Technology Leaders Wanted: Technology Leaders Wanted: Acknowledging the Leadership Acknowledging the Leadership Role of a Technology CoordinatorRole of a Technology CoordinatorBy William Sugar and Harold Holloman

Presentation by Doug Strahler

GDIT 708: Technology Management and Leadership

OverviewOverviewTechnology Coordinator’s

ResponsibilitiesFocus on LeadershipInitial Investigation & ResultsImplications of the results

Technology Coordinator’s Technology Coordinator’s ResponsibilitiesResponsibilities“Multi-hat”“…responsible for promoting

technology integration within a school or school district” (p. 66).

Leading teachers in developing an effective K-12 environment

Four Main ResponsibilitiesFour Main Responsibilities

ResponsibilityInstruction

TaskModel best practices; staff

development; effective technology integration

Technology Purchases and recommendations; technical and networking support

Technology plans and policies; assessment

Supervision; vision; collaboration

Technical expertise

Planning and assessment

Leadership

A shared responsibility?A shared responsibility?Within a school district, who is

responsible for providing technology leadership?

Should this leadership responsibility rest on one person or should it be shared?

Is it the school administrator or the technology coordinator?

Which school leader or leaders should provide the oversight?

““Technology staff need Technology staff need more leadership training more leadership training and leaders need more and leaders need more technology training.”technology training.”

Nine Leadership Nine Leadership CharacteristicsCharacteristicsCorporate visionDevelopment of

OthersFacilitatingServant

LeadershipProblem SolvingResource

Management

School Communications

Student Centeredness

Systems Thinking

An initial investigationAn initial investigationFull-time technology coordinator for

a middle school with 37 teachersMixed-method approach

◦Observations & surveysTrained observer ‘shadowed’ for

nine three-hour sessions and recorded each action

Assigned one of the nine characteristics to each recorded action

Observation ResultsObservation ResultsThe technology coordinator did

exhibit characteristics of a leaderProblem-solving & Facilitating

were the top two characteristics observed of this technology coordinator

Survey ResultsSurvey Results

ImplicationsImplicationsCurricular revisions for training

◦School improvement planning Corporate vision, Systems Thinking, &

Resource management

◦School’s needs analysis Student Centeredness & School

Communications

◦In-box tasks Problem-solving and Facilitating

◦Leadership development self-assessment Servant Leadership and Development of

Others

ResourcesResources

Sugar, W., & Holloman, H. (2009). Technology Leaders Wanted: Acknowledging the Leadership Role of a Technology Coordinator. TechTrends, 53(6), 66-75.