In this project, we chose to focus on the whole school complex, on all four schools together, and on what would develop when all four schools infused technology into classrooms at the same time.

We used a shared decision-making model for the cross-school implementation committee and stuck to that model. That allowed all members of the school community to have a real say in the process and to structure the types of professional development that were really needed. Parents have played an increasingly active role in this committee, and the education technologist has conducted workshops just for parents to learn how to use the technology. Several of those sessions have actually been taught by parents themselves. This has reached more deeply into the community, and we are seeing a corresponding increase in interest and activity with the Hanau Army Base.

Our decision to be inclusive was based on the belief that the technology needs to be equally accessible to all teachers and students. We anticipated what the national figures are showing, that "To the extent that computer skills are important in today's labor market, middle-class kids have a distinct advantage" (Benton Foundation 1997). We provided in-school access to all students and also brought small portable keyboards for home use with students who did not have a computer. Again, this emphasis on working with the whole school community most likely increased the speed with which the technology was adopted in classrooms, by creating a community sense of the importance of the schools' work with technology.

By including all teachers and classrooms in the project at the same time, we were able to build more cohesive peer support among teachers. As different teachers became local experts, the conversations among teachers, even in the lunchroom, changed dramatically. Our ongoing qualitative research model allowed us to capture these informal, but powerful, connections among teachers, and the on-site education technologist verified the changes within classrooms on a daily basis through his electronic logs.

The partnership has actively shown that educational reform and technology changes can support each other on an ongoing basis. For example, we found that classroom practice changed toward more inquiry-based and project-based activities as teachers learned how to use two computers with differing groups within the class. The scheduling for a student team to use the scarce resource prompted activities to be structured so that teams were working on different tasks at the same time. In addition, we found a new focus on understanding the curriculum guidelines and national standards themselves, as teachers questioned not only their own classroom management techniques but also the learning styles of their students, with closer analysis of student work both off and on the computer. In both cases, content knowledge has deepened as teachers expand the use of the technology beyond games or word processing.