Chair: Hopkins, Scott
ISBN    0-493-54185-3
DAI-A 63/01, p. 154, Jul 2002

 The purpose of this study was to investigate the presence of Ely's conditions in integrating technology in a Wireless Laptop Program at a Southern United States school. This study specifically sought to identify conditions that would most impact the adoption and integration of laptop technology. The framework used for this study was Ely's (1990, 1999) list of conditions that facilitate implementation of an innovation. The conditions include: (a) Dissatisfaction with the status quo, (b) existence of knowledge and skills, (c) availability of resources, (d) availability of time, (e) rewards or incentives exist, (f) participation, (g) commitment, and (h) leadership. The primary medium for data collection was a questionnaire designed to assess teachers' instructional laptop use and agreement with Ely's eight conditions. Within instructional laptop use, time of adoption and degree of integration were established. The prevalence of Ely's conditions was computed from responses to forty statements, five for each condition, coded along a six point Likert-type scale. Follow-up interviews were also conducted. Participants included twenty-nine teachers in the Upper School (grades 9–12). Analysis methods included graphically analyzing boxplots of both the stages of adoption and degree of integration with the prevalence of Ely's conditions. Additional boxplots of the stages of adoption and teaching experience were also analyzed. A correlational analysis was also conducted to determine if there were any correlations between the participant's teaching experience and the prevalence of each of Ely's conditions. Results indicated more prevalence of the following Ely conditions among early adopters than late adopters: status quo, knowledge and skills, participation evident, commitment, and leadership. Those with a higher degree of technology integration reported having a stronger prevalence of all of Ely's conditions except resources available than those with a lower degree of technology integration. This study also found that teachers in this school with more teaching experience were more likely to be early adopters than late adopters, and the largest correlation between teaching experience and Ely's conditions was with the condition related to knowledge and skills.