| Boulder Valley School District
Libby Black, Internet Specialist, talks about her job coordinating the instructional part of technology in the Boulder Valley School District. by Melissa Burgos Brown SCR*TEC "I think there's no end in this process. It's very much an ongoing process. Unlike where you adopt a new curriculum, for example, and teachers learn the new curriculum and in a couple of years they feel comfortable with it, technology is always changing." --Libby Black |
 ibby Black is an Internet Specialist for the Division of Learning
Services, in the Boulder Valley School District, Boulder, Colorado. Her job
involves helping the district's teachers, administrators, students, and parents
learn the technology skills they need to function in a digital age. She designs
and teaches professional development classes and writes most of the documentation
for those classes. Much of her professional development material is available
online at her Web
site. |
 Libby Black | Let's start with a little bit about your background. How did you
get started with Internet training and professional
development? My background is as a secondary math teacher and I was looking for a new teaching position. At the time, the University of Colorado at Boulder and the Boulder Valley School District were beginning to collaborate on a project to work at getting Internet into the classrooms. This was in 1991. They needed somebody to help write a grant and to lead the effort and I was in the right place at the right time. Since I was looking for a position in teaching, I chose to do that at that time. This opportunity seemed interesting and that's how I got involved. I had taught some computer classes, but I wasn't what you'd call an expert in any way. I had never actually used telecommunications before that. So did you just learn as you went along or did you decide take classes? There were no classes then [about the Internet] and there were no books. So the way I had to learn was by calling up the "techie" people, in this case, at the University, and having them help me through it. My principle job became changing a techie's description of how you use this thing into something that a classroom teacher could relate to and understand, translation if you will. |
| Tell me a little bit about your district and what your job as Internet
specialist involves. I'm an Internet Specialist in the Division of Learning Services, that means that my job encompasses the instructional part of Internet. I do lots of teacher training. I do development of materials. I design a lot of the professional development courses that are taught in the district, not necessarily by me, but by other teachers. I am also in charge of policy issues; things like acceptable use. When kids misbehave, I get involved in those situations if they're substantial. I also do some grant writing and try to disseminate the teachers' opportunities that come along as a result of having access to the Internet. |
| "My principle job became
changing a techie's description of how you use this thing into something that a
classroom teacher could relate to and understand, translation if you
will." | Did your district
fund this technology initiative through a grant? Initially it was a grant from the National Science Foundation that got us started with the Internet in 1992. Since then, our voters passed a bond in 1994 and part of it was for technology. Through that bond, we were able to put an Internet connection in every building, in the library, and one other place, not necessarily in all classrooms. At the time it was exorbitant, and it wasn't really clear yet if that was something that we were going to want. And so, the ongoing costs of Internet access, for example, are paid through the regular district budget. Then, when the need for getting upgraded technology and more technology arises, we just sort of piece all different kinds of things together like most school districts do. |
| Tell me about the organizational structure of your professional
development programs, is it voluntary for teachers? Is it mandatory? How is it
set up? It's all voluntary, at least from the district perspective. A principal might have some requirements, but from the district level it's all voluntary. It's set up in different ways. Most of the teachers do not get paid for it. They can get credit if they choose. There are some types of training in the past that have been paid. It really depends on what the training is and how necessary it is for the functioning of either a certain curriculum or a school. For the most part, it's voluntary and it's all taught by teachers in the district or myself. It's open to any employee, sometimes students enroll, and sometimes parents join us in our classes. |
| "One of the things that we've
found that teachers like is mentorships and either small group or one on one
support to help them get to that and that's an expensive model, but probably the
most effective. " |
How are parents involved in the technology effort in the
district? Our district is very decentralized and so, that happens at every building level. Every school has a PTO [Parent/Teacher Organization] as well as a School Improvement Team and so, parents are involved in different ways. It really depends on the school. In some places, they help fund some technology efforts. In other places, they help with the upkeep of technology. In some schools they may come in and help kids use the computer labs. It really varies across the district. When did you begin putting your workshops and documentation online? Well, I can't really answer that question. I think that our district Web page was created in 1995. We've been putting workshops and documentation online since then. |
