Re: Tech Coordinator Interview Questions

Pamela Livingston (Livingsp@aol.com)
Sat, 30 Mar 1996 12:39:19 EST

I have seen again and again the techie versus educator debate. I think
what's important is how one communicates with all groups of people. If the
person also has a technical background, but has done things like systems
analysis work, where he/she is a liaison between the programmer and the end
user of the product, that is the type of wire head you want. Having been in
computers for over a decade and now in schools for the last several years, I
purge techie terms from my speech when speaking to teachers and
administrators. But I also fix things and call out the techie who presented a
Token-ring topology design for an Ethernet network.

Questions to consider:

1. Where should computers belong in a school environment and why? (In the
classroom with the teachers directly accessible; not in a computer lab; not
down the hall.)

2. How should computers be taught? (not as a separate unit "now we're going
to computer class" but within the classroom, seamlessly, by the teacher.)

3. How will you get teachers involved? (By demonstrating new technology,
educating them about computers, by learning their curriculum and then
suggesting the technology pieces, by becoming a part of as many teams and
committees as you can, by holding informal brown bag lunches and bringing
along some software, by winning them over to your expertise, by making their
lives easier by helping to work out the details, by being friendly and
approachable and an ally.)

I hope you will truly commit to supporting this individual's efforts to break
your paradigm and not just pay lip-service and then reign him or her in when
changes start beginning.

Good luck

-- Pamela Livingston
The Hendrick Hudson School District
Montrose, NY
livingsp@aol.com