Running head: PERSONAL TECHNOLOGY SWOT ANALYSIS, GOALS, AND PLAN 1

Personal Technology SWOT Analysis, Goals, and Plan

Burt A. Parker

University of West Georgia

Personal Technology SWOT 2

Personal Technology SWOT Analysis, Goals, and Plan

I am currently employed as an academic lab instructor at Hawthorne Elementary School.

My focus area is math. I see all one thousand students weekly on a rotation. My job is to review

the math concepts they are learning in the regular classroom, providing remediation for those

who are behind and extension for those who have already grasped the concepts. In addition, I

have recently begun assisting our media specialist with the morning news, due to the

implementation of new hardware recently installed in the school. The news program that was

once broadcast over the intercom and cable is now broadcast via our intranet.

Strengths

In considering my strengths in technology, I must first consider my weaknesses. I know

that I have not arrived in my knowledge and ability in technological areas. Recognizing this

weakness is a strength. I am continually looking to see what innovative ideas others are

implementing into their classroom, and because I am not afraid to try new things, I am willing to

experiment with technology in the classroom, as well as other areas of my life. One of those

areas is my cell phone. A few years ago I dropped my large carrier and went with a startup

carrier, Republic Wireless. Republic, though their system has not been without its issues, is the

best deal on the market and uses Voice over Internet Protocol, VoIP, and cellular for their calls.

When Wi-Fi is available, calls are made via VoIP. When Wi-Fi is not available, calls are made

over the cellular signals.

I, also, have surrounded myself with people who are certainly more technologically

advanced than I am. In my role as a church elder, I tend to gravitate toward my men who are

more tech savvy and probe their answers to my technology problems. At my last church, which
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was much larger than where I am now, one of my men helped me as I experimented with Virtual

Network Client, VNC. We successfully worked out the glitches so that I could wirelessly control

the projector in our large auditorium from my laptop while standing at the lectern.

Another strength is my experience in my personal education. Both of my masters

degrees were earned via online education. In these educational endeavors I have seen some

pedagogy that worked well and, of course, others not so well. I know what it means for a

professor to misuse technology to simply augment his traditional way of teaching, rather than

utilizing it to a much fuller potential. However, I have also had instructors who challenged me

and engaged me through the technology required in their courses.

Finally, I am a highly analytical and methodical person. I see most everything as a series

of steps, and most technology follows this schema. Therefore, when explaining how to use

certain technologies, I can walk my cohorts through the steps as I see them. I also can usually

see the missteps others have taken in the process and help them get back on track.

Weaknesses

As far as the field of education goes, I was out of the classroom when the major computer

technologies began to be seen in the school system. I was teaching fourth grade when teachers in

Clayton County, Georgia, were first issued desktop computers but left just a year or so after. I

have been a teacher in adult, religious education for over twenty years but am not of the mind

that many of the technologies, games, interactive discussions, etc. have a place in the church

worship setting, which has been my primary focusthe discussion of such hesitancy for the

utilization of certain technologies in worship is beyond the scope of this paper, as the length of

the discussion of Scriptural support of such an argument exceeds the limits placed on us here. In
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short, I was out of the educational technology loop for about twelve years and have just recently

returned.

That is not to say that I have used no technology in my teaching of adult education. To

the contrary, I have used PowerPoint, VNC, embedded videos, and LCD projectors among others

when teaching adults; however, I have utilized these technologies primarily to support the status

quo. They were only to make my lecture clearer, not to revolutionize the way the content was

disseminated to the students. Consequently, when I integrate technologies into the classroom, I

have noted this same mindset of using technology to support what I am already doing, and this is

a great weakness.

Opportunities

Despite my weaknesses, the opportunities for integration of technology into the

classroom are ripe. New, free web applications appear every day that make integration of

technology easier. Technology prices are getting lower, and many teachers are unwilling to do

more than take their class to the computer lab, leaving the laptops, iPods, and iPads for those

who seek innovative integration. My principal said recently that she was going to spend her

remaining budget on three iPad carts with thirty iPads per cart.

Though I am only beginning a program pursuing an educational specialists degree with a

concentration in media, I have already come in contact with many cohorts who are tech savvy

and have been able to glean from their discussions. I look forward to the opportunities of the

future, as I continue on this educational journey through the remaining classes which focus on

technology.
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Not only am I taking online courses, but my oldest children are beginning to take their

studies online, as well. As they learn new technologies, I will be watching them closely to see

what I can incorporate into my own repertoire of tools for education.

Greater awareness is building for technology in education, and, consequently, more

trainings and in-services are available within my own school district. The superintendent of

Clayton County Public Schools, recently winning a grant because of the technology usage in the

district, wants her teachers using technology, so those innovative teachers who use technology in

Clayton County will soon realize some sort of reward, even if only by means of support, for

utilizing technology in the classroom.

Threats

At a district level, the threat I see to the use of technology is that many of the decisions

regarding technological purchases are made at the district, rather than the school level. When

decisions are made by bureaucrats at the county level, teachers have little to no input. The

hardware and software purchased often are not what teachers would choose, if given a choice.

Hence, they are not the tools that the teachers will use. Much money is spent this way in an

effort to get teachers to use more technology, but most of it is wasted. As a result, much of the

technology that I have available at this time in my school is nearing the end of useable life

simply because of outdated software or hardware.

Personally, I do not have much time for researching the latest and greatest technological

advances nor the patience to deal with flawed technologies to see them through to the end. I

often feel like I am the last living person to hear about some new way of using technology in the

classroom. Due to the size of my family, twelve children in all, my working two jobs in addition

to going to school, and living nearly an hours drive from my day job, I truly do not have surplus
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time for research or experimentation. Then, when I do use technologies and they cause more

work rather than less or have bugs, I have very little patience to see how they turn out. Coupled

with these issues is the fact that I live in the country and have satellite internet with data limits

which are consumed rapidly by the four college students and socialites in the home.

Goals and Plan

My personal goals are to move into an instructional technologist position training and

encouraging others in their use of technology in the classroom. I also would like to work on the

development of innovative educational programs for the students at my current school, allowing

them to work in project based learning groups rather than the traditional classroom setting.

These goals will require the development of my own technological prowess. Over the

next year I intend to continue experimenting with new instructional technologies as I discover

them, tweaking them for the best results. I also will approach my principal requesting

permission to work on an innovative technology project with a small group of students. This

project will serve as a pilot for future work with a whole class focused on project based learning.

In addition, I will continue working on my degree in instructional technology seeking to

immediately apply what I learn in class to my personal instructional practice. I will, also,

endeavor to be a peer coach sharing with my cohorts the engaging technologies I have been

using with their students in the academic lab.