Kristy Slaughter FRIT 8132 Technology Coordinator Interview

I interviewed the head of the Technology Department for a rural public school system in central Georgia that serves approximately 4400 students and employs 330 teachers and 27 administrators. The first thing that I noticed when deciding who to interview was that none of the technology positions were actually titled Technology Coordinator. I decided to interview the Chief Technology Officer who oversees the technology staff which includes a network coordinator, a data coordinator, the system registrar, an instructional technology coach, and two technology support specialists. What I learned from the interview was that the CTO does not have a defined list of duties, but rather works with a technology team that does whatever is needed to keep technology functioning and growing within the school district. She sees herself in the role of a change agent for integrating technology into the educational process. Her job necessitates that she is constantly learning, sharing ideas, and finding ways to increase procedural efficiency. With so many duties (see attached concept map), she emphasized many times the need for organization and planning, but also acknowledged that things often come up suddenly that must be dealt with immediately. She said that she and her staff are often at work after hours and on weekends and holidays to ensure that everything is working correctly when educators need it the most. My CTO shared so many wonderful words of wisdom that I must summarize and paraphrase them rather than including them in full: Dont feel like you have to be the first one to implement a new program. It is often good to let another system go first and learn from their experiences. Always do your homework. Read, investigate, ask questions of vendors, and network with other directors before you decide to go ahead with major hardware or software changes. Realize the extreme demands of the job and understand the stress involved with being on call 24/7. The job comes with responsibility that will often take away time from family, but try to find balance. Always keep learning. Subscribe to RSS feeds and read blogs and news articles about technology and trends in education. Follow innovative people using social media and keep in touch with a network of people with whom you can share ideas and ask questions. Communicate. Part of the job will be to lead people into unfamiliar territory that is outside of their comfort zone. The success of the implementation of a new technology may hinge on how it is introduced. Plan with the big picture in mind, but then plan down to the smallest details. Implementation cannot happen if the details are not considered. Be an advocate for technology, and be a supportive leader. But also realize that as the leader you sometimes have to make tough decisions that may involve millions of dollars, and that you may have to have difficult conversations with people. There will sometimes be hard discussions

about user agreement violations and personnel investigations. Try to balance the negatives with positives, pointing out great things when you see them, showing appreciation, and recognizing good work. I added a lot of details to my original concept map based on what I learned from the interview with the CTO. One thing I did not realize before was how many meetings she has to attend to help set up for the presenters or to oversee that the technology is working properly. She noted that she likes being in the various schools for things like that, especially when she can talk to teachers directly, but that the meetings can be overwhelming and that they take a lot of time away from other work that needs to be done. I also had not considered that the phone lines and voicemail, as well as security and surveillance equipment would fall under the technology umbrella. Furthermore, I had not included all of the legal responsibilities in my original concept map, such as student record-keeping and reporting to state and federal agencies. I would have assumed that individual schools handled that through their counseling offices. Finally, I was not aware that the CTO was the one responsible for publishing the weekly electronic newsletter that is sent to everyone in the system. Though I receive it and read it every week, I had not thought about who actually gathered all of the photos and put together the articles from various schools, and it made me realize that much of the work of the technology coordinator goes on behind the scenes and may, unfortunately, be unappreciated. This interview was very eye-opening for me. I realized that this job is forever growing with the addition of new technologies and that it is incredibly important to read everything you can about technology and education to stay up-to-date. I had not realized before how many technology positions make up the technology team within our small school system, and I would not have known that the job responsibilities for each position were so diverse and undefined. I also enjoyed getting to know my CTO better and to learn about her background and experiences that led her to the position she is in today. It gave me a better understanding of the education necessary to perform the tasks that she does and the jobs that were stepping-stones to her current position. At first, the thought of doing this nebulous job was so intimidating that I would never want to do it, but by the end I felt like I wanted to be a member of her team.