Challenges of BYOD

Although there are many benefits for a school who has a "bring your own device" policy, there can be some challenges for implementing such a policy.  Here, I will explore some of the challenges and offer suggestions that I believe can help ease schools into a BYOD policy smoothly.

• School BYOD policy:  School rules and guidelines need to be clear for students use of their own devices on campus. Doug Johnson says in Power Up to "make sure the appropriate and inappropriate use of technologies described in your Acceptable Use Policy covers personal devices as well as school-owned devices."  He also suggests that rules regarding lost or stolen devices need to be addressed "articulate rules in your handbook regarding lost, stolen, or damaged personal devices." It is also important to keep parents informed about the use of devices in school.  I also think it is a great idea for each classroom teacher to develop their own policy on the use of devices in their rooms. If parents are on board with what we are doing, the transition will happen more smoothly. A parent meeting for incoming freshman may be a good time to discuss the new policy and the reasons for implementation. 

• Security Issues:  I would assume that a big concern for schools and their Technology Departments would be security issues.  I would suggest that schools have separate Wi-Fi networks for staff and for students.  Technology support is something the school will need discuss.  Since students will be bringing their own outside devices not provided by the school, is the school responsible for helping with troubleshooting and support?  

• Connectivity:  Most schools, including our own, already have Wi-Fi provided for students and teachers.  This tells me that our school is already in the preparation stage for BYOD.  Most classrooms have a good Wi-Fi signal but there can be some issues regarding the bandwidth for our students. One school describes what they did when they implemented what they called BYOT (Bring your Own Technology) in BYOT Improves Learning Without Breaking the Bank  "To accommodate the spikes in network traffic that BYOT would trigger, Forsyth County Schools boosted bandwidth WA?N speeds from 1 gigabit per second to 2 Gbps in each building and from 500 megabits per second to 1.3 Gbps for Internet access.  District IT staff also spent much of 2008 installing Wi-Fi networks with filtered access on every campus." As stated in an earlier post, the BYOD concept is especially attractive to help save money for districts.  There will, however, be additional costs to up the connectivity for students by providing more bandwidth and access to the internet for multiple devices. 

• Educating Teachers:  What I see as the biggest obstacle at our school is the acceptance of BYOD by the digital immigrants, also known as the teachers in our district.  The majority of our Professional Development this school years is devoted to technology and its importance for our students while learning.  Most of the staff are starting to embrace the use of technology in their classroom but are concerned about learning how to do so.  As long as our district continues to emphasize the importance of technology and its benefits to our students, and continues to provide professional development opportunities for teachers to learn, we will see an increase of its use in the classroom.  In the article "7 Questions for Bringing Your Own Device to School", Barbara Bray suggests to "use a one day or one hour session to introduce an idea, method, or strategy, or to empower teachers to move into a specific direction."  Another idea would be for schools to employ a "teacher coach", a person on staff that is just there to support the teachers in their quest to implement devices and other technology into the classroom.  Later, I will describe the impact of "digital immigrants" teaching "digital natives"