Dr. Douglas L. Ragland
Retired Superintendent of Schools
Technology Initiatives
In an effort to be informative, creative, collaborative, and communicative, technological mediums and strategies are essential in achieving success with students, teachers, staff, administrators, parents, stakeholders, community leaders and the like. In this day and time communication, collaboration, professional development, and student achievement are greatly enhanced with the use of technological resources such as Symbaloo, Live Binders, Edmodo, webinars, Google Hangout, Google Voice, Google Docs, Google Cloud, Google Chrome, Face Time, Meeting Wizard, Tango, Skype, Facebook, Twitter, and the like. The aforementioned technological tools give school leaders flexibility to communicate openly in providing important and resourceful information to students, parents and community stakeholders, enhance resource development, and organizational skills for teachers, administrators, students, and parents by providing access to tools of knowledge and computer back up, enhance student achievement as a result of collaborative measures and providing access to online resources for students, parents, and teachers, provide avenues for teachers and students to be creative in their respective roles of teaching and learning, and the like. The success of any organization, particularly educational institutions, is the provision, use, and accessibility of technological resources for teachers, administrators, staff, students, parents, stakeholders and the community at large, which in turn will enhance communication, collaboration, organizational skills, creativity, professional development, and ultimately student achievement. This is in essence a synopsis of my reflection of my understanding of strategies, collaborative activities and new ideas in the utilization of technology and its impact on student learning.