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| Dr. Jerry Schnabel |
Have you heard that Bill Gates is giving $5,000 to Facebook
users who click on a share link? I got it in my email, so it must be true,
right? Well, thank goodness for sites such as
Snopes.com that can either
confirm or debunk many of the urban myths going around the Internet. (And no,
Mr. Gates really
isn’t
giving money away to Facebook users).
Okay, maybe that was an easy one. Well, have you heard that
the reason school districts are implementing 1:1 programs is to “keep up with
the Jones?” In my position as Director
of Information and Technology Services at AEA 267, this is a belief I have
often heard expressed. Unfortunately,
Snopes.com can’t tell me if this is true or not. And this is important for me
to know, as the reasons and expectations schools have for implementing 1:1
programs give direction to the work of the AEA in the support of schools. So in
the fall of last year, I went on a trek to visit a number of superintendents in
Iowa to explore what factors influenced their decision to implement a 1:1
initiative.
I asked all the superintendents I interviewed if “keeping up
with the Jones” was a reason they implemented their program. They discounted this as a factor, although a
few didn’t seem to mind that they had a 1:1 program and their neighbor did
not. Even given that nod to a bit of competitive
school pride, I concluded this was not a factor in their decision.
I also wondered how enrollment trends of the district
influenced the decision to implement a 1:1 initiative. I thought that an initiative might be part of
an effort to attract more students from surrounding districts and retain the
students the district already had. This
was akin to a “getting ahead of the Jones.”
All but one of the districts had experienced declining enrollment in the
past five years. Enrollment ranged from
a one-student gain in five years to 20% fewer students in the same timeframe. Even then, this was a minor factor at most. While some superintendents felt it couldn’t hurt,
none used a 1:1 initiative in an effort to attract and retain more students.
Another factor that I speculated might have played a part in
the decision was increased student achievement.
With the emphasis of NCLB on student achievement, I thought that might
explain the surge in the number of programs.
But I discovered student achievement was a minor factor in their
decision. In fact, most superintendents
that I interviewed went to great lengths with their constituencies to downplay
the possibility that a 1:1 program would increase student achievement. When I asked why, some superintendents
pointed to the mixed research results, with some studies finding a link to
increased student achievement and others not.
Some said they did not know how they could determine that an increase
(or decrease) in student achievement was directly linked to the 1:1 program.
A possible factor that puzzled me was how in a year of 10%
across the board budget cuts to the general fund and a year of zero percent
allowable growth, districts were moving ahead with 1:1 initiatives, without
apparent budget concerns. The answer to that was the two-fold.
Almost all the superintendents I interviewed
used proceeds from the one-cent sales tax to fund the program.
The other source of revenue was the
PhysicalPlant and Equipment Levy (PPBL).
Both of
these revenue sources largely escaped the hits that the general fund experienced
and were available for 1:1 initiatives. With a steady source of funding, budget
was not an issue.
So in the interviews I conducted, “keeping up with the Jones,” attracting
students from neighboring districts, increased student achievement, and budget
were not really factors in influencing the superintendents to implement a 1:1
program. So what factors did influence
them? I’m no Snopes, but I’ll share with you what I discovered in the next
edition of this blog.
What is your opinion on why schools go 1:1?
