-
We are very excited to offer Service Cooperative members the opportunity to purchase Clarity, powered by BrightBytes. This is a learning analytics tool that collects data from administrators, teachers, and students in four areas (classroom, access, skills and environment). The results help you measure and drive technology decisions and investments, position your students for success with technology in the 21st Century, measure the impact of technology spending on student learning, and save money on technology projects and professional development. At its core, the Clarity platform provides a quick, efficient way to measure the degree of instructional technology integration in the classroom, resulting in a detailed report that shows technology strengths in the district, provides a plan for meeting standards, identifies professional development needs, and allows districts to track progress over time.
Through a statewide partnership between BrightBytes and the Minnesota Service Cooperatives, we are able to offer the Clarity tool at the substantially discounted annual fee of $0.70 per student. Your annual fee allows you to offer unlimited surveys throughout the year. The cost includes support provided by BrightBytes in the collection of data through the districts’ distribution and collection of surveys completed by administrators, teachers, and students an unlimited number of times during the year, compilation and aggregation of collected data to provide insight into technology use within your district, and identification of technology projects and professional development best suited to meet your district’s needs.
What are Minnesota districts doing with Clarity?Kasson-Mantorville Public Schools’ Superintendent, Mark Matuska, remarked on their district’s use of Clarity, “Clarity has allowed our district to take a profound look at multiple technology factors within our district, both at home and at school. The survey results highlighted our strengths, but also helped determine detailed focus areas that will make a difference in student learning, specifically staff development. Our budget is tight, thus determining where to focus our technology dollars is vital. Clarity helped our district do just that.”Kristy Cook, Technology Integrationist at Chatfield Public Schools, cited one key finding they discovered in using Clarity, “Our district’s teachers believe access to technology and beliefs in using technology are advanced and their skills in using technology are proficient, but actually using technology in the classroom is only emerging.” Based on this data, Chatfield moved forward with offering numerous trainings this past summer to assist teachers in feeling more comfortable using technology in the classroom. Cook hopes to see data reflect an increase in classroom technology use in the next round of Clarity assessments as a result of the summer PD opportunities offered. This is one example of how a district utilized the results from Clarity to pinpoint areas needing improvement and work toward increasing effective technology integration in the classroom.
