Case Study: Verizon Innovative Learning Schools (VILS) Program

Broward County Public Schools, 2021 - 2026

The Challenge

The Verizon Innovative Learning Schools (VILS) program is a national grant initiative designed to bring technology access, devices, and digital learning support to schools. In Broward County Public Schools, 21 schools total participated in the 1:1  program, each receiving iPads and a dedicated instructional coach to support technology integration across their campus. Supporting each of the VILS schools, their coach, and teachers required a consistent, high quality professional learning infrastructure, strong vendor relationships, and careful program management to follow grant requirements and deliver meaningful outcomes for educators and students.

The Approach: From Builder to Program Leader

My involvement with the VILS program spanned five years and two distinct district roles, giving me a uniquely deep understanding of the program from the ground up.

As an Instructional Technology Facilitator, I was among the first cohort of Apple Learning Coaches from Apple Education. Working alongside a colleague, I co-designed and built the foundational professional learning course for VILS coaches and educators from scratch, creating a training framework that would be offered from the department for years to come. I personally developed six of the original nine teacher facing modules, which covered the full suite of Apple native applications including Keynote, Pages, Numbers, GarageBand, iMovie, Clips, Apple Classroom, Office 365 on iPad, and how to navigate the district's specific device environment.

As Project Manager, I took on ownership of the program, managing the VILS contract and participating in regular meetings with Digital Promise, as well as leading meetings with Broward County Public Schools school administration and VILS coaches to ensure alignment with grant requirements, reporting deadlines, and program expectations. Those meetings focused on data, reporting, and collaborating on the evolving needs of schools and the district.

I also organized two on-site observation visits per year for Digital Promise representatives, coordinating with each of the schools to identify participating teachers and administrators, scheduling vendor visits, and accompanying the team to every campus to ensure the visits ran smoothly and schools felt supported throughout the process.

Building and Evolving the Apple Learning Teacher Professional Learning Experience

Our Apple Learning Teacher professional learning course was originally designed as a live, synchronous, in person experience. When the district shifted toward asynchronous learning, I restructured the course for independent online delivery. While the foundational content was intact, the assignments, pacing, and learner experience required significant reworking to function effectively without a live facilitator. The restructured course launched in the summer of 2025 and drew more than 400 teacher enrollments. With two ITFs supporting facilitation during the first two weeks, I facilitated the remainder of the course myself and personally graded all 400 participants' assignments throughout the summer. It was an enormous undertaking that reflected both the demand for the content and the commitment required to deliver it at that scale.

When teachers in trainings shared that they needed resources to help them show their students what to do with their iPads, I responded by creating two student facing modules: a Student Orientation Module and a Student Uploads To and From OneDrive Module. These were published to the VILS Commons, a shared Canvas space where coaches across all VILS schools could access and download the modules for use with their students. Many coaches implemented this content directly with their staff and students, expanding the reach of the work beyond the original audience.

During one of our live training sessions, I identified that coaches were experiencing difficulty with the Canvas course enrollment process. I introduced a QR code solution that allowed teachers to self enroll directly from their iPads, eliminating the friction and significantly improving the onboarding experience for participants.

The Outcome

Over five years, the VILS program maintained a consistent professional learning infrastructure, strong vendor and school relationships, and a growing library of teacher and student facing resources. As schools completed the program, they transitioned to alumni status.

The restructured asynchronous course drew more than 400 teacher enrollments in its first summer, reflecting strong educator demand and confidence in the content. Coaches consistently reported that the training increased their teachers' comfort and confidence using iPads as their primary instructional device and felt the professional learning was both practical and immediately applicable.

The program is currently in its final semester with four remaining schools, a natural conclusion to a long-range initiative that strengthened digital learning capacity across some of the school sites in Broward County Public Schools.