Bradford Saron

Cashton Public Schools

Cashton, Wisconsin

In the rural setting of Cashton, Wis., Saron has helped make his school system a leader in innovative and research-based practice.

Through careful integration of local, state, and federal programs to minimize waste, along with conservative budgeting and a voracious pursuit of public and private grants, Cashton has been able to invest in many technology tools. With the support of a dedicated school board and community, Saron has equipped each classroom in the district with an interactive whiteboard, full wireless access in all district buildings, numerous mobile laptops, iTouch devices and iPad 2 labs, and even SMART Tables in each of the four-year-old kindergarten classrooms.

Through Google Apps for Education, all staff members have the resources to create websites, shared documents, interactive forms, eMail, and cloud-based data storage—and so do students. Saron also commits the necessary resources to maintain and update available hardware and software, and he provides the professional development required to fully leverage technology’s potential. Besides providing resources for off-site training, he ensured that district staff would have continuous on-site support in adopting technology tools by creating a full-time technology integration coach.

Using shared public Google calendars to schedule all events, facilities, and resources has proven invaluable for Cashton. From any internet-capable device, employees can access information that once required a phone call or a trip to the district or building office. The schedule of school or district events, the availability of school buses or vans, the location of the mobile computer or iPad labs, the name of a scheduled substitute teacher, and much more are all available with just one of the Google tools.