The CEO School Technology and Readiness (STaR) Chart

Overview

The CEO School Technology and Readiness (STaR) Chart provides a fairly effective measuring system for a school's effectiveness in ICT integration. However, it is not an absolute measure since the different categories presented may see a school having high ratings in one category and low ratings in another, resulting in difficulty determining a definite indicator level for the school. Even with this draw back, the chart can give administrators a good idea as to a school's level in the various categories and enable them better plan their developmental programs for ICT integration, inclusive of staff development and resource acquisition. Importantly, in planning, administrators have a very good idea of what areas and resources need to be focused on to get the school to each stage of development.

In examining the chart in relation to the Intermediate High School, I have looked at the following categories:

Hardware and Connectivity

Digital Content

Student Achievement and Assessment

Hardware and Connectivity

The school is in the Early Tech stage of this category. There is an IT lab which has the capacity to house an average class comfortably, with one computer per student. However, due to scheduling challenges for subjects other than IT, most classes would be unable to have such a ratio of computers to students. While some students own netbooks as part of 'one-laptop-per-child' initiative, many of the netbooks have been damaged. Therefore, in the regular classroom, there is a very high ratio of students to computers.

Internet connectivity is excellent as all classrooms and offices have adequate access to a stable internet connection. However, there are no computers installed in regular classrooms to allow independent classroom use. A multimedia projector is also available for use to teachers. There is little use of other forms of hardware technology.

Digital Content

The school falls into the Early Tech stage in this category. Learning is teacher centered and limited use is made of digital content to supplement instruction and reinforce basic academical skills. Better hardware support in the classroom or a secondary laboratory that can result in a computer-student ratio of even five students to a computer may encourage further use of digital content.

Student Achievement and Assessment

Since there is little overall integration of ICT in the classroom, measuring student achievement from an ICT perspective is almost non-applicable. An assessment of student skill improvement can not be done since little digital content is used to develop those skills and measure their developmental process. The digital process is not integrated into the assessment of subject matter though this is an avenue that can be systematically introduced without great difficulty.

The school does not have a web site and therefore not portal to communicate with parents via the web.

The rating here is also at the Early Tech stage.

Conclusion

All in all, the Intermediate High School is at the Early Tech level and requires a significant amount of planning and strategizing to move to the next level.