Texas Campus STaR Chart

The Texas STaR Chart, comprised of the Teacher STaR Chart and the Campus STaR Chart, is a measurement tool that was developed to assess progress toward the Texas Long-Range Plan for Technology, 2006-2020, which addresses skills both students and teachers must achieve in order to be prepared to work in the 21st Century. The Teacher STaR Chart is a self-assessment survey whereby teachers rate their proficiency and school achievement in four identified domains. The Campus STaR Chart is a summary of each campus' progress toward the Long-Range Plan.

Educator Preparation is the weakest domain statewide for the 2007-08 school year. The Chart identifies four levels of progress - Early Tech, Developing Tech, Advanced Tech, and Target Tech. In the report, only 0.6% of campuses responded they were at Target Tech. Additionally, 5.4% of campuses reported being at the Early Tech,74.2% at Developing Tech, and 19.9% at Advanced Tech. These results showed a slight decrease from data reported in the 2006-07 school year in Target Tech and Early Tech, and a slight increase in the other two areas. One interesting point was while the total number of campuses increased over the two years, the number of responses actually decreased.

Educator Preparation is also an area of weakness when looking at my campus results. The rating remained as Developing Tech for the 08-09, 07-08, and 06-07 school years. However, the total points for this area dropped to 11 for the 08-09 school year.

It would seem that since this is a critical area for teaching toward the 21st Century, more emphasis must be placed on this area in teacher preparation programs for new teachers, as well as in embedded professional development opportunities for established teachers. Technology is not going away, in fact it only continues to evolve and improve. Educators must be ready to engage students in learning that not only incorporates technology, but embraces it every day, everywhere, and in every scope imaginable.