SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – The Springfield Public School District is taking a step back as they plan to scale back on student use of technology in and outside of the classroom.  

With the rise of technology in education post-pandemic, this move could have a major impact on the way students in the district learn. 
“first and foremost, we’re listening to what our teachers need and what they believe our students need.”  

Parents in the Springfield Public Schools district with children in kindergarten and middle school can be expecting some changes.  

As administrators have decided to scale back on technology.  

“Last April, the Board of Education asked administration at SPS to review the use of technology and to ensure that we’re being purposeful,” said Bruce Douglas, the director of information technology. “we took our recommendations from the committee, presented that to the Board of Education for us now to continue the planning stages for the next school year.”  

School leaders have been talking about what the use of technology looks like post-pandemic.  

“The recommendations from the committee as to changes with technology include changing our kindergarten students from iPads to touch screen Chromebooks and then at our middle school level, the students would no longer take the devices home, but they would be left on-site to ensure that they’re charged overnight and available,” said Douglas. 

After consulting with teachers they found that issues with the technology were taking from instructional time in classrooms.   

“We listen to what teachers and principals were saying at the middle school level what they found was that it’s very often a student would forget the charge overnight or that the device may need a repair and they may have to forget it at home and go get a loaner from the library, which took away from instructional time,” said Douglas. 

“This just provides teachers the ability to ensure they have a device ready for that student that’s charged.”