Via Deborah abramsen brooks Regarding the Smart Schools Bond Act. THIS MONEY IS NOT AUTOMATIC. Before any school district can be awarded any money, each district must first submit a Smart Schools Investment Plan for approval to the Smart Schools Review Board. (The Smart Schools Review Board is comprised of the Commissioner, the State budget director [DiNapoli?], and the SUNY Chancellor -- or their designees.) The Smart Schools Review Board is tasked with issuing guidelines regarding the Smart Schools Investment Plans. These guidelines will include any required components of the Smart Schools Investment Plans, as well as more details regarding the timeline for plan submission and any additional spending parameters. AGAIN, THIS MONEY IS NOT AUTOMATIC. The Smart Schools Review Board may approve a school districts plan, reject the plan, or return the plan to the school district for modifications. Once the Smart Schools Investment Plan is approved, the school district will be eligible to begin receiving grant funds, up to the amount of its Smart Schools allocation amount, to reimburse costs of the approved projects. NYSED will administer the grant funds. IMPORTANT: school districts are required to consult with parents, teachers, students, community members, and other stakeholders BEFORE submitting a Smart Schools Investment Plan. THIS IS WHERE WE COME IN. Get ready to discuss with your districts whether the technology and the accompanying foreseen and unforeseen expenditures associated with the technology are worth it. Get ready to discuss whether your district will go into a fiscal hole just having to train teachers how to use the technology, having to hire personnel to maintain, repair, replace, etc., broken and obsolete stuff, having to retrofit aging infrastructure to accommodate increased WiFi in schools, etc. Get ready to discuss whether there is a cost-benefit to districts to buying massive amounts of technology whose teaching efficacy is unsupported. Get ready to argue that if Cuomo wants computers for PARCC, HE should fund this unfunded mandate. This should be our new focus when this issue comes up locally. Although we may have some time until the Commissioner issues guidelines, lets not delay.
Posted on: Thu, 06 Nov 2014 19:49:58 +0000
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