WHAT!! The world…has changed?

Small World, Big Technology

First Day…

January 28th, 2008 by · No Comments · cowood2676, EdTech

Well I just got back to my hotel after a the first day of TASA Midwinter. I was not very impressed, my first session (all 12 of us) were bored to tears as we quickly found that what was listed in the program wasn’t exactly what we got. Oh, it gets better, just as I was getting excited to hear Marco Torres, Education Technology Director for San Fernando (CA) High School… We found out that he had canceled due to a family emergency. Ok, so if that’s not bad enough I got a call from my wife telling me that her grandmother had passed away. I had decided to call it quits and make the 5 hour drive home when my wife called and said that she wanted me to stay, they had scheduled the funeral around me, talk about feeling like crap. So, what do you do when your 1st day of a conference has been a bust? Grin and bear it and hope for a better day tomorrow? I did what any sensible person would do, I picked up a book and began to read (grin). The only book I had with me was titled “Recruiting and Hiring Effective Teachers” now, I don’t hire teachers but found the book very informative… more to come on this later.

Stay tuned I’ll be back tomorrow, with good stuff, hopefully.

Taking my own advice…

January 10th, 2008 by · No Comments · cowood2676, EdTech, Technology

As I was cleaning out my digital clutter, I found a “plea” I had written to my Superintendent several years ago. It seems that I should have focused more on the outcome of that plea, Instead I followed the “traditional” paths. This is what I learned: Following instead of leading has brought me back to where I am today…take a minute to read below, keep in mind I wrote this in 2000-2001

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School systems that cling to traditional methods of operating in the midst of the technological revolution that has taken our society hostage will become alienated, obsolete and ultimately unsuccessful in the creation of educated and resourceful learners. For technology to make a genuine contribution in education it must be allowed to shape and be shaped. Its effect will be insignificant if it is simply “added on” to existing curricula. To be effective, technology must be an instructional tool that is used to emphasize the subject matter being taught rather than highlighting the technology itself.

Technology is best used to increase learning options for all students. It remains for teachers, using the tools, to translate information into knowledge; for students to formulate questions and acquire learning skills.

Every student must be able to access information and have the ability to analyze the information for validity and usefulness. The failure to understand, use, and appreciate technology will be a handicap that could affect the fulfillment of an individual’s personal and professional goals. We must insure that students develop critical thinking skills in the application of technology. Students should ultimately harness technology’s potential by understanding, using, and appreciating technology’s role in real-life problem solving and decision making.

During the past decade, computers, satellite dishes, and VCR’s have become everyday utensils for many people. Word processing, telecommunications, databases, and information contained on CD/ROM are used routinely in the workplace. In our society technology has become the primary means of information storage, access, processing, and communication.

What does this mean? If the nature of society has changed, then clearly the skills required to live successful and fulfilling lives have also changed.

The traditional role of education has been to help students learn a knowledge base of facts. This knowledge allowed them to graduate from formal educational institutions and become effective citizens in the society that existed. Factual knowledge was power then. Today, there is an infinite body of knowledge which rapidly becomes outdated. Schools need to prepare young people to educate themselves throughout their lives.

Understanding concepts and how to manage information is now more important than factual knowledge alone.  Today’s students need to learn using a wider variety of resources which challenge them to think, reflect, and express divergent viewpoints. The focus must be on individuals and what activities and experiences they need in order to be successful learners.  Perhaps Eric Hoffer said it best. “In times of change learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.” Information technology used to its maximum potential allows teachers to be the best they can be and students to be learners inheriting and managing an ever changing world.  

Technology can contribute significantly to the improvement of educational opportunities and increase all students’ skills, competence, and knowledge. The capacity of the computer and other new technologies to provide visual representations, feedback and rapidly processed information greatly expands the methods through which students learn, work with information, and communicate.”

Well there it is..What do ya think? 

Setting a Direction

January 3rd, 2008 by · 2 Comments · Blogging, cowood2676, EdTech, Rural Technology, Technology, Technology Directors

I have found in my years as a Director that technology in small schools rarely has a direction. We seem to react instead of “proact”. We watch and then act.  We as schools are required to write technology plans that are out there in la la land and then by some sort of magic make it all work.  I am perplexed by people who say they are for technology, but don’t use it themselves, and when it comes to beginning a project they are scared to start. Aren’t we are supposed to have a vision for student learning, beliefs, and a rationale for creating and continuing to build. Why can’t we move into the 21st century?  

