Then and Now - Assumption High School

Technology Then and Now Joyce Koch, Technology Director
Paper, pencil, pen, and books. That was then. Computers,
projectors, SMARTBoards and the Internet. This is now. The
technology that is used in homes, schools, and businesses is much
more sophisticated today than when Assumption was founded in
1955. However, our mission and vision have not changed. We are
still committed to educating “the whole person” and graduating
students who will be “socially responsible women, committed
to gospel living, lifelong learning, and a life of leadership and
service in society.”
Individual
teens sent
or received
3,339 texts
on average
per month
during the
second
quarter of
2010*
A Nielsen Company survey found that
individual teens sent or received 3,339
texts on average per month during the
second quarter of 2010.*
We recognize that today’s youth have
never known a world without computers
and the Internet. They take technology
and media for granted as much as we
did air when we were teens. A study
sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation
found that the average 8- to 18-year-old
spends seven hours per day with digital
media on screens.** We want our students
to be engaged in active learning here at
school using the tools that they need in their current and future
lives. We need to capitalize on their attraction to technology and
help them learn to use it properly and ethically.
Assumption has begun the process of implementing a one to
one initiative which will put a Tablet PC in the hands of every
student. In preparation for this transition, we divided into
subcommittees and investigated various aspects of using Tablet
PCs in schools. We wanted to see how other schools handled
issues such as the following:
• How do we assist teachers to integrate the use of tablets into
the curriculum effectively?
• What are best practices for charging batteries or storing files?
• How many loaner tablets should we have on hand?
• Where will students store their tablets when not using them?
• What procedures can we implement to use less paper?
• What about electronic textbooks?
We are still working on some of these areas and others, trying
to have policies in place that will make our transition easier for
teachers and students. Check out our blog at http://tinyurl.com/
TechSense.
This past year we worked on infrastructure preparedness
by installing 802.11n wireless access points throughout the
building and making sure every room had a ceiling-mounted
data projector and speakers. We chose a new cloud-based
web filtering software that will filter sites when students access
the Internet at home as well as when they are at school, and
a cloud-based storage site where our students can save their
files and access them wherever they have Internet access. Our
technology director studied and passed an exam qualifying us
as an HP Certified Self-Maintainer site which allows us to fix
broken computers here at school and have a faster turnaround
time to get the malfunctioning Tablet PCs working and back in
the hands of the students and teachers.
Last summer
we purchased
Tablet PCs for all
of the teachers and
held five one-day
orientation sessions
so they had
some knowledge
and experience
with using the
tablets in their
classes. Assumption teachers have attended required and optional
technology training sessions throughout the school year helping
them to better utilize the Tablet PCs in their classes. All of our
research has shown that teacher professional development is key
and must be ongoing. We are committed to providing our teachers
with training and support for successful technology integration.
In the fall of 2010 we met with technology personnel and
administrators of Louisville Catholic
The average
8- to 18-yearold
spends
seven hours
per day with
digital media
on screens.**
schools to hear from vendors and other
schools in Ohio and Kentucky about
how to launch a successful one-to-one
program. All of the Louisville high schools
are in various stages of studying and/or
implementing a one-to-one initiative. We
then surveyed our students and found
that they are overwhelmingly in favor
of having student laptops. Access to
information, ease of keeping track of their
work, collaborating with their peers, using less paper, and having
textbooks in electronic form are some of the reasons they believe
we should go this route.
We are in the process of forming a parent and a student panel
in order to gather their input to assist us in setting up some
policies with regard to proper use, Internet filtering, and other
acceptable use policies for the laptops. We want and need the
involvement of all stakeholders.
The more we read, research, and talk to teachers and
administrators at other one-to-one schools, the more convinced
we are that the Tablet PC is the right tool to engage our students in
learning today and to prepare them for the future. We know, as with
any program, that we must prepare for success. Our next phase
in this process is to purchase some classroom sets for two of our
most technologically experienced teachers to use with their classes.
They will become more experienced users, discovering effective
procedures and working out the bugs. They, in turn, will assist
the rest of the teachers as the freshman and sophomore classes
purchase and use the tablets for the 2012-2013 school year.
As we have done in the past with major initiatives at
Assumption, such as block scheduling, we are doing our
homework and studying all aspects of successful one-to-one
schools in order to design the program that is best for our
students. We will move forward deliberately and decidedly with
our mission of preparing “socially responsible women, committed
to gospel living, lifelong learning, and a life of leadership and
service in society,” using the 21st century tools they need.
*The Nielsen Company. “U.S. Teen Mobile Report:
Calling Yesterday, Texting Today, Using Apps
Tomorrow.” 14 October 2010. 17 March 2011
.
**Rideout, V.J., Foehr, U.G., & Roberts, D.F.
“Generation M2: Media in the Lives of 8-
to 18-year-olds.” 2010.
4 Assumption Magazine Spring 2011