachers are going to be expected to move to the Target Tech level, we have a ways to go to allow them the growth they need to experience. Lesson plans are going to have to be relaxed in order for teachers to feel less pressure while they are working their way through the implementation of technology into their lessons.