“Building a Technology-Rich Community” is an article that explains the work of the State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA) and their thoughts on technology integration and how it will improve education. The ideas shared are from the group meeting in April of 2003 for the second annual “SETDA National Leadership Institute 2003 Toolkit: States Helping States Implement No Child Left Behind. The meeting included six state education technology directors and over 100 state education technology leaders in an effort to collaborate and share ideas and resources (George, 2004).
According to Melinda George, the author, the goal of the
SETDA is to set up a national network for collaboration and to formulate a
national voice to promote using technology to foster students learning. The group has members from all fifty states,
the
George states that “technology provides opportunity in both instruction and administration to improve learning for all students.” She also feels that students are given opportunities, experiences and resources that would not be available to them in any other way. Another benefit of technology that is mentioned is that students gain skills and knowledge that will be helpful for future work experiences.
Leadership is important to having successful integration of technology was another theme of George’s article. The SETDA believes that in order to successfully integrate technology, leaders must build partnerships and provide resources for teachers, including hardware, software and appropriate professional development to make it work (George, 2004).
In conclusion the article states that “as a community” we need to perform research which will prove the benefits of technology integration. This will help support our case for technology integration. George also feels that we need to support the technology leaders at the local, state and federal levels to ensure that technology-rich learning environments continue to grow.
I felt that this article fit well with Standard VIII because it discussed the importance of leadership and suggested ways that leaders can help extend the use of technology through the curriculum. Standard VIII promotes the formation and implementation of partnerships to help promote the use of technology. The SETDA is doing the same thing on a larger scale. Instead of working within individual districts this group is forming a partnership for the entire country to share issues, ideas, and research.
The article supported many of the ideas and issues that we have discussed throughout this course. The article was rather short and would have benefited from adding suggestions regarding how to support the local, state, and federal technology leaders. Also it may have been helpful to share a model of a partnership that has worked well to help technology leaders, administrators, teachers and parents see the benefits of technology integration and what can be done when we work together.
George, Melinda. (2004). Building a Technology-Rich Community. THE Journal, 31, 12.