Superintendent’s Goals for School Year: Technology

Editor’s note: This is part one of a four-part series that takes a look at the goals of Medfield Superintendent of Schools, Bob Maguire, who broke them down into four categories.

Technology has been a driving force throughout the “over the past couple of years” and will continue to be a focal point of instruction moving forward, according to Medfield Superintendent of Schools, Bob Maguire.

“I think [technology] needs to be an ongoing initiative,” said Maguire. “We’ve deployed equipment and we’ve got a lot of training to do.”

Maguire told the Medfield School Committee at its Aug. 29 meeting that his goal for technology across the district is centered on finding the best practices for it in the classroom to facilitate instruction and enhance students’ learning experiences.

“It’s really talking about how to get teachers a better skill set,” Maguire said. “How to actually integrate the technology in their curriculum that really changes in ways that are instructional and really changes in ways that are meaningful and improved on in terms of experience and learning outcomes.”

Maguire and several of his colleagues on his administrative staff spent time over the summer at an EdTech Leaders workshop, which helps support school districts with various training.

“The group’s philosophy is getting people excited and engaged,” Maguire said. “A lot of change in classrooms are occurring when teachers look at their neighbor and see they’re doing something really great.”

The ever-present question surrounding this concept of technology in the classroom is where to go with it. Developing an answer to that question that best suits Medfield is Maguire’s goal for the district.

“This whole idea of ‘where are we going to go with this with kids?’ … We’ve talked about this wireless network and providing this kind of capability,” Maguire said. “We’re starting to have more conversations about engaging the community. What kind of environment could we create here with more devices being available that kids could access.”

Maguire said in this economic climate it is difficult to have these conversations about technology with parents but in terms of providing students with high-quality education, the conversations are necessary.

“That’s a pretty complicated conversation,” Maguire said. “Some of the talk with [EdTech Leaders] was around the idea of helping us think about organizationally, how do we engage in these conversations and how do you approach this topic with the community and parents in a way that kind of facilitates an exchange of ideas and develop a consensus of opinion about where we are going to go with [technology].”

The bottom line is the town has made the investment for technology throughout the school district and the administration will have discussions with the goal of developing a plan that best utilizes the equipment in the classroom.

“We made a financial investment and to really capitalize on it, we really need to do a real good job with training,” Maguire said.

School Committee chair Susan Ruzzo echoed Maguire's opinion on the presence of technology in the district.

"I think it’s very important," Ruzzo said. "We spent all this money, we don’t want it to just sit there. We really want them to use it properly and where we go from there."

Check Medfield Patch Friday for part two of this four-part series as Maguire outlines his second goal: Global competencies.