The Role of Principals in Learning Schools to Support Teachers’ Use of Digital Technologies

Abstract

The aim of the analysis is to present the role of school principals in supporting teachers’ skillful use of information and communication technologies in education. The article presents the results of analysis of a fragment of data from a study carried out in 2017 as part of the research project devoted to the specificity of functioning of schools awarded the certificate ‘Leader of a Learning Organization’. The multiple case study method (Yin, Studium przypadku w badaniach naukowych. Projektowanie i metody, Krakow: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellonskiego, 2015) was used in the research. The study involved five schools of different types (one elementary school, one general high school, and three high school complexes with different professional profiles) located in a provincial capital city in central Poland. Data from qualitative, semi-structured, in-depth interviews with school principals (four females and one male) was used in the analysis. The structure of the article includes the characterization of the role of school principal in the concept of a learning school, the way of collecting and analyzing the empirical data, and the presentation of findings. As a result of qualitative analysis of the collected data, examples of teacher-supporting behaviors were identified and attributed to one of the two groups: either the group concerning care for infrastructure and ensuring teachers easy access to modern equipment, or the group concerning the promotion of culture of cooperation which facilitates the development of ICT skills.