Technology Facilitator services have proven successful in producing student achievement gains and improving teacher effectiveness in the K-12 environment.
            Coupling this high quality professional development mechanism with available technology resources results in an effective strategy for meeting district, state, and national goals for highly qualified teachers and better student performance.
            A technology facilitator, also sometimes know as a technology integration specialist, or technology coach, has the primary responsibility to facilitate the integration of technology into the curriculum. This facilitation is provided to teachers in the classroom, thereby supplying support during the instructional process.
            The main focus of this support consists of modeling the effective use of technology for instruction and learning, serving as a coach or mentor to classroom teachers as they learn the appropriate uses of technology in the curriculum, and assisting teachers to locate and use technology resources in their lesson planning. During this process, the classroom teacher is learning to use the power of technology to improve teaching and learning.
            In 2003, Synergetics, which has locations in Cleveland, Jackson, and Starkville, began a program to provide Technology Facilitator services to school districts in Mississippi. This program was in response to local education agencies’ need to achieve the goals outlined above while overcoming obstacles and issues at the local level. District officials recognized the need for professional development to help their teachers become technology proficient and provide strategies for integrating technology into the curriculum.
            However, many districts had few, if any, professional development days in their school calendar and struggled to find a way to provide needed training without disrupting instructional time. Teachers needed to be in the classroom during the school day and asking teachers to attend training after school hours or on Saturdays was not working. Additionally, administrators needed a plan for monitoring their district’s progress toward meeting these technology goals.
            Synergetics has the resources and expertise to respond to this need expressed by so many school districts. With a strong background in educational technology as well as data-driven decision making, this team is able to put a strategic plan in place that focused on needs assessment, customer service, data collection, and accountability for measurable results.

            The program began with part-time technology facilitators in four school districts, expanding to six fulltime technology facilitators for the 2005 – 2005 school year. These six districts received services everyday of the school year. Typically, the technology facilitators provide support to teachers and students four days per week, with one day per week set aside for planning and collection and analysis of data.
            Some of these districts focused the work on the technology facilitator at one school while others had multiple schools receiving services. The number of teachers being assisted at each district also varied from as few as 10 to as many as 21 teachers. The scope of the work included teacher technology skills, and student achievement in reading, math and language in grades four through eighth.
            The technology facilitators supervised the implementation of curriculum-based software programs for reading and math. The implementation plans included installation and setup of the software, initial training on basic use for the software, and one-on-one support for the teachers in the classroom to ensure a smooth transition from basic knowledge of the software to practical application for student learning. Using the diagnostic reports in these software programs, student’s progress was monitored over the course of the year through data collection at three points – baseline, midpoint, and year-end.
            In the sunflower county school district, the technology facilitator worked with fourth through eighth grades in language. At the first nine weeks, the students who were failing language were identified. The progress of these students was tracked over time. By the end of the school year, 33 percent of these students improved their language grade to passing.
            With the full time service of a technology facilitator, teachers in all six of these school districts showed improvement in their technology proficiency levels as well as an increased in the use of technology in the curriculum. Progress towards mastering the Mississippi Technology Standards for Teachers was measured three times during the school year with the use of a self evaluation instrument. When this data from all six districts is combined, these teachers showed a baseline of 63 percent mastery of the standards, by the end of the school year, the mastery level had increased to 77 percent.
            The results for one school district during this same time period demonstrated the even more dramatic improvement that can result from technology facilitator services in the classroom. In Sunflower County School District, teachers scored an average of 70 percent on the Mississippi Technology Standards for Teachers at the beginning of the year. At the end of the school year, the overall average was 93 percent, representing a significant increase in the teacher’s technology proficiency and confidence in using technology in the classroom.
            Jean Millen, Sunflower County School District’s Technology Coordinator states “Our teachers showed so much improvement on their technology skills. They just needed someone to help them through the first hurdles of using technology in the classroom. Having someone there to help them through the rough times and show them how to do it made the difference. Our technology facilitator was wonderful. I wish I had more of them.” The success of this program, as demonstrated by student achievement gains and improved teacher effectiveness, is due to several key elements, company officials say.
            Synergetics defines five areas of expertise a technology facilitator needs in order to be successful:

• Teaching experience – classroom experience essential for establishing a trusting relationship with other classroom teachers.
• Training experience – knowledge of how to train adults in varying situations.
• Technology expertise – a solid understanding of a wide array of technology resources including hardware, software, and methodologies.
• Communication skills – effective communication with all stakeholders in the district.
• Troubleshooting skills – basic skills to prevent down time of technology resources.

Secondly, technology facilitators must receive continuous training. Regular, ongoing training ensures that technology facilitators will be kept abreast of new technologies and methodologies. As districts implement new technologies or encounter new challenges, training is provided to meet those needs and challenges.
Thirdly, technology facilitators emphasize the collection of data to analyze the effectiveness of the program of services being provided. Data is collected on teacher and student technology skills, student achievement, use of technology, as well as other measures required and requested by the district. The program of services is data-based and results-driven.
Fourthly, the technology facilitators are a supervised, organized team working together for a common goal. Regular meetings together encourage idea sharing, problem solving and strategizing. DBJ