December 2005 — Technology Integration
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Keeping Tech Support In Step With Technology
Student techies. One district from Washington state has found that student technicians in a “Generation Tech” program can add more support, especially for classroom technology use. Students are capable and willing, and thrive on being given responsibility for improving education using technology. “Without the students, we couldn’t possibly afford the level of technical support our teachers have come to rely on,” says Jeff Waddington, a technology coordinator in Olympia, WA. This mutually beneficial relationship gives students needed job skills, and provides the school with on-site, trained technicians to help with simple technical issues. The students are often around longer than part-time aides. Students also have an existing relationship with teachers, as well as a better understanding of classroom technology issues.
Walking the ‘Line’
Technology support staff in schools must walk a fine line that business IT personnel
never do. They have to keep the hardware operating the best they can with limited
resources, while not impeding the very human, unpredictable, and sometimes messy
process of learning. If they exercise too much control, they are called autocrats,
and the technology will only be useful for rote, mechanical applications. If
they are too lax, the systems will break down and nothing will work. And in
the midst of performing this delicate job, they must keep in mind technology’s
ultimate aim, which is to give all students the ability to visualize and create
new meaning in the world, using what the father of educational computing, Seymour
Papert, succinctly called a “tool to think with.” It requires that
a delicate balance be struck, one that educators are only just beginning to
get a handle on.
Sylvia Martinez is VP of Generation Yes (genyes.com), which offers the Generation Tech and other student technology programs. John Umekubo is executive director of AdTech, and an educational technology consultant for public and private schools in Los Angeles.
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