View/Download the full staff survey results (pdf file)
Summary of the results…
“The guys are great. They are helpful and in good spirits when they have to
come into my room. They never make me feel as though my questions are silly,
though they probably are. :)”“Repairs are handled in a timely manner.”
“I also appreciate the new and innovative ideas presented at
professional development. I have worked in other districts before where the
technology department was somewhat a mystery – I very much appreciate the
transparency of the department in WDM and the efforts to move forward with
technology in a timely manner.”
“Teachers should have more than 3 iPads.”
“We are way behind other districts. We need tech integrationists to help teachers
integrate tech. Jackie does a great job, but 1 person is not enough.”“More WED collab day trainings. I think we are severely lacking those.”
“I would like to see more time given to the technology department during staff
development to share new ideas.”NOTE FROM BRIAN: In regards to Wed collaboration days, most collab. day topics are decided at your building level. Talk to your building staff that oversee your Wed collab days, as we’d be glad to help you out!
“Bluntly, I don’t feel like access to technology is allocated in an appropriate
manner. However, I don’t feel like that is the technology dep’t’s fault. I really
think the board and TLS need to examine which schools are in the most need of
district contributed funds to purchase and update technology. We really need to
get out of this mindset that fair is equal.”
“still not enough computers in our building. Much much better since we got a cart
for each team, but still hard to plan lessons if you don’t know if the devices will
be available”
“Updating technology i.e. IC Revtrack, Paypal it would be nice to know what the updates are before we go in and find that something has changed.”
NOTE FROM BRIAN: We certainly agree that it would be great to have more knowledge of how the updates will impact, unfortunately, this isn’t always possible as we are reliant on what information is given by our vendors. We also have a significant amount of our own customizations in things like Campus and RevTrak – that makes it hard for vendors to tell how their updates will impact our customizations.
“Other surrounding districts have technology teachers for each building and are
implementing classes that teach technology skills to their young people. This
should not fall on the shoulders of regular classroom teachers.”
NOTES FROM BRIAN: This concern has been raised over the past few years, however, it is significant to note that Waukee this past year moved away from this model and the elementary “tech teacher” is now dedicated towards training staff members how to integrate technology into the grade level classrooms.
All staff receive a short on-line survey. Each question is a positive statement such as, “When members of the district technology departments visit my building, they are courteous and treat the staff and students with respect.” Users are asked to rate the statement as: Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, Strongly Disagree, or I don’t know.