Evaluating Technology Integration

The Canyons School District, located in the progressive South-East suburbs of Salt Lake City, Utah, hosted the Utah Content Forum (aka C-Forum) on December 4th, 2009. I volunteered to apply my dissertation research (Utah State University, 2002) on Evaluating Technology Integration to school technology in Utah.

For the dissertation I had asked to compare the three types of assessment that were being used in Idaho to assess teachers' abilities to integrate technology with instruction. These were ...
the so-called "Boise Exam," developed at Boise State University;
the Idaho Performance Assessment, developed at Idaho State University in Pocatello; and,
the Idaho Technology Portfolio Assessment, developed at the University of Idaho in Moscow.
Each method was based on one educational philosophy or another, but neither camp could agree on the best way to assess teachers' ability to integrate or "infuse" technology in their schools. I was only given access to data at Idaho State University, but the discussion on the best way to assess teachers' ability to use technology continues.

Along with teacher assessment, I discussed program evaluation. Administrators, board members, and tax payers alike are all asking, "What is our return on investment for money paid for technology in the schools?"
This question fits the summative evaluation category where data is quantitative and facilitates value comparison between programs and requires large numbers to show significance. This process is extensive, expensive, and is often performed by an outside entity.

For the purpose of Professional Development, as internal and district level trainers, we must gather qualitative data on the ways that teachers are currently using the technologies that are available to them. This is so that we can ...
a.) perform a needs assessment,
b.) develop or locate training materials to meet those training needs,
c.) deliver training individually or in small groups, and then
d.) gather post training data to see whether the needs were met.
e.) repeat the cycle!

Since I only had 15 minutes to introduce the topic at C-Forum, I built this blog so that participants (and others) might continue to interact and provide ways that they are evaluating technology integration in their schools. These contributions will potentially benefit a wide audience!