I started my conference session with a quick question for a room full of technology leaders. How many of you have an email address, a social media handle, or some other identity online with your organization or your job title in it? Almost every hand went up. Then I asked them to do something that…
When the network works, nobody notices. No one emails the superintendent to say the Wi-Fi held during state testing. No teacher posts a thank-you because rosters synced overnight. The bell rang, the Chromebooks opened, the doors unlocked on schedule. A normal day. The Silence After the Classroom When I moved from the classroom into the…
What a vendor does on your worst morning tells you what edtech vendor trust is really worth. I was in the car with my family, coming home at the tail end of spring break, when my phone started going off. Texts. Emails. Help desk tickets stacking up on a Sunday afternoon. Nobody could log in,…
When I stepped into my first district technology leadership role, I inherited a lot of things I didn’t choose…a network, a device fleet, contracts, renewal dates, and an empty filing cabinet. And I inherited vendors. Dozens of them, in a small rural district that didn’t have the enrollment to warrant a dedicated account manager at…
I still think like a French teacher. It’s a strange thing to carry into a career in technology leadership, but the translation skill never left. Every job since the classroom has really been the same job: take something dense like a funding cycle, a device lifecycle plan, or a risk assessment, and find the version…
Right now, somewhere in a school district, a welcome letter is being drafted. A transportation update is queued for next Tuesday. A device reminder is sitting in a folder labeled “send week 1.” I know because I lived enough Augusts around that cabinet table to know how much trust gets packed into messages nobody in…
In K–12 leadership, we work with a lot of vendors. Some are responsive. Some are innovative. Some are persistent. But very few are true partners. And in this moment, the difference matters more than ever. District leaders are navigating AI, cybersecurity, interoperability, enrollment shifts, staffing shortages, board politics, and community trust, often all at once….
Every conference sends you home with two suitcases. One holds what you’re taking forward. The other holds what you’re finally willing to set down. After this year’s Future of Educational Technology Conference, I’m reflecting less on what inspired me and more on what earned its way back into my leadership practice. Because inspiration is easy…
