Shift to the Future

Our School District (Coquitlam, BC, CA) has agreed to set a new direction in how it provides teachers with technology.  Have a quick look at this presentation recently delivered to introduce our principals to the teacher laptop initiative (TLI). 2010-2011 teacher laptop initiative in coquitlam school district View more presentations from Brian Kuhn . The TLI is designed as a District <—> School cost share:  35% District and 65% School.  Each year up to 1/3 of all teachers will receive a new laptop and after three years, the laptops will be given to students to use and those teachers will receive a new laptop.  In other words, every three years, teachers get a new laptop and students gain access to a set of three year old laptops. Coordinators from the District Staff Development department will design and coordinate various professional development (PD) opportunities for teachers and the implementation is based on an inquiry model (action research).  ...

Last year I had the privilege of facilitating a learning team consisting of a small group of school principals.  Learning teams in our District are learning structures designed to support action research.  These principals had recently purchased tablet PCs and had the following question: “In what ways will my leadership skills be improved by my learning the various tools of my tablet?”   They are leaders of elementary (K-5) and middle (6-8) schools. Learning teams are a very important method for our teachers and principals to experience embedded action research of their own design.  I presented their story at CUEBC in October 2009 .  We have over 1/3 of our educators who’ve chosen to be on a learning team and around 41% of all learning teams have a learning with technology focus.  I talked about technology leadership in a previous post and I think this group of Principals exemplify learning and leadership. Role of Principal and Technology They see the...