District-Wide Implementation of the ParSYSTEM

by
Walter A. Cornnell, Area I Instructional Support Team
Palm Beach County School District

     This article describes how ParSYSTEM software was set
     up in 16 high schools, 17 middle schools, and several
     elementary schools in Palm Beach County. Of particular
     note is the strategy using the "Teacher As Expert"
     format so that as ". . . teacher experts evolved, they
     became the instructional agents to help other
     teachers."
     

The School District of Palm Beach County, Florida, has
approximately 125,000 students in approximately 120 schools.
Assessment and recording of grades are some mundane, though
necessary, tasks required of teachers in the instructional
process. The District had two software objectives: to reduce the
amount of paperwork, and simultaneously increase the accuracy of
recorded student grades. Further,  a related software need was to
provide students with specific information about their academic
progress and current grades.

The arrival of the personal computer changed one constraint of
the grading process. By placing student assessment on a computer,
teachers could place student grades clearly and accurately in
data files. In the early years, adventurous teachers wrote
simplified gradebook programs in BASIC. With the coming of
spreadsheets, teachers used Multiplan, Visicalc, Supercalc, and
Lotus to record grades. But with all of the variety of
applications came a corresponding diversity in the records
produced. Not only were the formats different, the content was
not always succinct.


The District began the search for an electronic gradebook that
would meet the needs of the teachers and the administration.
Simultaneously, the Florida Department of Education sent out a
request for proposals for the development of Model Technology
Schools. These schools would serve as centers for training and
developing instructional uses for new technologies. The Palm
Beach County School District responded with a comprehensive
proposal and received a grant. John T. Leonard High School was
one of five Florida schools funded for a five-year period to
investigate and use technology in the instructional environment.

An electronic gradebook was one software feature in the
evaluation project. Teachers investigated several products and
made the ultimate decision to use the ParSYSTEM family of
software. Subsequently, training on the ParSCORE/ParGRADE program
was initiated for teachers with the highest degree of interest
and computer skills. The teachers used the software and discussed
their experiences with their colleagues. As teacher interest
grew, the District offered other training sessions. Personnel
from SCANTRON Corporation aided in assisting with the initial
application of scanning capabilities.

Teacher planning periods, department-wide sessions, one-to-one
sessions with teachers, and open-invitation sessions for all the
teachers at the John I. Leonard High School were the initial
options for training. (An off- site model was initiated at three
schools, but was not successful due to lack of sufficient
support.) As the skill and comfort level of the teachers
developed, they wanted to explore the many capabilities of the
ParSYSTEM. The test generator, ParTEST, became the next program
of interest. Teachers wanted the capabilities inherent in that
program.

The key to success of the initial use of the software was the
comfort level of the teachers. Closely related was the inclusion
of the "Teacher As Expert" format for continuing instruction.
Initially, Walter A. Cornnell, from the District office, and Jim
Sheehan, the assistant principal for the model technology school,
provided the training. Additionally, the District purchased a
site license for the complete family of ParSYSTEM software. As
teacher-experts evolved, they became the instructional agents to
help other teachers.

Teachers from other schools became aware of the ParSYSTEM and its
capabilities and began to request access to it. The staff of John
I. Leonard High School worked with District personnel to make
training available at other school sites. Initially, one
assistant principal and a computer teacher from each of the high
schools received a copy of the programs to train other members of
their instructional staff.

The Florida Department of Education, besides funding the Model
Technology School Program, began the Florida Instructional
Technology Program (INTECH). Within the bounds of INTECH were
provisions for training teachers in the use of software. A key
software adoption included the use of the ParSYSTEM family of
programs. The other high schools in the model school program
subsequently purchased ParSYSTEM. INTECH training and model
school funding provided training for District personnel and for
other teachers.

As the use of the gradebook escalated, Ralph Lewis and John Lucas
of Economics Research, Inc. helped in modifying the software to
meet the needs of secondary schools. For example, an option was
added to provide for the computation of grades on only work
attempted by students. Without this feature, the software
penalized late-enrolling students because they missed early
assignments in the school term. To further enhance the use of
ParSYSTEM, the District's programmers agreed to provide access to
mainframe files. This innovation provided uploading and
downloading of information from the mainframe database to and
from ParSYSTEM. Using the files from the District student
database, a teacher could utilize the "disk file" option when
adding students and not have to type or scan in the student
enrollment data.

Recently, an attendance program has been added to ParSCORE/
ParGRADE. This enhancement was done at the request and
encouragement of the Palm Beach School District and the author.
This modification within ParSCORE/ParGRADE would give the
teachers another mechanism to track student participation
accurately. Again, Economics Research, Inc. made the necessary
modifications. ParSCORE/ParGRADE integrated the new attendance
program and the feature was evaluated by teachers this summer.
Further investigation of the possibility of transferring
attendance data to the district mainframe database is being
planned.

Additionally, the Institute for Research and Development of
Teacher Education at Florida Atlantic University assisted in
assessing the gradebook at John I. Leonard High School. The
implementation was evaluated at the end of the first full year of
using ParSYSTEM. Ninety-two (92) percent of the teachers
responded that they would not have done the training any other
way.

The ParSYSTEM software has made a major impact on the use of
technology by the teachers in the Palm Beach County School
District, The software is in use in 16 high schools, 17 middle
schools, and several of the district's 71 elementary schools. The
developers of the ParSYSTEM, Mr. Lewis and Mr. Lucas of Economics
Research, Inc., have helped this district raise the professional
abilities of the instructional staff with quality software.
Members of the mainframe programming staff ahve echoed this
support. In concert, the teachers, the developers of the
ParSYSTEM, and the district's mainframe programming staff are
providing a smooth and accurate assessment of students in Palm
Beach County.

For additional information, contact:

Walter A. Cornnell, Area I Instructional Support Team,
407/279-1744 or James C. Sheehan, John I. Leonard Model
Technology School, 407/ 641-1231