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In the fall of 2008 the Office of Educational Technology (OET) in the U.S. Department of Education asked the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) to conduct a survey of public schools to track access to information technology in schools and classrooms. 50 states were sent a total of 2005 surveys to gather national data on the availability and use of educational technology in public elementary and secondary schools during fall 2008. The school survey covered the following specific topics – the number of computers for instructional use, types of operating systems, number of mobile devices, logistics of technology support in schools, leadership, and other topics.
There were eleven key findings on educational technology in public schools in fall 2008 in this report.
- An estimated 100 percent of public schools had one or more instructional computers with Internet access and the ratio of students to instructional computer access was 3.1 to 1. Ninety seven percent of schools had one or more instructional computers located in classrooms and 58 percent of schools had laptops on carts.
- Of the computers in public schools, 91 percent were used for instructional purposes. Of these instructional computers, 98 percent had Internet access, 15 percent were less than 1 year old, 14 percent were laptops on carts, and 51 percent were located in classrooms (excluding laptops on carts).
- Of the public schools that provided handheld devices, 49 percent provided to administrators, 15 percent to teachers, and 4 percent to students.
- Public schools reported providing various technology devices for instruction, including LCD and DLP (digital light processing) projectors (97 percent), digital cameras (93 percent), and interactive whiteboards (73 percent). Within the schools with LCD or DLP projects, the ratio of students to projectors was 32 to 1.
- Public schools reported having wireless network access for the whole school (39 percent), or for part of the school (30 percent), or wireless connections only from laptops to carts (9 percent)
- Windows operating systems for instructional computers included Windows Vista (in 13 percent of schools), Windows XP (84 percent), Windows NT or 2000 (27 percent), Windows 95, 98, or ME (23 percent), and Windows 3.1 or DOS (2 percent). Macintosh operating systems included Mac OS 10 or higher (in 31 percent of schools) and Mac OS 09 or earlier (15 percent).
- Public schools used their district network or the Internet to provide standardized assessment results and data for teachers in individualize instruction (87 percent), data to inform instructional planning at the school (85 percent), online student assessment (72 percent, and high-quality digital content (65 percent).
- Thirty-one percent of public schools reported having full-time staff in the school whose only responsibility was technology support and/or technology integration. Forty-seven percent of secondary schools reported having such staff compared with 27 percent of elementary schools. Thirty-vie percent of schools with low poverty concentration reported having full-time technology staff compared to 28 percent of schools with high poverty concentration.
- Nine out of 10 schools reported that it takes 8 hours or less to get network services restored when the network goes down (22 percent reported less than 1 hour and 68 percent reported 1 to 8 hours). A larger percentage of schools with low poverty concentration compared to schools with high poverty concentration reported that it takes less than 1 hour to get network services restored (27 percent versus 11 percent). Fifty-one percent of schools reported that it takes 1 to 8 hours to receive3 assistance with software problems or questions, and 45 percent reported that it takes 2 to 5 days to get a computer repaired.
- Public schools reported the extent to which various staff helped school staff integrate technology into instruction. Teachers helped in 20 percent of schools to a major extent and in 47 percent to a moderate extent. School-level technology staff helped integrate technology into instruction in 29 percent of schools to a major extent and in 34 percent to a moderate extent. District-level technology staff provided technical support in 59 percent of schools to a major extent and in 27 percent to a moderate extent. School-level technology staff provided technical support in 42 percent of schools to a major extent and in 30 percent to a moderate extent.
- Opinion on the use of educational technology in the school differed by poverty concentration. A larger percentage of schools with low poverty concentration than schools with high poverty concentration agreed that ‘teachers are sufficiently trained in technology usage’ (74 percent versus 60 percent), and ‘funding for educational technology is being spent in the most appropriate ways.’ (79 percent versus 69 percent).
