Empowering the 21st Century Superintendent
In March, 2008, the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) launched a new initiative dedicated to helping superintendents, aspiring superintendents and district leadership teams build their knowledge, skills and confidence as effective technology leaders. Empowering the 21st Century Superintendent highlights five themes and action steps for technology leadership, which emerged from CoSN's extensive conversations with superintendents and from topics that are gaining national – and international – interest among educators, parents, policymakers and the business community.
The Pearson Foundation is proud to have documented many of these conversations in a supporting video, which like the effort itself highlights five key themes for technology leadership. These themes build on the results of CoSN’s 2004 nationwide survey of 455 technology decision makers—findings subsequently published in CoSN’s report Digital Leadership Divide.
Empowering the 21st Century Superintendent underscores the great degree to which visionary technology leadership – and the community support fostered by district leaders – makes the difference in districts able to bolster their technology plans, budgets and implementation. The report encourages district leaders to
- Strengthen District Leadership and Communications, specifically by modeling innovative uses of technology and by empowering educators, parents, students and the community with technology solutions
- Raise the Bar with 21st Century Skills, by understanding the kind of education that students need today to be prepared for workplace demands, citizenship challenges, and personal success in an internationally competitive environment.
- Transform Pedagogy with Compelling Learning Environments, by understanding that reaching all students today requires new methods of teaching and different kinds of learning environments.
- Support Professional Development and Communities of Practice by understanding that all educators, including administrators, need sustained, job-embedded opportunities to improve their knowledge and skills, collaborate with their peers, and build collective wisdom.
- Create Balanced Assessments, by staying on top of emerging issues and trends in education and technology, such as balanced assessments, and create ways to develop expertise in these issues within their districts.
With CoSN, we hope that this report, will help superintendents, aspiring superintendents and district leadership teams build their knowledge, skills and confidence as effective technology leaders.
