Technology Support
Ed. Leadership, Ed. Policy, Ed. Tech., blogging March 31st, 2008
At one of the sessions at which I presented at AERA, a conversation arose around the issue of tech. support in schools. Neal Strudler, who’d done research on the issue 20 years ago, mentioned that the tech. support personnel he studied then spoke of “working themselves out of jobs.” I’ve heard that phrase from tech. support personnel at the higher ed. level. Strudler said that such a goal was idealistic and, as it turns out, unrealistic. I wondered (out loud, of course) whether it really is an unrealistic goal in the information age.
You see, I learn GOBS through my Web 2.0-based personal learning network. I consider Twitter, my Bloglines account, etc. my tech. support. SO, what if tech. directors / tech. support personnel in schools made it their professional goal to make teachers learners? What if the job description of ed. tech. support personnel was to facilitate professional learning networks? By teaching teachers how to learn as I (and others in my PLN) do, they might just work themselves out of a job.
What do you think?
Tags: AERA, education, support, technology
We are toying with exactly this idea for our summer learning project. It should be a great time teaching teachers how to use and form professional learning networks. As a building principal after purchasing an imac after Christmas I have enjoyed subscribing to blogs. I’ve learned so much in so little time and it has really been a blast. The development of my own PLN has really been the catalyst. The only downside is I miss television. I don’t think I’ve watched more than an hour in the past month.
GREAT comment, Charlie. Here’s how I’ve solved your problem. Either I learn with my laptop in front of the TV or, better yet, I have a TV tuner in my desktop. I can watch TV right on my monitor in a window next to my browser. Voila!
More importantly, I’m intrigued by your summer learning project. I’m eager to hear how that goes.
I find that many teachers feel they don’t have the time to correct things themselves. I hesitate to say “fix,” because they obviously don’t expect to “fix” something. The word “fix” connotes something only a specialist could accomplish: a broken drive, a snapped cable, or a lost video dongle.
Back to correction, we have teachers who take things into their own hands. I’ve thought over the years this is attributable to a) comfort with what we’ve termed their personal digital culture (comfort around computers and other tech), and b) motivation. They want to use something so badly, or for it to work in such a way, that they do whatever is necessary to try and “correct” the issue.
Of course, we don’t hear from those folks too often; but we do encounter the rest who never considered Googling an issue, or even talking to their colleagues who they share space with in teacher offices. It’s almost like a socialization issue at play, which is somewhat out of the control of the technology team, it’s more a personal or school culture issue.
But to address the personal learning networks: later this month, we are going to introduce all of our teachers to a new Ning-based network and see how that might facilitate some instructional support using technology. We’ve set up groups (i.e., Secondary Math, elementary emotional intelligence, etc.) where the dialog might take place. I’ve found myself wanting to see what’s “buzzing” in social networks to gain ideas, provide insight, and and compare notes. Hopefully a few folks who share my motivational traits will follow suit.
I think they once have this experience, I might end the year with asking them to provide their own summer professional development by joining an outside social network, and to contribute their experiences, and spend some sofa-time online with their laptops.
Jon, after I commented this morning, I thought more about this… it takes me awhile to wake up.
Two more points:
a) I don’t think tech support will ever be out of a job; while end-users will grow more sophisticated, so will the technology. And the division of sophistication between end-users seems to be widening from my own experience.
b) We do (now that I think about it) foster learning communities in a loose sense by giving every teacher a laptop, an internet connection, and a 3-way protocol IM client (iChat A/V). Teachers and administrators have regular access to technology personnel, one another, and their administrators via voice, video, or text chat. Not every single person chooses to use iChat each day, but many do use it to seek out support from their colleagues, no matter their hierarchical position within our organization.
Very cool that you’re using iChat. That certainly allows for the creation of an intra-district learning community (perhaps a Learning Organization in Peter Senge’s terms?). Do/Can you encourage teachers to use iChat (and other apps) to learn outside the organization?