A colleague just left my classroom after showing up to vent after hearing "through the grape vine" that there was talk in our central office about no longer funding the digital video library she uses... the tech folks suggested "she can just use YouTube." After we ranted for a few moments about the ethics of that (I wonder who would be held responsible for teachers' use of the unlicensed media on YouTube in violation of school policy-- no actually I know who would be liable), we talked for a few minutes about the design of school ICT systems and who gets to make decisions about what gets installed and how it is configured...
It was a good preview of one of the images I will be using at one of my presentations at the Annual Conference:
I say we start at the top, and technicians get to design systems and then teach teachers how to use the systems... teachers have the responsibility to follow those instructions as presented. If the system then doesn't meet the needs of the users (teachers and their students) then the system must be redesigned. In my view technicians trump teachers on design, but technicians must accommodate each and every need identified by the teachers.
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