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School wide Web 2.0 Collaborative Tools Workshop 

Facilitator: Joel Backon, Choate Rosemary Hall, CT

Overview


There are a multitude of Web 2.0 collaborative tools available for schools today, but a few are as much at home in the academic program as they are in administrative offices. Using the same tools for effective communication and sharing of information throughout the school places the school community in a powerful position. This hands-on workshop will include the following tools:

  • Collaborative note taking
  • Collaborative file sharing
  • Collaborative project management
  • Social tagging and bookmarking
  • Collaborative writing
  • Media sharing

This workshop will run in the form of a collaborative session in which the group will respond to a case study using Web 2.0 tools for reasons that will be explained in the study. The finished product will be posted on this site with a summary of all the tools used in the process of producing the final report.


Case Study

 

Betty White, the Head of The Comedy Show School in Cleveland, OH, has responded to a serious budget crisis with several assignments to outside consultants. The school's endowment was entirely supported by derivatives in the form of mortgage-backed securities, and most of those obligations are now worthless. To maintain a PK-12 school of 1050 students, White will have to cut the school's operating budget by 50% across the board.

Ms. White has retained edACCESS to evaluate the Information Technology operation and cut the $1 million budget by 50%. Comedy Show School has an IT operation similar to those of edACCESS members, so members should rely on knowledge of his or her own IT operations as a frame of reference. White has read Adrian Segar's book, and feels that the collective wisdom of 50 experts in a somewhat organic environment will provide the best solution. The timing of the 2010 edACCESS Conference makes the production of the study ideally suited as a conference activity. Because the school has little money for consultant travel, the members of edACCESS must do the entire study remotely using communication and collaboration tools, and producing a final report within a week.

During the edACCESS workshop, the group will identify the appropriate Web 2.0 tools necessary to complete the study, and use those tools to develop a plan for The Comedy Central School. Communication during the workshop will be handled through a live blog called CoverItLive, so the process and time spent will be documented for Ms. White.

 

Deliverable at end of workshop

 

Ms. White has requested a one page report summarizing the recommended cuts with brief justifications. She emphasizes she will not read more than a single page report, and will request more details in the near future if she decides to retain edACCESS for the implementation phase of the project.


Data for The Comedy Show School

 

  • Annual budget = $20 Million
  • IT budget = $1 million
  • IT staff = 8
  • Total faculty and staff = 150
  • Total students = 1,050
  • 1:1 program
  • Number school-owned computers = 200
  • Outsourced IT services = email, web site hosting, SchoolDude for IT and Facilities Services Help Desk, Naviance
  • Number of servers = 10

Possible Tools

The following tools are worthy of consideration, but certainly do not represent an exhaustive list:

  • edACCESS Wiki - to create collaborative documents, particularly final report Comedy Central School
  • Google Docs - to create collaborative documents, spreadsheets, and presentations
  • Google Wave - anybody brave enough to create a wave?
  • Diigo group - to collect relevant websites for review of group members
  • Lino canvas - to organize major tasks for various subgroups
  • Nexty - to create and assign projects with detailed task lists
  • Nota - casual collaboration for brainstorming

 

Goals of Case Study

 

  • Time: How long will it take the group to organize themselves and the project?
  • Consensus: Will there be consensus on the following:
    • Which tools to use for deliberations
    • What solutions to recommend to The Comedy Show School
  • Size of Group: Is the edACCESS membership an appropriate size for effective deliberations? Do Web 2.0 tools permit more people to participate in the deliberations?
  • Will the technology get in the way of coming to a consensus, or any specific task during the deliberations? If so, why?
  • What lessons can be learned from the overall experience? Is such an approach to problem solving realistic? Would it have been easier to use the Web 2.0 tools if everybody had not been in the same room?

 

Artifacts resulting from the workshop

(Please add links for anything you used during the workshop.)