Technology Plan Review

What are the main parts of a technology plan?
· Mission
The Mission statement provides an overall view of what the district or organization is trying to provide on a daily basis
· Vision
The Vision is what the district or organization is trying to accomplish
· Shared Values
Shared Values are the values and objectives that are ‘shared’ between the mission of the organization and the vision of what it is trying to accomplish
· Needs Assessment
A critical assessment of the what the district or organization is currently doing, utilizing survey instruments to determine professional development opportunities and need
Teacher’s and administrator’s needs are also identified through survey responses to better coordinate the uses of resources and personnel for the betterment of the district
· Goals & Strategies
Goals identify the target objective that the district will be attempting to accomplish, while the strategies are specific activities and steps to be taken toward the realization of each goal
I think the purpose of a technology plan is to identify the current situation of your district or organization, as well as the direction of where you are going in the future. The technology plan will also assure that your strategic goals and strategies align those of your district or organization. From personal experience, the mission/vision/goals of our particular office MUST align with the mission and vision of our university. We have to provide narrative documentation that the direction of our office is aligned with the direction of the university in general. One way to identify and track this progress is through a technology plan.

A viable technology plan, developed and revised in alignment with the Mission and Vision of your organization, assures that you are using technology and resources to benefit and promote the goals of your parent organization. Purchasing and utilizing technology resources, in conjunction with the direction of where your district is currently and would like to be going in the future, helps to keep you and your constituents moving in the same direction. It seems like we have to make the most of limited resources available, and stretch our budgets to the extreme, while still providing the immediate support and updated technology that is demanded by our colleagues. It is more important than ever to have a technology plan that can be proven to support the direction of your district and their administrators.
One of the best, and most intrinsic advantages of having a technology plan would be to create and administer a technology replacement schedule that would help promote the needs of your colleagues and administrators. A replacement schedule can assist with budgetary constraints by building into line items the costs involved with keeping technology current and up-to-date, and also help to reduce costs for service and repairs to outdated equipment.
The information contained in a technology plan can benefit a district by providing guidelines and direction toward achieving the goals the district sees as part of its mission and vision. It can also help the teachers in the district use the available resources to better promote the success of their students. The assessment results identified in a technology plan are an important part of how successful the district is in promoting the needs of their students. They are a good measure of the current state of the district, and can also be a good indicator of where the district should be going in the future. Without a functioning technology plan, the district may make the wrong decisions when making technology purchases, or move in directions that may be contrary to where they have identified they would like to be going.