My instructional technologist and I met today to talk about PD. We decided that we are going to start training teachers on the things that really matter; we are going to shift our focus away from productivity tools to the tools that will help create the 21st century classroom. I hate to break it to you if you don’t know, but PowerPoint just doesn’t cut it anymore. Students want IM, Bloging, iGoogle, Content Management, Wikis, Podcasts etc… Students today live, learn and play in a media-saturated society, in a world of “infotainment” and spectacle. For many students the curriculum is not relevant, and they become disengaged from learning. Transform the teacher, transform learning, engage the learner.

 I may be way off base here, but what we are doing isn’t working.

Open What Record?

December 7th, 2007 by · No Comments · cowood2676, EdTech, Open Records, Rural Technology, Technology

This past summer I had the opportunity to speak at the TASB Summer leadership Institute. The experience for me was awesome as I was able to enter a world that few techs get an opportunity to see. If you don’t know about SLI, it is a Texas based conference dedicated to School Board members, but as I found, the content is widely applicable to all stakeholders in a school. One of the best sessions I attended was titled, “Trustees and Technology: Getting Wired Without Getting Shocked.” The presenter, Thomas A. Gwosdz, is a Staff Attorney for TASB.  The presentation primarily dealt with the Open Meetings Act and the Public Information Act as they relate to school boards and technology.

The format was very unique; he started with a question, then a scenario, the answer, an explanation, and finally the solution. I have gained approval from TASB to share some of his presentation with you. If you would like the full presentation you can find it here. https://www.tasb.org/apps/tasbstore/storeCategory.cfm?at=4&StartRow=21&PageNum=3 

What do e-mails have to do with the Open Meetings Act?
Short Answer:  If school board members use e-mail as a substitute for deliberation in properly posted public meetings, the e-mails may violate the Texas Open Meetings Act (OMA).  

Is it ever appropriate for board members to contact each other by e-mail outside of public meetings?
Short Answer:  If the e-mail exchange causes a quorum of the board to deliberate outside of a public meeting, then an illegal meeting will have occurred.  Whether the board or any individual could be held liable for the violation depends on the circumstances surrounding the communications.  

What kinds of e-mails qualify as deliberation of public business?
Short Answer:  According to the attorney general, if even one board member speaks (or, presumably, e-mails) about school business to a quorum of the school board, deliberation-and therefore a meeting-occurs, even if no other member responds.  If a one-way communication by one board member to a quorum of the board constitutes deliberation, then a listserv posting, cc to the rest of the board, or a reply to all e-mail on a matter of public business could run afoul of the OMA. 

Is forwarding information from a non-member considered a deliberation?
Short Answer:  Arguably, yes.  By expressing views in a message copied to all board members. Potentially causes a deliberation among a quorum of the board.  On the other hand, if the message is sent to the superintendent without copying the board, no violation will occur. 

Can the administration use e-mail to contact board members outside of a public meeting?
Short Answer:  The superintendent is not a member of the school board; therefore, he is not technically subject to the OMA.  As a result, the superintendent and other members of the administration may use e-mail to communicate with the board (even the whole board at one time) about school business. Superintendents and others who are not on the board should exercise caution, however, not to use e-mail in a way that facilitates an open meetings violation on the part of board members.  

Are board members’ e-mails public records?
Short Answer:  The e-mails are records subject to the Public Information Act.  According to the attorney general, e-mails about district business sent to or from a government official’s home computer are subject to disclosure absent an applicable exception.

 What about a personal e-mail sent from a school e-mail account?
Short Answer:  E-mails that are not related to the transaction of official district business are not subject to public disclosure. 

Are trustees allowed to make personal use of school district technology?
Short Answer:  Perhaps not, at least according to the Internal Revenue Service. 

Are there any limits to what a trustee can say on his or her own website?
Short Answer:  Yes.  Just because it is easy to say your peace on the Internet does not mean it is free.  If members cross the line and disclose confidential information or commit defamation, they may expose themselves to a variety of civil penalties. 

Can trustees use cell phones to conduct school business?
Short Answer:   many of the legal issues presented by the use of e-mail are also presented by the use of cellular telephones. 

Is there a way board members can participate in meetings while they are out of town?
Short Answer:  Yes, but it will not be easy.  The OMA provides several telecommunications options for participating in or broadcasting public meetings, but each applies only in limited circumstances.  Although a telephone conference call is not an option, the OMA appears to permit participation by videoconference if the district can overcome several technical hurdles.  

I have come to the realization that if there ever were questions regarding Electronically Stored Information and my school board, I would be the one answering all the questions.

In the spirit of sharing

Page cannot be displayed…again…UGH!!

