Setting Your School Up for Meaningful Edtech Integration

As schools face an ever-increasing number of educational technology (edtech) tools and feel the pressure to bring the newest tools to their classrooms, it is essential that schools prioritize digital safety and the purposeful use of these tools. Technology specialists and instructional leaders can play a critical role in helping to establish this safety by vetting tools before they ever make it to students. 

If your school isn’t sure how to start vetting tools, one of the most effective ways to approach this task is to create a dedicated edtech team that is responsible for assessing the usefulness and safety of tools, and for helping everyone at the school understand how to use them correctly.

BUILDING YOUR EDTECH TEAM

Depending on the structure of your school or district, the titles of the roles may differ, but the key is to identify who can serve the following three roles effectively:

1. Determine if a technology will work with your network and on your devices, and review data privacy and security (director of technology).
2. Deeply understand the technology, including any accessibility considerations (supervisor of instructional technology).
3. Evaluate the fit of the edtech tool with the curriculum and supporting materials already in place (director of curriculum and instruction).

It’s helpful to take a closer look at each of these critical roles.

Director of technology’s role: It may seem simple to check whether a technology tool will work with your school’s network and on your devices, but, believe it or not, technology routinely gets purchased only to be delivered without a means to utilize it.

And if your school has spent money on tools you cannot use, you’ve probably already learned how difficult it can become to get new technology added to the budget. This team member plays a crucial role in ensuring that money is not wasted on tools that simply cannot be used. 

In addition to assessing the compatibility of the technology with the school, the director of technology should also be responsible for reviewing data privacy and security. At our school, our director of technology often seeks a connection at the relevant technology company to meet and discuss the privacy documents and sign a student data privacy agreement.

Supervisor of instructional technology’s role: This team member is responsible for learning about the technology. Since I serve as the supervisor of instructional technology for my district, when a new technology is proposed, I seek out professional development resources, read reviews, and look for any research on its effectiveness.

If everything I find looks good, I then create an account to trial the tool—ideally, a free option exists, and if not, I have reached out to the companies directly to get a free trial as part of our vetting process.

Another important role this team member plays is leading a professional development session at the beginning of the school year on this team and the process through which teachers can request that a tool be vetted. This is a brief session during which I outline who is on the team, why it exists, and how long a teacher should expect a review to take.

Director of curriculum and instruction’s role: For our district, we brought in our director of curriculum and instruction to help fill the vital role of evaluating the fit of edtech with the curriculum and supporting materials already in place.

We don’t want to invest time and resources into a tool that does something our previous tools could already do or just brings technology into a lesson in a way that isn’t meaningful for learning. Instead, we want to ensure that any new technology will provide a significantly different and more effective way for students to engage with content.

VETTING A NEW TOOL AS A TEAM

Once you’ve created your team, it is time to vet new edtech tools. Our team worked together to create a process and develop resources that have helped us effectively review tools in a timely manner.

When a staff member identifies a new technology that they are interested in bringing to the district, their first step is to submit a technology request form. During our beginning-of-the-year professional development session, I review this entire process and ensure that all staff know where to access this form.

Once the form is submitted, it goes to me as the supervisor of instructional technology, and I begin exploring the technology using online resources—including an AI risk assessment—researching reviews, and creating a trial account. I also notify the teacher who submitted the request that I have begun exploring the tool.

After I’ve completed my initial review and it seems like it could be a good fit, I reach out to the other two members of the team to complete their assessments: The director of technology looks at the network and device compatibility and data privacy, and the director of curriculum and instruction looks at how the technology aligns with curriculum and instructional goals.

Next, the team meets either virtually or in person to make a final decision on the technology request. We discuss our individual findings, the cost of the tool, and the process we would need to undergo to roll it out. If we approve the technology, the tool is added as approved to our district-wide Approved Technology List, and our team begins the procurement process and planning for implementation.

If the technology is denied, it is added as denied on our district Approved Technology List—we found it important to put the denied technologies at the bottom of the list in a separate section so that teachers would not request a technology that had already been denied.

Regardless of the decision we make, we notify the staff who submitted the request. For those technologies that we do approve, the next phase is bringing the technology to our school for use. Our team works together to plan the rollout, and we use time during our dedicated district professional development days to introduce the technology, explain why it was approved, and help everyone understand how to use it effectively.

By creating this edtech review team, your district can ensure that it avoids spending time and resources on tools that are unnecessary or incapable, protects staff and student data, and brings new technology to classrooms that can positively impact student learning.