Progress Report

The Texas Long Range Plan for Technology has started doing a yearly progress report for the state of Texas. This report shows progress being made for Texas campus and districts in the area of technology. This progress report was extremely thorough and went into extreme detail for any technology activities and programs that were newly introduced to campuses. One program, the Technology Immersion Pilot was brought in to increase awareness of technology and to show the different usage. Since 2008, progress has been made in many different areas. At the beginning of 2007, a new advanced placement course in computer science was created to be taught as another math credit. Then in June 2010, the StaR chart showed an increase in technology being taught at the higher level. These progresses show an improvement in awareness and usage of technology in Texas’ schools. The Long Range Plan for Technology in Texas has four key areas that measure that progress in the school district. Those four areas include Teaching and Learning, Educator Preparation and Development; Leadership, Administration, and Instructional Support; and Infrastructure for Technology. The progress report goes into detail in each key area to show where the state of Texas stands for each. In each of the four areas, campuses and districts were almost always in the developing or advanced stage. Since the progress report began in 2008, the developing and advanced stages have become the norm for most campuses. The progress report also included steps that each of the 20 Region Services Centers are taking to improve technology use in the classroom. In this age of technology, education has been making strides to catch up. This report is proof that we, as educators are using more and more technology in the classroom and in schools in general. Someday, education will close this gap completely, and the state of Texas will be at a target level for the four key areas of the Texas Long Range Plan for technology.