The eBOARDsolutions 2012 User Conference was held in late February in Atlanta, Georgia. Almost 200 eBOARD users gathered for a day of learning with and from their colleagues about how to take full advantage of the web-based suite of software tools that they have implemented for managing and aligning the work of their school districts. ...
This past November, I had the opportunity to be part of the Senior Consortium for School Networking Delegation to Montevideo, Uruguay and Buenos Aires, Argentina. CoSN is the premier professional association for school district technology leaders. CoSN’s mission is to empower educational leaders to leverage technology to realize engaging learning environments. I currently serve on ...
In May 2011, tornadoes ripped through Joplin, Missouri. A community was destroyed. The hub of that community is the local public school system. The administrative building and many of their schools were leveled. Seven lives were lost within the Joplin school family. But, nothing stops the people of Joplin. Superintendent C.J. Huff announced within days ...
In a world where many are nearing retirement, public education faces changes in leadership across our country. How does a school system prepare and transition with new leaders? Grow your own! Many local school systems have implemented leadership academies. These one- or two-year programs are structured for teacher leaders to work towards becoming administrators. In ...
Is your school board’s work in the weeds or are you looking from a global perspective? It’s so easy to get off track. For boards of education, it is imperative that the board simply follow the system-wide strategic plan with that plan driving the monthly meetings of the board. So why do boards end up ...
Local school boards meet all around this country in governing our nation’s public schools. Who makes the agenda? In my home state of Georgia, the superintendent and board chair have the responsibility of creating the monthly agenda; each member of the board can additionally request that an item be placed on the agenda. What’s put ...
Art, music, P.E., drama…do we need performing arts and physical education in our schools? Absolutely. There are some students who only come to school because they look forward to their art class. The same is true within the other disciplines. So, then why are these the first things to go when budgets are cut? What ...
Is your head in the clouds? It should be. If you are a school administrator or a board member, you may have never heard or thought about “cloud” technology. I mentioned the word the other day in an e-mail and was surprised to hear back that it meant nothing to the recipients. I would respond ...
Planning for accreditation can be an incredibly busy time for any district. Our plates are all full, as the tired saying reminds us, but we needed to collaborate on this extremely important sign and seal of our district work. And as with all things in a school district, working with adults is an excellent opportunity ...
If you’re like me, you’ve attended your fair share of meetings (staff meetings, board meetings, cabinet meetings…you name it.) Most of these meetings have had an agenda but many agendas were just SKELETONS, or basic outlines of the topics that will be presented, discussed or acted upon. So as we’ve had access to technology tools, ...
Over the past two years, I have had the privilege and good fortune to be a part of what I believe to be one of the greatest movements in Georgia history to transform public education. In 2009, the Georgia School Boards Association and the Georgia School Superintendents Association embarked on a journey to bring together ...
Now that doing more with less is the new norm, how do you market and promote your school district and successful programs? Maybe it’s time for a brainstorming session with your school public relations professional. Don’t know where to start? I’ll kick the conversation off with these five freebies: Create desktop wallpaper and screensavers for ...
Over the last two decades I’ve worked with school systems (both administrators and teachers) helping them to more effectively use technology. In most of these cases, this has been in the service of a technology company such as Apple, Promethean or eBOARDsolutions. According to this Edupotia article “Shaping Tech for the Classroom” by Mark Prensky ...
Successful school districts take accountability seriously and strive to cultivate a culture that values continuous improvement. School boards can model their commitment to these ideas by engaging in regular self-evaluation, in addition to completing timely evaluations of their superintendent. With the focus on technology and data collection it is easy to lose sight of the ...
With elections across the country at the end of 2010, there has been a good bit of turnover with locally elected officials. Simply put, 2010 was not the year for incumbents. In the world of public service, there are many new school board members beginning terms this month. How is a change in a school ...
Are you planning for your school system long-term? Strategic plans are a must in today’s education world. We have to decide what we believe, who we are, where we’re going, and how we’ll get there. Who do you bring to the table for this planning? ALL stakeholders. Board members, parents, teachers, principals, central office staff, ...
Riding the Bus Together: Nurturing Collaboration of Technology Services and Curriculum and Instruction More than ever, a school district’s technology services and teaching and learning leadership need to work and plan collaboratively to ensure the instructional goals of a school system are realized and measured. Technology leadership can serve a strategic role in advocating for ...
Georgia’s local school systems can ask their communities to pass a Special Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) for additional revenue. Those pennies can really add up. That’s how we paid for our high school’s auditorium. To the school board, how do you get your community to support this initiative? First, if you’ve passed a SPLOST ...
Education leaders want their districts and schools to be high performing. To do that, leaders recognize that they must create Performance Cultures. But what exactly is does this mean and what do leaders do to create a Performance Culture? Culture, simply defined, means “the way we do things around here.” At Georgia Leadership Institute for ...
A solution to transform public education Last week I had the privilege of being one of three speakers in the TEDx session at the NSBA Technology and Learning Conference in Phoenix, Arizona. The first speaker, Julie Evans, CEO of Project Tomorrow addressed the importance of listening to students about how they want to learn in ...