Lefkowitz+Rough+Draft

Technology integration and implementation within a school, is a great way to aid in a school's reform effort. Students utilize technology in their daily lives outside of a school setting. It is important for a school to recognize this phenomena and incorporate it within the curriculum. Increasing the technological options in school can increase student engagement, and therefore have an effect on student achievement. Hickory Ridge High School has had substantial technological upgrades, which includes 15 computers for student use in each classroom. The inclusion of these computers in the teacher’s curriculum and instruction has been slow. The superintendent and Jim O’Connor must work together to design and implement a school technology plan that can enhance the curriculum for both students and teachers. Cunningham and Cordeiro (2009) present the four steps for implementing a five year technology plan including: vision, design and implementation, wheeling and dealing and staff development. Wingfield school district has already taken steps to integrate technology inside of Hickory Ridge High School; it is up to the school to mold their plan to fit within the district's vision of technology. Once Jim O’Connor and the faculty have decided on the vision for the technology plan, they must design steps to ensure each teacher has the skills to implement this in their classroom. Jim O’Connor must first organize a technology team to help decide what staff development to pursue. Jim O’Connor can tap into the skill set of the fast-trackers, including Michael Scott and Kerri Beth, to help align the staff development needs. Staff development with regards to technology, is only the beginning phase. Jim O’Connor must encourage the newly formed technology team to continue to research and decide on future technology direction for the school that are in line with the district’s and school’s technology vision. The technology team can conduct semiannual facilities audits to determine the needs and deficiencies within the school including: professional development, curricula, instruction, student assessment, and the physical learning environment (Daugherty, Klenke & Neden, 2008). Including the fast-trackers on the technology team will have a dual purpose. First, it will create a positive impact on technology implementation at the school; and second, it will give the fast-trackers a feeling of respect and voice within the school, which will earn Jim O’Connor more respect from his faculty and staff. ** School Reform ** Schools, both low performing and high performing, need to continuously monitor and improve themselves to stay competitive with the rigorous state and federal standards set forth in the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation. High performing schools need to maintain their level of excellence and not allow past successes to stagnate their present and future goals. These schools “sustain achievement” and “embrace change” (Cunningham & Cordeiro, 2009). Low performing schools, on the other hand, need to think outside the box and learn to perform at high levels. To bring Hickory Ridge High School to better meet the needs of the students and faculty, the superintendent needs to work with the principal on instituting sustainable reform efforts, while utilizing his expertise in preserving the history and culture of the school. Before any school reform efforts at Hickory Ridge High School can be started, the superintendent and the principal, Jim O’Connor, must ensure that each step toward change is not superficial. According to Reeves (2007), there are “four steps to ensuring lasting change”. The first step for enacting lasting change is for the principal and superintendent to define what aspects of the school will remain the same through the reform process. This step is where the superintendent can work with Jim O’Connor’s strength’s and expertise as keeper of the history and his excellent rapport with parents and students. There are some positive aspects at Hickory High School, and Mr. O’Connor can help the superintendent “place change within the context of stability”. Second, the leader must recognize that his or her actions are louder than his or her words. In this step, the superintendent and Jim O’Connor must have follow through on any reform effort they propose. As principal, Jim O’Connor must have buy-in, if he does not respect the specific reform effort, then the staff will not respect it either. This is the superintendent’s most challenging part of the four steps, because Jim O’Connor is set in his ways. The superintendent must work to show Jim O’Connor that he has a lot to offer his staff by leading them in school reform. Third, the tools for reform must fit with the school culture. There are many tools for reform, but it is important for the superintendent and Jim O’Connor to select reform tools that are appropriate for Hickory Ridge High School. In this step, the superintendent can again tap into Jim O’Connor’s skills and knowledge of students and the community to decide which reform efforts could produce the best results. The last of Reeves’s (2007) steps toward lasting change is that the leader must get “get down and dirty along with everyone else”. The leader must fully embrace the reform effort; and there is no better way for Jim O’Connor to show he is for reform efforts than to show the staff that he is ready to help in every aspect of the school reform. One way the superintendent can encourage Jim O'Connor to embrace a school reform effort, is to start in an area that Mr. O'Connor excels. Mr. O'Connor has a strong and supportive parent group who are ready and willing to assist in the efforts of the new school direction. In addition, Mr. O'Connor has a great rapport with the parents in his school and is very familiar with the community. This provides an excellent starting point for reform and would help bridge the gap between the administration and the faculty. Community involvement would benefit the faculty and students, which would be a bridge to a more productive partnership between the administration and staff. For the community involvement to be successful, Jim O'Connor needs to engage the stakeholders to want to assist in improving Hickory High School. To do this, Jim O'Connor will need to make an effort to improve school climate, extinguish barriers to participation and allocate funds to perpetuate family and community involvement. Community involvement is only first step in reforming Hickory High School. A more concerted effort will be needed to improve the school climate and instruction. The superintendant and Jim O'Connor must institute a framework for school improvement which are more conducive to improved collegiality between administration and staff. The renewal framework includes: a covenant, shared governance plan and ability to participate in action research (Cunningham & Cordeiro, 2009). The covenant is a belief system that administration, staff and community members share about exemplary teaching and learning within a school setting. Mr. O'Connor must want to collaborate with his staff to define the direction of the school. This covenant is more than a mission and vision, because Hickory High School already revised the mission to no avail. To get buy-in from the staff, Mr. O'Connor must allow individual opinions and voices to discuss what the new direction of the school should be. This collaboration can be in large groups during staff meetings, smaller groups during department meetings or personally through surveys and data analysis of survey results. In order for the covenant to be affective, Mr. O'Connor must utilize the beliefs that the staff has about teaching and learning to serve as a guide that will direct the school through its reform effort. Once the covenant is mutually agreed upon through collaboration and discussion, the staff must decide how they will achieve their goals through shared governance. The shared governance model must be detailed and show the decision making process. Mr. O'Connor should develop teams of teachers and assign them specific responsibilities with decision-making power for those responsibilities. Mr. O'Connor should institute A+ teams, leadership teams, department teams, technology teams and safety teams with specific responsibilities and decision-making power. For example, A+ teams can be responsible for reviewing and selecting upcoming staff development, while technology teams could be in charge of the technology budget needs for instructional hardware and software. Each team would be composed of teachers from varying disciplines and grade levels thereby creating a horizontal and vertical sampling to better address the needs of the school. Action research is the third and final prong of the framework for school improvement (Cunningham & Cordeiro, 2009). Action research is the ability of the staff and administration to reflect upon their goals and determine if the school is on track to make its desired progress. Standardized testing and rigorous state standards have increased action research in the teaching profession. Action research can be as simple as teachers collecting class data and developing a plan to improve results over time, to working with college professors of a specific discipline to hone and improve classroom skills (Megowan-Romanowicz, 2010). In the case of Hickory High School, due to the large variance in teaching experience, it would be appropriate to ease action research into the classroom setting. Jim O'Connor and the staff can start out with simple action research implementation such as graphing classroom and school achievement goals, then analyzing the data to formulate a plan. Hickory High School can also utilize plus/delta charts with student input, to improve or change instruction to suit the students’ specific needs. The more intensive action research can be introduced slowly through staff meetings, professional development and even best practices within the school.
 * TECHNOLOGY **