Education Week - Managing the Digital District - October 2, 2013 - S24

Digital Material Gets
An Organizational Lesson
F
By Amanda M.
Fairbanks
or the Vail Unified School District in Arizona,
the problem was not a lack of digital resources.
Rather, the district needed a system
for organizing the plentitude of resources already
at its disposal.
Back in 2008, Vail, a 12,000-student dis-
trict near Tucson, created an in-house wiki
to manage its growing assortment of digital
curricula and lessons.
What began as a modest wiki grew to be-
come Beyond Textbooks, a digital clearinghouse that now contains
more than 20,000 resources. Curated by teachers, for teachers, the
wiki works in much the same way that an iPod sorts music into
separate categories. By dividing material into grade and subject
areas, it helps educators unpack state standards and places them
into bite-size expectations for what teachers should teach.
Shortly after its launch, Vail discovered the district was hardly
alone in its frustration with digital resource overload.
“The curriculum was paper, and we wanted to digitize it,” said
Kevin Carney, the executive director of Beyond Textbooks. Three
years ago, Vail began granting access to other districts around the
state. Now, 81 partners across Arizona are members, with 9,000
teachers sharing assessments, lessons, and materials.
“It’s put sharing on steroids,” Mr. Carney said.
In recent years, educators nationwide have become overwhelmed
by the breadth and abundance of digital resources, whether opensource
offerings or paid content. Rather than relying on individual
educators to sift through endless material, many districts and
states are helping to curate and catalog such resources, serving
as the librarians of the digital age. But creating a repository of
high-quality content which is also aligned to the Common Core
State Standards, is no small task.
Mr. Carney estimates around $1 million went into the creation
of Beyond Textbooks. Depending on the size of the district
(and corresponding number of users), Vail charges an annual fee,
which costs from $10,000 to $60,000 a year. So far, math is aligned
to the common core, with English/language arts to follow.
According to Mr. Carney, of the top 10 districts in the state, four
are Beyond Textbooks users. “Our ultimate goal is to improve student
achievement across Arizona, not just within our district,” he
said. Vail consistently ranks near the top of the list.
Though districts and state-level organizations in 40 states and
10 different countries have approached the district in hopes of
forming partnerships, Mr. Carney said, he remains concerned, for
the time being, with maintaining the quality of the clearinghouse,
not expanding its reach beyond state lines.
Since the project’s launch, Vail has found that providing extensive
professional development, not merely granting access, is the
key to its success. Since July, the leadership team in the district
has fanned out to 37 cities across the state to lead 75 workshops,
with more to come later this fall.
“We don’t look at this as a purely commercial enterprise. We’re
first and foremost educators,” said Calvin Baker, the district’s superintendent.
“This is curated by teachers, not by someone on the
70th floor of a New York City high-rise. It’s simple, but powerful:
Teachers tend to trust other teachers.”
EVALUATING MATERIALS
Over the years, printed textbooks have been the primary cur-
ricular resource, and states and districts have created lengthy
adoption processes for approving such textbooks for use. But in
the rapidly changing digital era, such processes—particularly, who
should spearhead such efforts—are still being ironed out.
In Texas, much of the vetting is happening at the state rather
than the district level. Project Share, a learning management system
run by the Texas Education Agency, provides teachers with
professional development and digital lessons. The materials, which
Project Share creates and reviews, all meet state and college-readiness
standards specific to Texas.
Project Share was launched in 2009, and has more than 900
lessons available across four main content areas for grades 8-12.
Statewide, lessons have been replicated more than 15,000 times at
regular public schools and open-enrollment charter schools.
But with such an ambitious undertaking, careful curating is key.
“It motivates us not to become one big Google search,” said Kerry
S24
EDUCATION WEEK | October 2, 2013
Managing the Digital District >>www.edweek.org/go/digitaldistrict-report
Ballast, who runs Project Share.
The goal is to provide materials that meld with a teacher’s normal
workflow—and not to become yet another website to visit.
“We’re trying to curate good content, letting them know it’s been
reviewed and meets our standards, while also being mindful that
there are a lot of resources out there,” said Ms. Ballast.
Still, the top-down dissemination of information, particularly in
a state the size of Texas, where more than 1,200 districts dot the
landscape, is not without its difficulties.
Kate Loughrey, who oversees the Texas Virtual School Network,
a state-run initiative that supplies schools with online coursework,
said: “The biggest challenge in Texas is that we’re such a big state,
and there are so many school districts. Each is an independent
entity. We have to make sure they’re all aware this option exists
and that they understand how it works.”
