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The primary purpose of the technology plan is to provide direction for the
future use of technology for learning and teaching in the Wheelersburg
Local School District.
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In times of change, the learners inherit the earth; while the learned find
themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.
-- Eric Hoffer
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It was abundantly clear to the technology study team
consisting of students, teachers, administrators, school
board members, community business leaders, and parents that
systemic change must occur if the Wheelersburg
Local School District is to successfully prepare its students
for the twenty-first century.
The technology study team developed both vision and
mission statements. The process of developing these
statements led to the premise that learning must be
enhanced by technology; therefore, the need for a
technology plan.
This vision and mission led the team to focus on curriculum, academic and
social development and learning environments that include students, staff,
and the community. This focus empowers all participants to be involved in
lifelong learning opportunities. For each area, the question asked was: How
could learning be enhanced with technology? The answer to this question
led to the development of three broad goals: Educational, Professional
Development, and Community.
Based on the technology plan, the study team recommends that the direc-
tion for future use of technology to support learning focus on:
1. Enhancement of student learning -- all must be taught the skills necessary to
access, analyze, apply, create, and communicate information electronically.
2. Empowerment of students and educators to more efficiently create and
effectively manage productive learning environments that include all the
emerging digital technologies:
- microcomputers
- laptops
- mainframes
- networking
- on-line databases
- facsimile transmission
- distance learning
- satellite
- cable TV
- microwave
- modems
- videodiscs
- CD-ROMs
- electronic card catalogue
3. Enabling teachers to take a more flexible, more innovative instructional
approach with electronic technology providing the means to gather great
quantities of information and communicate over great distances in text, sound,
graphics, and video, irrespective of time and space.
The team recognizes that the use of technology
must be encouraged, implemented, and supported
for school restructuring to be successful.
It is imperative that the Wheelersburg Local
School District have a technology plan that ensures
the most effective use of the district's resources.
To this end, the study team developed
mission and vision statements along with goals,
an action plan, and provisions for evaluation. This
plan is intended as just one part of a dynamic
blueprint for systemic change. As such, we must
review, refine, revise, and rewrite it as necessary to
keep it current.
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If American schools continue along the business as usual path in the
next decade, we will find public schools have become technological and
intellectual ghettos for a predominant poor, disadvantaged, and minority
population. -- Lewis Perlmen
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