3 Reasons to Push for Change in District Edtech

#Data Read time:
Why push for a big change to your student information system (SIS) or enterprise resource system (ERP) when you know everyone is going to hate the entire process? Don’t avoid the next generation of K12 data analysis—tap into a leader’s instinct to grow into something better.
 

Foresight

A Greek proverb states that “A society grows when old men plant trees whose shade they know they’ll never sit in.” When you’re the leader planting, your work may go unnoticed and unappreciated—that’s okay. The foresight to make an unpopular, but healthy, decision separates the great leaders from the forgettable. Sometimes this looks like choosing to invest time to upgrade an outdated SIS or other edtech system in order to automate processes.

 

You’ll wish you started sooner

Picture the task of moving from your current SIS to a new one as the mountain. At base camp, the peak looks daunting, and the status quo hammock looks pretty dang good. However, if climbers can motivate themselves to just get started, as you scale the impossible task of data migration, you’ll reach a turning point. Somewhere in the chaos of moving from old to new, things click into place, and we begin to wonder why we didn’t start the process sooner.

 

Type 2 fun

The fun scale helps sort enrichment activities into three categories:

1. Fun and enjoyable in the moment
2. Fun in retrospect, not enjoyable in the moment
3. Not enjoyable nor fun in the moment nor in retrospect (but makes a good story)

Type 2 fun can be thought of in terms of growth. Growing pains are so-called for a reason: It’s hard to push out of your comfort zone into something bigger, better, and more challenging.

But Type 2 fun also comes with a wonderful psychological reward. It’s the knowledge that we can do hard things, super challenging things, things that take a lot of time and are no fun until they’re done. Type 2 fun in K12 edtech looks like migrating decades of data into a shiny new system. Type 2 fun in K12 edtech looks like improving daily workflows for staff despite needing a few months’ detour to implement. Type 2 fun in K12 edtech is worth the challenge.

 

Your reward

The reward for improving edtech experiences, particularly with high-use systems such as an SIS, is increased automation, less time spent on administrative tasks, and better tools for analyzing a wealth of K12 data.

 

Follow-up resource: A true team effort

Wondering how to make the process of migrating sensitive data a little less worrisome? Here's the mindset shift you seek.


 
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