Going High Tech Under High Surveillance: Technology Integration, Zero Tolerance, and Implications for Access and Equity

GIGI GRAY

Freedom and peace, for which we are all yearning. May they endure. O, NYC High!¹ O, NYC High, our sacred alma mater! Within your walls dwell friendliness and charm.

-NYC High’s First Alma Mater²

Technology Integration in Urban Schools: A Matter of Access and Equity

In 1985, when computers first began to make a significant entrance into schools, the average student to computer ratio was 63:1, and the Internet was not even a figment of most people’s imaginations (Kafer, 2002). Now, twenty-five years later, the state of technology integration in U.S. schools has made great strides. Ninety-nine percent of the nation’s schools have Internet access, and the student-to-computer ratio has steadily decreased to approximately 4:1. Even in urban schools the ratio has decreased to just over 5:1 (Parsad, 2005). These positive trends in technology availability are often taken as a sign that the digital divide is indeed closing as technology is becoming increasingly affordable and available. Yet, technology has not entered into the lives of all U.S. students to the same extent and in the same manner (Kvasny & Keil, 2006). As Gándara and Contreras (2009) point out, “students from different backgrounds use technology differently outside of school . . . [lower-income students, for example] are more likely to use technology for games and entertainment than for information seeking. Middleincome students are more likely to have parents who can guide them in their use of the computer as an information-seeking tool”(96). This results in what Jenkins (2006) refers to as “the participation gap,” where some youth learn to use technology for creating knowledge and shaping society whereas other youth learn to use technology as consumers of knowledge created by others. For many urban youth, these differences in technology exposure and dispositions toward technology use could mean entering colleges and careers at a disadvantage and being faced with long-term academic and employment challenges (Farrell, 2005).

While there have been countless school reform efforts designed to integrate technology into our nation’s schools (see, for example, Cuban, 2001 and Oppenheimer, 2003), in many urban schools technology integration initiatives rarely impact teachers’ and students’ daily practice. Despite what the above ratios indicate, in practice, technology access and use in urban schools may in fact be drastically limited or non-existent, thus contributing to the perpetuation of inequitable education for urban learners. Insufficient facilities and financial resources continue to be common impediments to technology integration. Computers are more likely to be housed in computer labs as opposed to the classroom. Hardware and software are often in disrepair and/or outdated. Technology integration initiatives are often trumped by other pressing issues such as overcrowding, teacher and administrator turnover, insufficient Annual Yearly Progress (AYP), contending with high drop-out rates, complying with mandated curriculum reforms, and school safety. These “at-risk” markers, typically present in underfunded urban schools that serve predominantly lower-income and minority students, are not found in schools in whiter and wealthier (often suburban) districts. They can and do have direct effects on whether and how technology is incorporated into teaching and learning, which continues to perpetuate a disparity between the educational experiences of urban students and their suburban peers.

This paper offers an illustration of how technology integration happened in one urban public high school that contended with all of the “at-risk” markers above. Specifically, I focus on the ways in which zero tolerance policies shaped the culture of New York City High School (NYC HS), a “failing” school in New York City, and how these policies impacted technology integration for teaching and learning. I tell this story through the perspective of Carol³, a high school literacy teacher at NYC HS, as she attempted to integrate technology into her English literacy curriculum. Carol’s experiences illustrate the contradictions of an urban school culture in which technology was used less to enhance teaching and learning and more to extensively police students and...