The Instructional Services Office, headed by the Assistant Superintendent,

coordinates professional development for the district. The district will continue to

work with outside partnerships such as Southern Regional ETTC and look to

make use of expertise within the district to enhance technology.

All classrooms have a Media Center PC – at least a 23-inch large screen

monitor with a wireless keyboard and mouse and high-speed internet access.

Currently, district computers have been connected to high-volume Xerox

Document Services machines at each school. This allows teachers to print 30

copies of a handout from their classroom computer and then walk over to the

copy machine to pick up the completed job. Speed of material creation and

distribution has been dramatically increased.

Every teacher has an electronic mail account and a home directory that

provides at least 100 Mb of network storage space. The home directory

network space is password-protected and accessible from home (using

Remote Desktop Web Connection). All district computers have the district

Intranet set as the default home page for the web. The Intranet includes district

forms, help-desk and how-to descriptions for self-study.

As funding becomes available, the district plans to outfit all classrooms with

two to four student computers each.

Most administrators currently use PDAs and computers regularly. A system of

cell-phones and two-way voice devices connects administrators, family school

liaisons, and other district employees.

Almost all district administrators have completed the three-day NJELITE

series. District administrators from the Curriculum and Technology

departments will continue to attend national and state conferences on

educational technology. In particular, the district will send representatives (as

it has for several years) to the annual conferences held by NJ Association for

Educational Technology and the Southern Regional ETTC.

Our staff has shown to be at various places on the learning continuum. With

this in mind, the district will look to move the staff along the continuum.

Through the established partnerships and our in-district experts, the district

will offer professional development to assure all staff members meet the

newly created Professional Technology Literacy Standards. Additionally, the

district will offer intermediate and advanced professional development

opportunities.

Funding for this area has always been too limited to provide advanced and

extensive training. However, the technical staff takes advantage of any

workshops or seminars available, usually one to three days in duration, on

very specialized topics as needed.

When the need arises, the district will utilize in-district experts or the

established partnerships to train staff on assistive technology.

The planning process for the Tech Plan has highlighted the need for formal

professional development as well as “technology coaching and mentoring”

services. Technicians are available on an as needed basis.

The Stafford Township School District will be instituting a mandatory teacher

webpage for the 2007-2008 school year. Specific training is scheduled for ZUMU

WebPages. Additionally, the district will continue to move people along the

learning continuum through workshops at a variety of skill levels.

The Teacher Consultants at each school play a key role in dissemination of best

practices and good ideas from one classroom to another. The Supervisor of

Technology will also play an important role in supporting infusion. District

teachers and staff have attended, and have presented at, several technologyfocused

conferences for the past several years including:

• New Jersey Association of Educational Technology Annual Conference at

Georgian Court College

• From My Classroom to Yours Conference at Stockton College

• Classroom Connect Conferences

• No Child Left Behind funding

• IDEA funding

• Local district Funds

• Stafford Township Education Foundation

• Monthly meetings

• Release time for school day workshops

• Professional days for out-of-district workshops/conferences

• Classroom visitation with substitute coverage provided

 

Stafford Township School District is an active member of the Southern Regional

ETTC Consortium at Stockton College. The Superintendent serves on the ETTC

Steering Committee and the district has been a member of the consortium for the past

six years. Through this partnership, a number of workshops each year are hosted

onsite by Stafford and made available to all teachers and staff on a space-available

basis. This partnership will be continued and Stafford will host ETTC workshops at

the Ocean Acres Training Lab or the McKinley Distance Learning Lab.

For the past several years, Stafford has been hosting up to four courses each semester

in Literacy Instruction from Georgian Court College and would consider hosting

educational technology courses as well.

The Stafford Township School District will plan and implement the technology

workshops to address the outlined needs within the plans.