But Susan Adelmann, the vice president of strategic partnerships
for Follett School Solutions, a River Grove, Ill.-based education
technology company, cautions that many teachers and districts
wish to be active participants in the building and creation of
new content, rather than being issued a state directive.
“There’s a lot of local energy,” said Ms. Adelmann. “Don’t discount
districts, even small districts, from wanting to influence their own
future in some ways.”
She sees part of the difficulty in disseminating content across
an entire state to be the disparate levels of technology available in
individual districts—and even among individual schools. Districts
that have deployed successful 1-to-1 computing or bring-your-owndevice
initiatives, for instance, have needs for digital resources that
are far different from those of a district just beginning the process.
ONE-STOP SHOP
The 41,000-student Forsyth County, Ga., school system is help-
ing to lead the digital charge. In 2010, the U.S. Department of Education
awarded the district an Investing in Innovation, or i3, grant
to build a districtwide personalized learning environment. Forsyth
County wanted a one-stop shop for parents, teachers, and students.
Previously, teachers visited one platform for instruction, another
for grades, and another for offline assessments.
Since receiving the grant, the district has tweaked its learning
management system to meet its needs. Rachel Hanson, an English/language
arts teacher in the district, and Erin Zitka, a high
school math teacher, were pulled from the classroom to harvest
and create high-quality digital content.
“For a very long time that first year, we basically searched far
and wide on the Internet for open and free resources,” said Ms.
Hanson.
While math resources were relatively easy to find, English/
language arts proved more difficult. Once they had amassed
6,000 pieces of content, all aligned to the common core, Ms.
Hanson and Ms. Zitka brought in teachers to create “highly
engaging content, such as videos and podcasts—not PDF documents”
to fill in the gaps.
Within “itslearning,” the district’s education management
platform, resources are stored in the “community library.” Students
can log in and receive content tailored to their individual
learning preferences. Teachers can search for content using
keyword searches or individual state standards.
Mike Evans, the district’s director of information and instructional
support systems, is continually working to improve its
effectiveness. Come January, teachers will be able to rate the
effectiveness of each digital resource. Eventually, students will
be able to weigh in too. Currently, based on a user’s history,
preferences, and popularity of use, (like Amazon and iTunes),
itslearning provides a corresponding list of recommended resources
based on academic need and learner-styles.
The system is now approaching 13,000 pieces of content. And
while the early years were all about curating great content
and finding high-quality objects, Mr. Evans sees a platform
now populated by teacher-vetted resources—and a system that
practically runs itself.
“Our role is helping teachers to personalize their classrooms
by providing access to great resources,” said Mr. Evans, who
emphasized the need to give teachers the flexibility to select
materials that meet their individual needs and passions as
educators. “It’s baby steps, but we’re getting there.” n
CURATING CONTENT
Experts recommend that
schools put in place several
measures to do a better job
evaluating and organizing
digital content, including:
l Assess readiness. Before beginning
a digital overhaul, first evaluate
and assess the readiness level
of teachers, the willingness of
students, and the capacity of the
district’s infrastructure—paying
particular attention to hardware,
software, network reliability, and
IT support.
l Identify access challenges. Moving
from print to digital resources
requires a common point of
access. Whenever possible, look
for ways to consolidate digital
resources, realizing that most
teachers will only log in to one or
two applications for content. Aim to
find a learning platform, or catalog,
that will eventually integrate your
content by placing it into a single,
searchable library.
l Provide professional development.
Offer constant learning
opportunities for teachers to
experience a wide array of blended
learning strategies.
l Prepare for unforeseen costs. As
districts make the digital switch,
there may be a corresponding
increase in printing costs,
particularly at first. Planning ahead
will lead to less frustration should
costs rise.
l Balance free vs. paid content. While
free resources abound, keep in
mind that digital subscriptions
are often necessary. Typically,
districts ultimately come to rely on
a combination of both.
l Determine student accessibility.
Finally, after assessing your
infrastructure and districtwide
needs, build out your network to
accommodate an abundance of
connectivity and media. And be
sure to define how your student
population will access such
resources—whether through a
BYOD program, 1-to-1 initiative, or
other alternative.
SOURCE: Education W
eek
http://www.edweek.org/go/digitaldistrict-report
Education Week - Managing the Digital District - October 2, 2013

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