| What about the professional development resources that you personally
have online? I've done almost all of the workshops that are on that site in the context of my job. I put them online because they serve as our agenda for the workshops and people are always having to go back to them and refer to them. They're always updated so if resources change they always know they can go back there and look at the things they worked on. Can you talk about what's available on your Web site and who can access it? Well anybody can access it. I have two different Web sites. One of them is my homepage which has some resources that I think might be useful to people. The other one is an index of all of the Web pages that I have designed. Most of my Web pages are pretty text based, because they focus on the content. For example, on my index of Web pages I list all of the agendas for all of our workshops. They're not just agendas, but they have the links to all of the resources that we use during those workshops. I have a couple of longer agendas for full-day workshops that are there. One is about using the Internet in your curriculum. One is on more effective research practices with the World Wide Web and includes evaluating electronic resources. Then I have a couple of pages that I put together for our district homepage, for example, there is a page on student resources that divides the various starting-point sites on the Web for kids by elementary, middle, and high school. I have a page for teachers which has good places where they can start so they don't have to go all over the Web looking for content. And likewise, I have a page for administrators. I also have a section on child safety because I do a lot of work on using the Internet efficiently and effectively and keeping kids safe. Then I have a section on designing and building Web pages. I guess that's probably most of it. |
| "You may design ways in which
to implement it this year, but the technology may change such that you want to
change it next year or you have to change it next year. So, for districts to
think that they can have a three or four or five year initiative for people to
"learn how to integrate technology," I think it's a little bit unrealistic. I
think it's ongoing." |
What are some current goals and future plans with regards to technology in
your district? I think we struggle like a lot of other school districts with support. Supporting the hardware so that teachers don't have to worry about that piece. So we're always developing ways to spread that out so that one person doesn't carry the burden of all of it, rather it's a team-based arrangement in schools. So we're constantly working on that. I think we've had a very large infusion of hardware and software over the last four years as a result of a bond. So now, we're really focussed on using that effectively and integrating that into the curriculum, which is the hard part. Are there any new activities going on now that you're excited about? There are lots of little efforts going on all over the place. One thing we did last summer which teachers enjoyed was, we got teams together to work on units. The goal was to either redesign the unit, or to design activities that use technology and could be integrated into the unit. So we picked the content of each grade level. For instance, one of the grade levels did immigration, one did Alaska, and one did colonial times. Each group of teachers worked on the unit for the summer and people really enjoyed doing that. We have a school that doesn't have a library so they're working on developing a virtual library. We have a school that has a student newspaper online that's received several awards and they continue to work on that. We have 53 schools in our district and about 1,800 staff so it's hard to keep track of everything that's going on. |
| Lastly, do you have any advice for districts just beginning to
implement technology into their curriculum? What would you say is the most
important part of successfully integrating technology? First of all, I think there's no end in this process. It's very much an ongoing process. Unlike where you adopt a new curriculum, for example, and teachers learn the new curriculum and in a couple of years they feel comfortable with it, technology is always changing. You may design ways in which to implement it this year, but the technology may change such that you want to change it next year or you have to change it next year. So, for districts to think that they can have a three or four or five year initiative for people to "learn how to integrate technology," I think it's a little bit unrealistic. I think it's ongoing. We did a survey recently of our teachers and one of the questions was "How long do you think it will take you to become proficient in learning to integrate technology into your curriculum?" and a number of people answered never and we had one person answer 100 years. And then there are other people who answered two years, so people have a different take on it, but I think people have to realize that technology isn't something that fits into a box and you're going to be there or be done in a couple of years. There tends to be two ways to teach professional development in technology and the first is learning how to use the technology and the second is the integration part. The second is far more difficult than the first part and I think the teachers need support. One of the things that we've found that teachers like is mentorships and either small group or one on one support to help them get to that and that's an expensive model, but probably the most effective. |
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