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Teachers and parents urge district to keep full-time instructional technology facilitators
Summary
Three Scroggs Elementary staff and parents told the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Board that planned reductions to full-time instructional technology facilitator (ITF) positions would harm classroom instruction and student safety, and asked the board to reconsider local funding choices.
Public commenters on Monday urged the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Board to reverse planned reductions that would eliminate full-time instructional technology facilitator (ITF) roles at several elementary schools.
"We are leaving students extremely vulnerable if we do not keep a full time position at the elementary school," Jeanette Dixon, a classroom teacher who read a series of parent letters, told the board during public comment. Dixon cited a case earlier this year in which a facilitator at Scroggs Elementary detected a bullying campaign via Google Docs that staff say they were able to interrupt because of ITF support.
Elizabeth Angel, a gifted specialist at Scroggs Elementary, read a staff letter signed by more than 50 employees in 48 hours describing the effect of combining one full-time ITF across three schools and noting that the district’s current ITF at Scroggs, identified as Mr. Brown, would not continue in that role. "This drastic reduction of support will limit students' opportunities to engage with technology in meaningful ways and will place an additional burden on teachers," Angel said.
Kenzie Patrick, a kindergarten teacher at Scroggs, described day-to-day classroom projects enabled by the ITF: green-screen video projects, a coding lab with programmable robots during Computer Science Education Week, and Seesaw portfolios introduced through an ITF-led device-care lesson. "All of this will not be possible going forward," Patrick said.
Speakers emphasized that ITF positions are funded locally, not by the state, and framed the cuts as a local budget choice with direct effects on classroom instruction, digital safety and teachers’ capacity to integrate technology.
Board members acknowledged the public comments and asked staff to consider the concerns. During a later discussion about the board's legislative priorities, several members suggested adding language that would seek state support or revised state allotment formulas for positions such as instructional-technology staff.
Next steps: board staff said they will incorporate public feedback into budget conversations and legislative-priority language and will return to the board with draft calendar and legislative text; the public commenters urged the board to visit Scroggs and other classrooms to see ITF work firsthand.
