Plan: Closing the Digital Divide

Closing the Digital Divide Plan

Annotation

Context and Conditions

“Closing the Digital Divide” was completed in Fall 2007 as one project in MIT 512: Computer Applications in Education. The project had a 2-week timeline and was completed under the direction of Dr. Sue Jen-Chen. The proposal outlines the technology access divide at district schools and interventions designed to narrow the gap between the “have’s” and “have-not’s.”

Scope

This proposal identifies issues in a school system such as technology integration, professional development, hardware/software procurement and community in Pender County Schools, where I served as the Instructional Technology Coordinator. In the proposal, problems are identified in each category based on a review of extant data and previous needs assessments. Goals and suggested interventions address each problem in a manner that suggests changes to help eliminate the “digital divide” between schools who receive federal funding and those who do not, as well as within communities whose socioeconomic backgrounds differ greatly. This proposal identifies an “action plan” with a general timeline for implementation of interventions and suggests evidence to be collected in order to demonstrate completion of each strategy.

Role

This proposal was completed as a group project with three other graduate students in an online environment. I served as the subject-matter expert and drafted the entire proposal; since the knowledge of public school systems in my group was limited, none of the other team members having ever been employed by a system.

Reflection

This proposal allowed me to use previous needs assessment data and my prior knowledge to construct a performance improvement solution to this problem. In constructing interventions, I was able to demonstrate my understanding of the system, align solutions to problems and suggest realistic interventions for a public school system.