Technology & Learning - September 2007 - (Page 28)

SCHOOLBIZ Apple, with its computer-recycling program, and IBM, with its Project Green Initiative that aims for a more environmentally friendly IT service. Sun Microsystems, with its Project Open Doors campaign, has made elimination of the digital divide a companywide priority. “We believe that for an ethical society and ethical economies, access has to be universal,” says Mary Smaragdis, executive director of Sun Microsystems Foundation. Employees are encouraged to engage with and give back to their communities. A flexible work-at-home policy is designed to facilitate this, while also cutting down on commute pollution and promoting a life-work balance. Sun has also reached out to high schools, inviting student leaders to its campus in Menlo Park, CA, for an open forum on the company’s business strategies and commitment to community responsibility. “Global citizenship is the focus,” says Smaragdis. “Students can take back and apply these same ethical behaviors to their communities and schools.” Companies offering training in this field include Integrity Interactive and ELT. For assistance with copyright and intellectual property laws, visit techlearning.com and download “Copyright Guidelines for Administrators.” sion makers consider five areas of potential value and agree to representative indicators, measures, and priorities. Software such as Decision Lens can structure and expedite these deliberations. The Consortium for School Networking’s (CoSN) Value of Investment (VOI) Leadership Initiative incorporates many of the considerations found in the previous two approaches. 10. Negotiation Negotiation skills are essential to 21st-century school leadership. With digital technologies evolving at a rapid rate and hardware cycles becoming shorter, superintendents, principals, and technology directors are faced with decisions about purchasing that require ongoing interaction with vendors and service providers. Dealing with multiple vendors and taking a systematic approach are two basic negotiation skills. While considering purchase of a budget-hefty student information system for the 130,000-student Prince George’s Country Public Schools in Maryland, CIO Wesley Watts’s team reviewed 10 bids and invited six to give full-day vendor presentations. As a follow up to the presentations, Watts’s team visited other locations that had implemented each of the solutions, and then it factored in costs, support, and necessary training before making its final decision. When it comes to negotiating a good Service Level Agreement, Colorado’s Jefferson Country Schools CIO Marcia Bohannon says the first step is determining key services from a user’s point of view. Other steps include defining the services in business terms as opposed to tech terms, clearly spelling out roles and responsibilities of staff, and setting realistic goals. For additional negotiation tips, visit the School CIO section of techlearning.com, and see “14 Tips for Negotiating Software Agreements,” page 31. 9. Estimating Investment Value A sound business approach to a new purchase should involve estimating “Return on Investment” (ROI). Conceptually, it’s a simple process. Add up the costs involved. Estimate the benefits in terms of cost savings and/or costs avoided. If benefit dollars exceed cost dollars, make the purchase. In education, ROI is useful when you’re looking at noninstructional uses of technology such as a new student information system. For instructional uses of technology, though, ROI falls short because it doesn’t take into account intangible, nonmonetary benefits such as higher test scores, expanded learning opportunities, or parent, student, and staff satisfaction. There are several approaches that can help you include intangible benefits in your decision making. The 5 Steps to Success approach is one and includes estimating total cost of ownership, creating a risks-and-rewards matrix, evaluating educational fit, identifying precisely what educational value you expect from the new technology, and considering how the value of the technology will grow over time. Value Measuring Methodology is another example. It involves four steps, perhaps the most important of which is the first: developing a “decision framework.” Through a systematic, facilitated process, a group of key, high-level deci- Resources Cited in this Article Annenberg Media www.learner.org PBS TeacherLine Peer Connection www.pbs.org/teacherline ELT www.elt-inc.com Integrity Interactive www.integrity-interactive.com Pearson’s National Evaluation Systems www.pearsoned.com Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium www.ccsso.org School Security Index www.schoolsafetyindex.com Teachscape www.teachscape.com OnlineLearning.net www.onlinelearning.net WestEd www.wested.org 28 | www.techlearning.com http://techlearning.com http://www.learner.org http://www.pbs.org/teacherline http://www.elt-inc.com http://www.pearsoned.com http://www.integrity-interactive.com http://www.schoolsafetyindex.com http://www.ccsso.org http://www.teachscape.com http://OnlineLearning.net http://www.onlinelearning.net http://www.wested.org http://www.techlearning.com

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Technology & Learning - September 2007 Contents Editor’s Desk News & Trends Product Guide Reviews Getting It Wrong Cover Story: SchoolBiz School CIO Higher Ed Integration How To What’s New Bottom Line

Technology & Learning - September 2007

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