Google Drive part of Common Core move

The La Cañada Unified School District has been preparing for the new Common Core state standards by ramping up professional development for teachers and making technological upgrades on all campuses, including a systematic move to Google Drive, a virtual file storage service provided by the tech giant.

So far, in the district’s second year of Common Core implementation, the trend is taking off.

Every day, 1,000 teachers and students are logging onto Gmail, while district staff report 2,400 daily log-ons to Google Drive. Last month alone, 55,340 Google docs (online documents) were created for use in LCUSD classrooms.

On Tuesday, two staff members working to ensure a smooth transition updated the school board on what’s being done to bring teachers and students on board with many new changes made over the summer.

Carrie Adkins, the district’s new teacher on special assignment (TOSA) helping with Common Core implementation, and tech TOSA Emily Blaney explained how well teachers and students were taking to the new transition online.

“We have a lot of resources to help them integrate the Common Core technology,” Adkins said.

The pair shared how the district is working on Common Core-aligned diagnostic and quarterly tests to measure student progress in the new era, despite uncertainty at the state level about how proficiency will be measured.

Teachers have adopted Illuminate, a new classroom management software that allows them to track and interact with students by computer.

“It really helps us to inform our instruction,” Blaney explained. “We can go into Illuminate and see what standards we need to focus on or re-teach.”