What is the Role of a School’s Instructional Technology Liaison?

As a myriad of technologies has been implemented into classrooms, a new role has been created within the school system: instructional technology liaisons. This position has underscored our nation’s aims to create a more technologically literate classroom, but what is the exact role these individuals play within the school? Here, the classroom technology specialists at SchoolMart explain the role an instructional technology liaison performs within their school, and how this has positively impacted the technology goals within education.

Although the increase of devices in the classrooms has subsequently increased student access to technology, a problem arose: many teachers simply did not know how to use the devices to their fullest potential. In order to improve technology literacy in educators, and consequently students, the instructional technology liaison role was born, and principals were instructed to appoint one liaison, as well as an alternate, for each of their respective schools. Within a K-12 setting, instructional technology liaisons support the use of instructional technology in schools, empowering educators to maximize their use of technology, and thus help students prepare for a technological and change-oriented society.

When choosing an instructional technology liaison, principals should keep in mind the abilities required of one, as well as their responsibilities. These include:

• participation in the planning and facilitation of professional development for the effective use of instructional technology in the school.
• participation as a member of the school team(s) that plan and implementation of the strategies for integrating instructional technology into the School Improvement Plan.
• operating instructional technologies and maintain awareness of various technological resources.
• possessing a strong knowledge of instructional technologies and possessing ability to do basic troubleshooting.

Instructional technology liaisons also serve as the school’s contact with the Office of Instructional Technology (OIT), as well as the Department of Technology (DOT). They regularly attend liaison meetings, at which they learn about new technologies, strategies for implementation and other pertinent issues. Liaisons are expected to disseminate this information to their principal and colleagues.

Besides providing education and support to teachers and other staff, instructional technology liaisons are expected to interact with the school’s technological devices in a repair and maintenance capacity. This includes providing troubleshooting services for their school’s computers and devices, as well as placing service tickets for troubleshooting and repairs. They should also be able to interact with the school server to configure common shares, access the Deployment Console to remotely deploy software, printers and various configuration changes and maintain the school’s software and hardware inventories with the school’s technology integration teacher and/or the library media specialist.

By positioning an individual as the school’s instructional technology liaison, principals ensure that the technology they bring into their school will be correctly used and properly maintained, ultimately increasing accessibility and usability for all students. To learn more about the technology available to educators, teachers and instructional technology liaisons alike should visit SchoolMart’s website, one of the leading providers of educational technologies for schools across the country.