Written by: Dan Maas
4/24/2009 

The Board of Education has formally approved the Educational Technology and Information Literacy plan during action on Thursday, April 23rd, 2009.  The ETIL Plan carries the new vision for Educational Technology in the district:  Inspired Learning.  These two simple words shall be our beacon of light and our expectation of the ultimate result of the use of technology in our schools: to inspire learning; for student work to be inspired learning; for our staff and community to be inspired by learning.

 Our Mission:

Through an elegant synthesis of humanity and technology, we will inspire a command of information, masterful communication, creative productivity and ethical citizenship in every learner.

 "Through an elegant synthesis of humanity and technology"

Here we state that this is about people who use technology to empower their lives and learning.  The technology must not be overbearing nor the focus of the work; hence the elegant synthesis.  We firmly believe that technology must enhance, not attempt to replace, human relationships.  And by placing humanity ahead of technology, we affirm our belief that it is our students and their teachers that make the difference.

 "we will inspire"

We cannot create learners nor can we make someone learn.  Rather, with these words, we espouse a constructivist view that the learner is the active builder of learning... but that we can influence that effort through inspiration.  Let the time begin that your textbook and binder are no longer the boundaries of your learning! 

 "a command of information"

Command speaks to authority and power.  And indeed we want our learners to be able to find and use authoritative information and use it effectively.  With these few words we honor the requirements of information access, evaluation, authentication and use that are so essential to information literacy as defined by our teacher-librarians.  Our learners, both students and teachers, must have the power of information at their command to be successful today.

 "masterful communication"

Masterful speaks to eloquence in the written word as well as the graphic arts, to the melody of music as well as oration.  But this phrase also alludes to a capacity to use telecommunications to reach across great distances and interact with others who traditionally have been separated because of old limits of time and boundaries.  Now, the whole World shall be our classroom.

 "creative productivity"

The word creative speaks to the aesthetic that is so essential to both the arts and the sciences, to poetry as well as to engineering.  But it also refers to innovation and risk-taking.  It is not enough to do something efficiently…it must have a certain appeal too!  And productivity is similarly broad in applicability... as much to the written word as the robotics project.  Productivity applies to the practical arts just as well as to the theoretical.

 "and ethical citizenship"

Last, but not least... in fact the bottom line... is our mission to educate our young citizens.  In today's ever earlier exposure of adult issues to children, we must instill a sense of ethical behavior both for the safety of the young child at the playground and online, but also for the interactions that inevitably occur.  Ethics refers to honoring intellectual and physical property; identity protection and acceptable use of technologies.  And citizenship first alludes to our role as Americans, but also in our responsibilities as good stewards of the Earth and our attitudes toward all human-kind.

 "in every learner."

The concluding phrase sends the mind first to students, but quickly one realizes that teachers are learners too.  As are administrators, staff, parents and the community.  The emphasis is not on a title or role, but on an action... the act of learning.  And isn't learning the one thing absolutely everyone has in common... the one mission of schools absolutely everyone can agree upon?

 This is our Vision and Mission for our use of technology in Littleton Public Schools.  We will use these simple words to ground our efforts and avoid the dazzle technology so often brings.  You can view our Vision video HERE that we gave at the LPS Foundation Spirit Dinner fund-raiser for the project.  So now, to quote our Educational Technology Advisory Committee Chair, Briggs Buckley (LHS Class of 2009): “Let it begin.”

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Location: Blogs Dan Maas, Ed.D. Chief Information Officer

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