Technology Planning for Innovation
“Does the rhino like to be scratched behind his ears?” A student asked that question during a series of lessons, presented via Zoom by the San Diego Zoo Careers in Conservancy, to Sarah Rines’ 7th grade science class at Calavera Hills Middle School. The trainer and keeper were right there with the big animals, so the students got a virtual experience with the rhinos, and could interact directly with the trainer.
In a similar way, Juli Bachman’s Biomedical Science pathway students at Sage Creek High School met with Dr. Sharon Derrick, a forensic anthropologist at Texas A&M. And Carlsbad Village Academy students took part in the Southwest Carpenters Training Fund LIVE virtual site tour to learn about careers and apprenticeship programs. Other students participated in a Nobel Women in STEM event, with panelists from Thermo Fisher presenting career information. Students also are learning from digital virtual field trips to a farm and from virtual guest speakers including scientists, astronauts, and even software engineers presenting an hour of code.
Virtual field trips. Synchronous and asynchronous learning. Video conferencing. These are all “just in jime” technologies. In February 2020 we would never have envisioned the explosion in instructional technology that we see today. Has it been challenging? Absolutely. Necessary? No question. But, if Necessity is the Mother of Invention, few instances in our lifetimes have highlighted that notion so clearly. Some of these new technologies will enhance our students’ instructional experience for years to come. And, once again, we are fortunate that we live here in Carlsbad, a community that embraces the latest technologies and supports our students to be the best they can be.
Our 2019 Technology Plan introduced the once-lofty goals of providing every middle and high school student and their teachers with their own chromebooks or similar devices, and moving all district technology onto a cloud-based infrastructure. When the pandemic hit in March 2020, our immediate priority was to ramp up attaining that goal, and to provide a suitable device–a current, working, compatible, and connected device–for every one of our 11,000 students and 1,000 teachers and staff members. Our Technology Team undertook a herculean effort to scale up our capabilities to meet these needs, scrambling to identify funding, and then locating, ordering, and distributing devices to students and teachers.
Last summer our Board of Trustees adopted the 2021 Tech Plan to expand these efforts, by upgrading the network backbone and adding bandwidth to better support video conferencing, graphics, video streaming, multimedia, and multi-tasking. In addition, outdoor WiFi is being added to campuses. And the plan included upgrading our phone system onto the cloud, providing staff with the ability to make and receive calls, and to send texts, from any location.
We have been lucky that a band of exemplary “techie” teachers magnanimously harnessed and shared their expertise–their tricks of the trade–to train teachers, students, and families how to learn in a virtual or hybrid setting. Our IT team already had built the infrastructure needed for cloud-based learning, accessible anytime, anywhere. Teachers stepped up to do an outstanding job of collaborating, coaching, and learning to teach in new ways. While many of our personnel already had used Google Classroom, Google Meet, and Aeries Gradebook in the past, they soon were embarking on brand new strategies: using Screencastify to make videos and employing interactive tools such as Flipgrid, Netop, and Nearpod to manage instruction. Professional development, via Alludo, was intensified to maximize teacher support and training on these technologies. Further, we tapped into lots of new software, websites, and other online resources and tools, to enrich the instructional program.
Some of the new technologies necessitated by the pandemic will continue to be utilized more frequently and effectively. Many of our teachers continue to use these new technologies in the classroom, and not just in remote settings, in creative ways. For instance, companies and businesses are more open to sponsoring virtual field trips and virtual guest speakers than in-person events. They are easier to schedule, less costly, and often allow students to do and see more than they had in the past. The logistics are certainly less stressful for the teachers and the businesses. Virtual technology is often the norm now, and we now have the equipment in all of our classrooms.
Yes, these have been the most difficult of times, but Carlsbad Unified’s resourceful teachers, students, and community have joined together to face the challenges and come through it all stronger than ever.
