Spring Tech Update

Following are some brief technology updates for our district:

Wm Budd and HS Math is getting SMARTer
During the past month SMART Boards have been installed in all of the grade 1 and 2 classrooms. Teachers at WB are actively working in teams to use this technology to improve their ability to help all students learn. Two boards will also be placed in math classrooms at the HS. All HS math classrooms will now be equipped with this technology.


New Computer Lab for Five Lakes
29 new computers are being purchased to replace the 7+ year old computer lab on the first floor of the Five Lakes Media Center. A combination of district technology funds, Microsoft funds and a $200 discount per computer break from Apple made this possible. The old workstations will be used to do reading and math computer assisted instruction at both Budd and 5 Lakes replacing some even older classroom workstations.


“New” Web Presence Going Live This Week
Bill Vader will be putting a new front page onto our old district web site that will redirect the general public to our new web sites. Both the old and new sites will stay on-line through the remainder of the school year. All new web information should be posted to the new sites starting today.


Tis the Testing Season
Computer labs will be used for testing in all three sites starting the last week of April. MCAII Science Tests in grades 5,8 and 10 will be administered April 27-May 1 and NWEA testing will be during the first three weeks of May.


Summer Project Bids Are In
Bids have been received and a vendor has been selected to do the summer renovation related technology projects at Five Lakes and the High School. Included in these projects will be projector mounting in all classrooms as well as classroom sound system upgrades at Five Lakes. The winning bid came in below budget. This will hopefully allow for more classroom technologies to be purchased in the future.


Mechanizing Essential Reading and Math Assessment Data Collection
Brad Wells, Bill and I are exploring ways to mechanize some of the common math and reading assessment items so that strand data from some assessments could be pushed into Educator Access (standards grade book) and/or View Point (data warehouse). The goal for this is to reduce some of the teacher time needed to administer some of the text based assessments giving you more time to do better non-traditional formative assessments and related interventions.

Tech Portal from February is Still Active
One shot professional development events, especially those that are technology related, are typically not very effective unless teachers and administrators contine to be active with the new content. The Tech Portal is desiged to allow folks to continue to get information and share ideas after the event. Please consider reviting this site if interested: http://www.soc6036.org/course/view.php?id=310