Adam Petrovsky – Government & Education Practice Leader Logicalis, Inc.
In 2013, President Obama announced ConnectED, an initiative designed to enrich K-12 education for every student in America. The White House website (https://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/education/k-12/connected) says, “ConnectED empowers teachers with the best technology and the training to make the most of IT, and empowers students through individualized learning and rich, digital content.” In 2014 and 2015, dozens of corporations have donated products, time, and money to Obama’s initiatives.
Years before ConnectED, states, districts, and schools have been trying to transform how our children learn. The term “personalized learning” has become a meme. It represents new learning models, such as the flipped classroom (where students do homework during the day and watch video lectures at night). It has come to represent any type of 1:1 technology in which students use a laptop, Chromebook, or tablet to digitize their learning experience. The term “personalized learning” has become synonymous with digital textbooks, classroom multimedia, intelligent whiteboards, and “classrooms of the future” (where technology rules, but students and teachers are lost).
Logicalis, a global leader in K-12 education, has met this challenge head-on by understanding the “golden rule” of ConnectED or “personalized learning”: Understand the school district FIRST! It’s a simple concept: How could any school environment transform a 35-year-old educational process without first understanding how that school operates? How do the teachers feel about this transformation? How do we take a student who has already spent an hour on his or her smartphone after breakfast and make him or her successful in a 48-minute English class? At Logicalis, we understand these challenges, focus on where the district is today (administrative, faculty, students, testing, facilities, and more), and create a plan for success in digitizing the school.
The top concerns amongst District CIOs and superintendents include the following:
- Personalized learning
- Student test scores
- Student engagement
- Teacher retention and enablement
- Student and faculty safety and security
- Aging facilities
With the right understanding and assessment, schools can approach these concerns by using technology as an enabler for success. Logicalis understands the top methods of financial procurement and can help give our children every advantage possible to succeed in a digital world.