Arlington ISD Case Study
THE DISTRICT
Arlington Independent School District, the 11th largest district in Texas, serves over 61,000 students on its 78 campuses. As the largest employer in Arlington, the district has a staff of approximately 8,500, with 4,000 of those being teachers. However, even a large school district with more than eight thousand staff members can have pain points like resource bandwidth.
THE CHALLENGE
The district’s Technology Integration and Innovation department's mission is to “empower educators to develop future-ready learners through technology integration, technology usage, and the use of relevant resources.”
Arlington’s teachers were already “tech-rich” before MobileMind, though as with most large districts, instructional technology skills varied from one teacher to the next. Additionally, the department only has so many staff members, and scaling personalized professional learning to fit the needs of each employee was nearly an impossible task.
“It has increased our capacity to help our teachers and staff. Without MobileMind, it is hard to provide the individualized support that you want to provide with so many people at so many different levels.”
JESSICA MAYS
Blended Learning Coordinator
THE MOBILEMIND SOLUTION
When asked how MobileMind helps support her as a Blended Learning Coordinator, Jessica Mays explained, “It has increased our capacity to help our teachers and staff. Without MobileMind, it is hard to provide the individualized support that you want to provide with so many people at so many different levels.”
Now Arlington’s teachers can seek out learning opportunities anytime, anywhere. “Teachers can engage in learning whenever and wherever they want,” Jessica stated. MobileMind has afforded Arlington’s Technology Integration and Innovation team the ability to facilitate the personalized learning opportunities they had always dreamed of and depart from a “one size fits all” professional learning model.
However, the enhancements to the district’s learning opportunities didn’t stop there. “In MobileMind, I can accomplish something in minutes. I know something that I didn’t know before, and I can DO something that I couldn't do before. With every lesson I am asked to do, which really helps solidify that learning - that’s a hard thing to replicate!”
Jessica explained that as more and more teachers become familiar with MobileMind’s learning methodology, she hoped that they would look to the learning platform for instruction design inspiration, stating,”This [MobileMind] is how we hope our teachers will design learning. It has helped me rethink the way I design professional learning.”
“In MobileMind, I can accomplish something in minutes. I know something that I didn’t know before, and I can DO something that I couldn't do before. With every lesson I am asked to do, which really helps solidify that learning - that’s a hard thing to replicate!”
JESSICA MAYS
SURPRISING USES & GOALS
Arlington’s next goal is to have at least one Google Certified Educator on all of their 78 campuses and a Google Certified Trainer on a third of the campuses by May 2023. MobileMind will be the critical tool to help achieve this goal, as Arlington educators will complete related learning paths in MobileMind to prepare for these certifications.
As learners submit activity-based Google challenges, MobileMind’s team of educators provide encouragement and individualized feedback, and learners earn badges and certificates as they progress. Arlington leaders are also able to track progress on these goals through leaderboards and reporting features within MobileMind. “Anytime I want to know who I should reach out to on a specific topic, I go to my leaderboards and identify someone to connect with or direct a colleague to,” Jessica added.
“The design of MobileMind is genius!”
JESSICA MAYS
When asked if any use cases surprised Jessica when it came to the professional learning hub, she explained that she did not expect the visibility it enabled her to have, “We get to see the diversity of our learners. The reach has extended upon what I originally anticipated.” The district has utilized MobileMind for more than just teacher PD. “Transportation, administrative assistants, and even engineers have joined in on the learning,” Jessica stated.
“Through reports, it helps us easily identify our high flyers, and in a district this size, that has been a challenge,” she continued. Since Arlington won the Raise Your Hand Texas Foundation Initiative's Raising Blended Learners grant, technology learning opportunities have become more vital. “Because of this, we have teachers that are completely transforming their classrooms. With MobileMind, we are able to make sure that everyone is getting the footing they need, and advanced learning can continue on with their learning.”
Since Arlington began using MobileMind in the summer of 2020, the district has seen tangible results. MobileMind has helped employees advance in their careers by assisting individuals in adding and enhancing their skill sets.
MORALE BOOSTER
When asked if MobileMind had helped the district boost teacher and staff morale, Jessica explained, “MobileMind Rewind is my favorite thing in the world! Anytime I get down, I just play it and it makes me feel so happy!”
MobileMind Rewind is a personalized, fun way for learners to celebrate and share their growth. The engaging video totals up learners' achievements, like favorite and top categories, the number of completed courses, badges earned, and learning paths completed.
She also explained that MobileMind’s leaderboards and digital badging give Arlington opportunities to celebrate their educators’ achievements in a way that they had never had before.
“Since we started using MobileMind, I have not heard a single negative thing, and that’s pretty remarkable.”
JESSICA MAYS
A NEW WAY
Arlington’s plans for MobileMind extend beyond Google. The district plans to leverage MobileMind’s professional learning hub for onboarding new teachers and staff, especially when it comes to their LMS, Canvas.
Arlington will be able to use MobileMind’s patent-pending technology, guided in-app learning, to train new employees on Canvas right from within their own Canvas environment. MobileMind will allow their educators to learn with hands-on challenges to create assets they can use immediately.
Key Arlington ISD Numbers
as of October 16, 2023
2,495
digital badges earned
8,851
micro-courses completed
2,169
hours spent in MobileMind