**9. Implications and concluding thoughts**

The findings implicate the value of VAS in developing cultural relevance and ethics in education during student teaching for teacher candidates in an educational preparation program at a HBCU. Equity, ethics, and cultural relevance are key to any

technology use for teacher candidates in an educational preparation program. However, there are limitations in the current report of findings. First, the responses from the teacher candidate category were limited in number, meaning equivalent to a sample size. As more responses from teacher candidates concerning cultural relevant education are collected in GoReact, more research is needed to prove the need for cultural relevance across the board in educational preparation programs. Second, the findings are localized to a top 20 HBCU in Virginia and cannot necessarily be generalized to other HBCUs or other colleges and universities. In other collegiate settings, the findings may yield varied results. Finally, the findings were influenced by the curriculum design of the top 20 HBCUs' educational preparation programs with multiculturalism and ethics being implied. The findings can only be comparable to other college and universities if their educational preparation program's curriculum aligns or is similar in design. Only then can these findings be considered as a resource for program curriculum necessary for teacher candidates in an educational preparation program.

The findings suggest that students are engaged in software that is interactive, evaluative and provides for self-reflection. Most importantly, teacher candidate engagement with GoReact suggests their usage and good performance rates, which is contrary to Doug Lederman's findings. Doug Lederman [24] argues with some reservations of the Duha T. Altindag study that online technology does not improve student performance nor engagement. Additionally, GoReact provides teacher candidates with resource limitations an opportunity to complete course requirements without regard to finances and transportation difficulties. Thus, accessibilities and finances are challenging issues for marginalized groups with those concerns. GoReact is an inclusive software in which inclusion and culturally relevant pedagogy are fundamental to its design. Thus, the added benefits of GoReact rebuke notions of poor student performance in relation to online learning. GoReact provided students with convenience and access, interactive support from site and university supervisors, and the opportunity to self-reflection.

### **10. Conclusions**

This chapter covers the application of a digital tool used in student teaching with teacher education candidates in an educational preparation program at a top 20 HBCU. The HBCU chose the digital tool of video annotation software (VAS) program that permits its users to provide feedback from cooperating teachers, university supervisors, and other students on a digital platform to student teachers. GoReact (VAS) program used in the educational preparation program allowed for the monitoring of responses as related to cultural relevance and ethics. The findings showed that teacher candidates recognized cultural relevance as related to the National Standards of Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) and the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (InTASC) as well as those provided by the State of Virginia Department of Education (VDOE). As cultural relevance in education is acknowledged by the teacher candidates as well as the educational preparation program, that cultural relevance sponsors encompassing ethical aspirations. The findings also showed that the VAS program of GoReact aligns with how the teacher candidates learn and educational quality of the technology is of value. While the findings were empirical, they also showed noted limitations that included the number of responses, localization, and curriculum variation. The

*Teacher Candidates Using Annotated Technology Foster Cultural Responsiveness and Ethics DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.112310*

findings supported that the educational preparation program saw students engaging in software that is interactive, evaluative, accessible, and convenient as long as cooperating teachers onsite and university supervisors collaborated with students and used the platform for feedback as for opportunity to teacher candidate self-reflection. This use of GoReact in a student teaching experience opens countless opportunities for the future of teacher candidates as they embark on a career in education.
