Assignment # 2

“We can no longer accept a head in the sand mentality as technology is changing all facets of society” (Sheninger, 2014, p. 1).  Leadership, in general, has changed greatly in the last twenty years, especially with the influx of technology and social media.  The impacts of decisions and choices no longer have any wait time or time to “stew.”  With the use of social media, any grievances can be issued to a wide variety of people immediately (as soon as the walk out of the office).  As a digital leader, you can influence the impact of negative or positive discussions on social media.  How?  By building those relationships through social media first.  Communicating all the positive things that your school is involved in will build a positive credit with the school community and the community at large.  You have built up a reputation and a positive brand on your school and the quality education you are providing.  

As a digital leader, you are also responsible for helping students move into an ever-changing digital age.  To be a positive digital leader, you have to be a champion for all of you staff and what they are doing.  By taking this step you can empower your staff to take on the challenges of creating a classroom full of technology.  Also, by giving teachers the resources, professional development, and technology needed for their classrooms, you as a leader can recruit and maintain a staff that is innovative in regards to technology.  Giving innovative teachers the technology they need will keep them in your school doing positive things for the students.  

As a principal, to immediately impact on your digital leadership, you can utilize social media to brand your school and build up “positive deposits” for the community.  Create and maintain platforms that have proven through data to increase student learning.  If you are a new principal, check the infrastructure of your technology and lobby immediately for updates if needed.  In my experiences, I have seen principals have to forfeit new technologies because they did not have the infrastructure in place.  In private schools, this can be very frustrating to turn a donor away when you do not have the wifi capabilities to include iPads for a classroom.  

I think you need to be cautious of implementing too many things too fast.  Buying a new technology does not mean everyone will use or use it properly (Sheninger, 2014, p. 59).  Professional development in how to effectively use new technology is important to help impact student achievement and make staff feel comfortable with the changes.  Just buying the technology does not equate to successful use.  Another caution is that everyone will be excited about the changes in technology (as much as you are).

Keeping in line with Standard 4, I think you also need to be cautious in implementing widespread change without a direct correlation to student achievement.   Gathering data and making sure that the changes are effective is what you will have to report to stakeholders, especially if you are receiving any grants or donations.  

In my school, we have talked about the use of social media to help increase awareness of our school.  However, these attempts have been approached half-heartedly and on a small number of platforms.  Social media is not going anywhere and I believe it is the time to reexamine the use of social media to further develop our school.  

Sheninger, E. (2014). International Center for Leadership in Education. Retrieved from

http://www.leadered.com/pdf/LeadingintheDigitalAge_11.14.pdf

Sheninger, E. C. (2014). Digital leadership: Changing paradigms for changing times.