Ector County ISD Director of Digital Learning Lauren Tavarez said she never in a million years expected to win Professional of the Year.
“Honestly, I was so surprised. It was funny because a group including our digital learning team, our Blended Learning Coordinator, Dr. (Kellie) Wilks, they all set up this whole surprise thing for me. I didn’t know what was going on and so I thought we were just taking team pictures. I never in a million years expected for that to happen and to receive that. So in a year that so many awesome things have happened, I still just think it’s a huge honor to have gotten that and with many other deserving team members on our district team that should have gotten that,” Tavarez said.
Tavarez is finishing her 17th year with Ector County ISD and she’s still celebrating the Super Bowl victory of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes with a No. 15 pinned to her dress.
“I’ve been fortunate,” she said. “I’ve loved different things about every position that I’ve done. I’m ending my third year of doing this and I’ve always said year three of anything is my favorite because you finally feel like you know what you’re doing. … You’ve experienced different things and learned from successes, failures, what works, what doesn’t.”
“But what I really love about this one is the number of people I get to work with in a day, and the impact that our team gets to make on so many students. I’ve always loved being at the campus and learned a lot doing that and I’m able to bring that perspective with me to this position. But it’s really neat when you think in a day you have the potential to impact 34,000 kids in all of our campuses and to be able to support them and help them make a difference with the kids. I really like that part. And we work with all of the different departments in the district. Digital Learning anymore, it’s become so core to what happens in our classrooms that we have to divide and conquer and be strategic about how to really, truly make a difference,” she added.
When she taught, Tavarez said teachers didn’t have as much technology in the classroom.
“I think about how much more efficient I would be if I went back to the classroom and the things that I know now that I would use. But I’ve always been drawn toward digital and if nothing else, the ways that it can make your life easier, make things faster. But I do think I found my love in doing this position. One of the things that brought me this direction was seeing firsthand the effect that students using digital tools for learning in the classroom, the impact that can make and we saw that when I was at the campus. That was one of the big changes that we made was bringing in student devices before the district provided one-to-one laptops. That was one of the things that made the biggest difference. That helped me fall in love with that even more, seeing that change,” she added.
She and her colleagues have to be flexible with the technology because things are always changing — something will update or a product will change how they do something.
“It’s just a daily thing that we just have to be flexible and go with it. But I know how to fix a lot more things now than I ever have,” Tavarez said.
The digital learning team has nine digital learning specialists and team members that work directly with campuses. Specialists are divided up among the campuses.
“We also have a digital learning coordinator. She really helps work with all of the campuses and the specialists and then myself working with the district-level departments and kind of figured out how to streamline all the supports we have from top to bottom. We also are fortunate that Mandy Hinojos, our blended learning coordinator, is also part of the digital learning team,” Tavarez said.
She added that she just loves what she does.
“I don’t do anything halfway … It’s nice to have recognition for the work that you do. And hope every day that you show up, I do anyway, that I’m making some type of difference for somebody. Even if some days you feel like you’ve made a bigger impact that some days you’re not as sure. It’s nice to receive that and it does push you to continue,” Tavarez said.
Chief Technology Officer Kellie Wilks said Tavarez is an amazing leader who has demonstrated exceptional skills in designing and implementing professional learning that effectively engages and motivates the staff she serves.
“Lauren’s passion for education combined with her creativity enables her to design interactive and immersive learning experiences that motivate and excite ECISD instructional staff and administrators. She leads by example and often asks for ways she can improve on what she does to serve the staff and students in ECISD,” Wilks said.
Big projects the Digital Learning team has done in the last three years include implementing their learning management systems like Schoology and Seesaw.
“That’s made a huge difference for our teachers and our students. We’ve really been a big part of all students being given a device. Our IT friends help get the devices to kids, but we’re tasked with how do you help teachers know how to use them effectively. That’s a huge investment made by the district. We’ll continue to do it … We’ve really redesigned what professional learning looks like. We take a much more personalized learning approach for staff in the same way that we help our students have that voice and choice in what they learn and how they learn it. We want to model that … ,” she said noting professional learning is open to all staff.
“… We want them to experience what it’s like to do professional learning when it’s something that you want to learn, something you’re interested in, and it’s in a format that meets your needs. So whether it be our podcast, that’s one reason we started that. We offer virtual sessions; we offer face-to-face sessions. We offer online coursework that teachers can work through it at their own speed …,” Tavarez said.
“We take a much more hands-on approach to supporting teachers. Our team is really big about growing ourselves to be able to better help teachers when they reach out and ask for a digital learning specialist to come and model a lesson with them, or help them design an activity using a digital tool, or just be there,” she added.
“We’re asked to be in classrooms often by teachers because they’re just trying something new. It’s nice to have someone there to celebrate when it goes really well, but also to help troubleshoot quickly when it’s not going as you planned. … I would say the biggest difference in the last three years of me in this position is just the way that digital learning is perceived and the types of supports we provide,” Tavarez said.
Five years ago, this was more of an option. The district did not provide devices and so when COVID hit and they had to figure out what to do, they put a lot of things in place that have become regular.
Tavarez said she would like to add to the digital team.
“I’ll take as many people as they’ll give me. I would love for every campus to have that person,” she added.
Her team has been really effective this year, but Tavarez would like to figure out how to further improve collaboration with other departments and the specialists they have.
“We’ve got in our curriculum instruction a bilingual department and so how do we look to, again divide and conquer, and most effectively support teachers using the strengths of those people,” Tavarez said.