December 5th, 2007 by · 6 Comments · cowood2676, EdTech, Internet Errors, Rural Technology, Technology

The protocol used to exchange information on the Internet – TCP/IP – sends information as “packets”. The packets of data can be thought of as letters in envelopes; the data is wrapped up inside (the “letter”) and the information about where it’s going and where it’s from is contained in a header (the “envelope”). The envelope has two pieces of addressing information on it, the address – which computer on the internet it’s going to -, and the port which defines - what the purpose of the data is -. The address is a number that your computer looks up from a master directory to convert names like www.yahoo.com into numbers like 66.218.71.92, much like you’d look up a number in the phone book. The port number identifies various services the packets are used for. For example, data sent to port #25 is intended for email, #80 is for fetching a web page, etc.

Most techs know all this but what some do not know is that when a page is requested on port 80, the server responding to the request does not respond on the same port. If you were to do a netstat on your own web server it would look something like this.

TCP    web_svr:http           10.50.32.24:49585      ESTABLISHED

TCP    web_svr:http           10.50.32.24:49586      ESTABLISHED

TCP    web_svr:http           10.50.33.58:49330      ESTABLISHED

TCP    web_svr:http           10.50.33.62:52435      ESTABLISHED

Notice the http connection (servername:connection type), but don’t overlook the port that the connection is established on (connected to:connection port).

This is where the confusion starts. Some ISP’s choose to create Access Lists in their routers that block incoming TCP and UDP traffic on certain ports. The problem is that the computer sending the request and the server attempting to respond to the request do not know that the port they are requesting to use is blocked. Thus, the end user gets a “Page cannot be displayed”. Furthermore, most of these Access Lists contain contiguous sets of numbers. This is a big problem because your browser is designed to ask for request in sequential port order, so if you “hit” an Access List at the beginning of one of these sets of numbers then it could take several minutes for your computer to re-establish connection with the foreign system.

I guess the only logical thing to do would be to attempt to find out why. Why do some providers choose to use port blocking technology instead of signature blocking? It seems to me that the provider should make every attempt to make the end user experience a good one, but as I have outlined above that is not always the case. Personally, I think we should hold the provider accountable for:

  1. Not giving us the best experience available
  2. Attempting to blame our problems on some other issue

What do you think?

To Tech or not to Tech

December 4th, 2007 by · 4 Comments · cowood2676, EdTech, Rural Technology, Technology, Technology Directors

Recently, I had the opportunity to speak to a group of educators at the Permian Tech Conference here in Big Spring. I was so excited, I was finally going to get to talk tech-speak to some fellow educators. As I began to speak about the “Golden Triangle” it became clear that not everyone in the room was “technical”. Although there were some great questions about the presentation, I couldn’t help be a little disappointed. I then took my disappointment and turned it into an opportunity to learn. I pondered this question: Why would some not so technical people come to a technical event? The answer I found was more than a little strange.

If you were to walk into a bank or large corporation and ask for the IT Manager what would you get? An IT Manager! In most cases you would not get a former teller or loan officer but rather a real IT person. You may be laughing or wondering where I’m going with this but if you walk into a rural school let’s say with an ADA of 4,000 or less and ask for the Technology Director, more often than not, you are going to get a former Ag teacher, Volleyball Coach, or Science teacher who used to utilize technology in their classrooms. (If you are one please don’t be offended…read on) I asked myself, why? Why do schools hire non-technical personnel to fill technical positions? Two reasons:

1. People that have the technical skills required to run a school do not want to live in a small rural community, and
2. the ones who are willing to live there won’t do the job for the available pay.

These factors put a small district in a real tough position. Most have decided that they need a technical “presence” but claim to not have the funding capacity to hire the skilled personnel they need! (More later on the claim, I have some thoughts about funding.) So, they hire the “formers” and assure them that any training they need the district will provide, and in most cases it is this very claim that hooks the teacher into a job that is more time consuming and harder than the one they used to have, but only because they need training. Then, finally the best part, the teacher who is working their fingers to the bone finds a great training opportunity, she/he tells their boss about the training only to find out that when they tell their boss the cost, it is suddenly decided that the district really doesn’t have the money to send them to training…. What?

So, as you can see I have found myself in an endless loop of questions.

What this blog is about!

December 4th, 2007 by · 1 Comment · cowood2676, EdTech, Rural Technology, Technology, Technology Directors

This blog is to be dedicated to those of us who live in rural parts of the country..you know the ones that always seem to be a step behind the “big city”. Anyway, hang around as I hope to bring to the forefront some relevant topics for discussion.