Back to School

After a busy month of August, I am now back at my regular school, with all the technology it provides. My experiences during the summer school session served to remind me how much we have come to rely on technology in our schools. This year, I am serving on the Educational Technology Committee. I am awaiting word on its first meeting.

Summer school was a challenge for me after the year at CTE. I found that upon returning to the school that had previously been my employer, I could not use the facility's computers except as a student, which meant that many websites were blocked from me that would not have been blocked from other teachers. In addition, all students at this school use a generic log-in, which meant that anything I put on the computer could be seen by all the other students in the school. This is disconcerting. I would have recommended to the school that they give a unique log-in to all students for security and monitoring purposes. I cannot believe that they do not do this! It would enable the IT personnel to monitor visits to inappropriate sites and inappropriate use of the computers by students. How difficult is it to add a user to the system? They do it for the teaching staff and assistants, why not for the students as well.

Anyway, I am now back in the land of SmartBoards, Online Course Management Systems, Curriculum Mapping Software and PowerSchool/PowerGrade, and will be regularly posting commentary on these and other technology uses in Alternative and Career/Technical Educational settings.