eTIPS response

I found this article appropriate. As a counselor, I have been required to be able to use whatever technology is present. Usually, that breaks down to three things: accessibility, hardware and software. As a high school/middle school counselor, being able to use the student management software the district has is crucial. A student management system (SMS) contains all of the vital information about students. It can range from grades to attendance to discipline records to parental contact information. Being able to efficiently navigate the system means being able to address problems quickly, and in some cases, about half the time as traditional paper records. Instead of calling all of a students' teachers for grades, all that I need to do is look on the system. If I need to see how many times a student has been late/absent from school, again, a couple of quick mouse clicks. And in my current district, Darien, the student management system (called X2 ASPEN) is even available to parents to check on their child's' grades. When implemented correctly, it can make everyone's lives a lot easier.

However, when professional development or training does not take place, technology can become counter-productive. In Norwalk, for instance, there was very little training on their new system, GENESIS. In fact, most people in th IT office didn't know how to use it to gather information. It was a web based system that was used primarily in New Jersey, and support for the company was not easy to obtain. We struggled through the first two years, but after playing with it and working with it,it became easier to use.

Also, making sure that the infrastructure can support the current or new technology coming into the district is important. In Norwalk, there was not enough server space, for instance, to run GENESIS, and it frequently crashed. Two years later, they add 4 more servers, and it runs seamlessly now. A large numbers of aging computers were replaced,  and the Brien McMahon (the building I was in) went wireless making it possible to access the student information system in the hallways or other parts of the building. This was essential for me, because a lot of my job focused on being visible to the kids, so being able to access schedules and attendance on an iPaq the district provided me while walking in the hallways between classes and in the cafe made things a lot easier on me, and made me more responsive.