ryancw's blog

Leadership in any school district is so necessary than ever before.  It is essential for leaders to understand that education is changing, including how that change is happening and what likely is the result.  The two main elements that impacted me in this chapter were the six qualities needed for a school district to achieve success in the 21st century found on page and the twelve reasons for an administrator to blog on pages.  The six qualities include:  individual excellence, organizational skills, courage, results (goal-oriented), strategic skills, and operating skills.  I believe that each of these qualities is vital for any school district administrators to successful adapt Web 2.0 tools within their district.  Administrators must have knowledge and understanding of technology’s impact in the classroom.  I believe if an administrator possesses these qualities they will be more open to technology and its impact on education.

In addition, the chapter also discussed the twelve reasons for administration to blog.  Those include:  sharing news and events, progress monitoring, status alerts, marketing, public relations, community building, customer relations, branding, creating “customer evangelists”, thought leadership, advocacy, and replacing the school web site.  Blogs are powerful tools that can be used in many different ways throughout the school district.  Some ways they could be utilized include collaboration with teachers, staff, and administrators, parents could give input and ideas for the school district, and community members could access the blog to acquire up to date new about the school.  The real challenge is how do we motivate and encourage the administration to use blogs.