January 2003 — Special Feature
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IT in a Time of Budget Cuts How School Funding Will Affect the Quality of Education
The “California K-12 Technology Challenges Survey” asked about 10 potential IT challenges. The following are the five most important challenges faced by California K-12 IT administrators and coordinators in public school districts:
1. Managing the budget and funding
2. Adequate student information systems
3. Software licensing verification
4. Network security
5. Student and staff e-mail account management
Analysis
Managing the budget and funding. Budget issues top the list of IT administrators’ concerns, with 97% of respondents considering sufficient resources somewhat or critically important. This response is not surprising, given California’s deep state budget troubles.
Adequate student information systems. IT administrators are concerned that budget issues could impact their ability to ensure students have access to the equipment and software they need, with 95% of respondents naming adequate student information systems as their main challenge.
Software licensing verification. The third most important issue, cited by 95% of respondents as somewhat or critically important, is software licensing verification. On the basis of individual interviews, we concluded that this is another resource issue. However, administrators are concerned that vendors will use licensing verification to raise licensing fees.
Network security. Following resource issues, network security is a major concern for IT administrators, with 92% of respondents considering this a somewhat or critically important issue. According to interviews, much of this concern is connected to the need to demonstrate Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) compliance.
Student and staff e-mail. Finally, 92% of respondents consider staff and student e-mail management as a somewhat or critically important issue. Interviews indicated two primary concerns with e-mail in the schools. The first concern is the volume of e-mail, especially spam. The volume of spam is growing exponentially and has become a huge productivity drain on staff as well as students. In some cases, the volume of spam is so great that it saps a significant amount of available bandwidth, negatively impacting the overall performance of the network. The second concern is the nature of e-mail, including spam, because a high percentage of spam is pornographic or otherwise offensive. Since e-mail is covered by CIPA, spam and other inappropriate e-mail threaten CIPA compliance and, with it, much needed federal monies.
Below is the complete list of the California school districts and offices of education that participated in the survey.
Participant School Districts/Offices of Education:
