School Board Members

A board’s role is to set a clear course.

If board members believe that the Information Age is real, then they need to convince the community that, to be successful in the future, kids will need to begin learning how to obtain and use information (not technology) at a much more rapid rate.

Once that is accomplished, the board should focus on top-level priorities to get the job done.

Top priorities for school board members include:

• Determining what you want students to learn.
• Outlining what roles you expect teachers to play in the learning process.

Work with other members of your board and administration to create a solid, long-term plan that recognizes that implementing technology is an ongoing process and not a one-time event.

Need to Preplan

Before going forward with a technology plan, your board and superintendent should prepare a clear set of guidelines that address the following issues:

1. Determine who the audience(s) will be for the final plan by asking: Who will read this document?
2. Determine whether a conceptual plan (e.g. goals and board policy), a technical plan (e.g. hardware and software) and/or and implementation plan (e.g. action plans) should be drafted simultaneously or separately and submitted to the board.
3. Specify the number of options to be presented within the final plan. Should the plan specify several different options or one major option for board consideration?
4. Establish a ballpark figure for cost estimates. Should the plan deal with an idea or a realistic view of technology integration?
5. Determine how final decisions are made across the district. Is the technology plan approved at the district or individual site/building level or both simultaneously?
6. Define emerging technologies for the technology planning committee. What technologies are included or excluded in the plan?
7. Determine if a one-, three- or five- year plan is required. How far should the technology planning committee project into the future?
8. Determine which existing committees should be working with or consulted by the technology planning committee.
9. Identify a field-tested technology planning model that has a track record of efficiency and effectiveness." (page 219, from Bailey and Lumley)

Organize and empower a district technology planning team, which should include a board member and teachers and administrators from each of the district’s buildings, subjects, and grade levels.

Develop guiding documents for technology. The first document should be a philosophy statement that identifies ideas, values, and opinions related to the power of technology as a teaching and learning tool, and how technology can support the district’s more general mission statement. The mission statement, which encapsulates the longer philosophy statement, communicates to all publics the potential of technology-based learning. The third document includes a series of goal statements that identify student outcomes. You and your board should use the documents continuously when making decisions concerning emerging technologies and not let them gather dust on the shelf.

Develop the long-range technology plan.

Request periodic reports from the technology planning committee and may also want to support the use of consultants to construct or review the plan.

Approve the plan.

Also, be sure that district staff, parents, students, businesses, and community members are informed about the plan.

Once your board has formally adopted the technology plan, you will need to see that it is update periodically and modified when appropriate.

Keep the plan a regular agenda item, and be sure one board member remains on the technology planning committee.

How does the school board's role relate to that of the superintendent?

The school board’s role is to govern, not administer, the school district. Effective school boards concentrate their time and energy on determining what it is schools should accomplish and developing policies to carry out these goals. They avoid day-to-day administrative questions except to ensure through the superintendent that the administration of the school is effective and efficient, and that it reflects the policies established by the board.

"Policy setting and the day-to-day management are two distinctly separate areas of responsibility within the educational structure. However, one cannot operate effectively without the other. The relationship between the two is similar to that between a pilot and navigator.

"In public schools, the board plays the role of navigator. As captain of the ship, it sets the course (direction or goal to be achieved). The superintendent plays the role of the pilot - steers the ship, operating the controls and assisting in piloting the course that has been set by the board."

Role of the Superintendent of Schools in Technology Change

The superintendent should solidify the vision and financial commitment, ensure a uniform, district-wide approach both to purpose and construction

Role of the Principal in Technology Planning

One of the principal’s key tasks in managing technology-based change is to bring into focus a vision of what the school will be with the technology in place, then move the school from where it is to that state.

• The planning stage. The tasks include determining the nature of the desired change, building a coalition in support of the change, and scouting possible problems.
• The implementation stage. The tasks include imposing order after new processes and procedures are introduced, managing the shakedown process, and encouraging feedback.
• The institutionalization stage. The tasks include maintaining, enhancing, and standardizing the new processes and procedures.

Lead the efforts to determine the instructional, technology plans at the school-site, keep local parties informed, reach consensus about the plan at the school and district levels.

Superintendent and Principal Leadership in Technology Planning

Planner

• Superintendent leads the development of a district-wide technology plan. The careful selection of technology team builds organizational scaffolding for technology integration.
• Principal - develops building-level planning teams and keeps all teachers informed

Visionary

• Superintendent - makes sure that technology vision becomes key part of the district’s culture.
• Principal - sees that vision is part of the school’s culture.
• Both communicate the vision in as many arenas as possible (service clubs, PTAs, the media, etc.)

Supporter

• Superintendents - support principals who take risks, don’t allow central bureaucracy to act as a barrier. Encourage principals to have their own pet technology projects.
• Principals - encourage teachers to have their own pet technology projects and to visit other technology-infused schools.

Facilitator

• Superintendents - organizes district’s human, material, time, physical, and financial resources
• Principals - work with superintendent and other principals on team to facilitate the above
• Both - don’t overlook teachers by trying to do everything at once.

Decision-maker

• Superintendents - shared with principals. All stakeholders are involved.

Role of the District Business Manager in Technology Planning

Budgeting the components, locating and negotiating with suppliers, administering grants and other specified-use funds for technology. Encouraging alignment along vendors: appoint the software vendor as the general contractor for the first year of the project and subcontracting the hardware and cabling.

Role of the District Manager of Information Systems in Technology Planning

Provide technical expertise to recommend equipment that will mesh with the district’s budget and instructional goals. Work with technical vendors. Maintenance and upgrading of system and its parts.

Resources

"A Framework for Managing IT Enabled Change", Robert I. Benjamin and Eliot Levinson, Sloan Management Review, Summer, 1993.

Role of Principal in Technology Integration http://mvhs1.mbhs.edu/~mvhsmail/archive.umd/

Maryland Virtual High School of Science and Mathematics

http://mvhs1.mbhs.edu/mvhs.html

Educating Your Board of Education, Electronic Learning, February 1992.

A Focus on Technology, NSBA Becoming a Better Board Member.

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