ABSTRACT
Globally, an estimated $13 billion is spent annually on educational technology in PK-12 schools, including hardware, software, Internet connectivity, and infrastructure, and is expected to reach $19 billion by 2018 (Future Source, 2014). The public discussion of how that money should be spent often centers on the devices students use in school, such as bring-your-own-device initiatives or laptop and tablet initiatives that lower student-to-device ratios to 1:1 or even 1:2. However, the focus on the increasing level of resources dedicated to technology overlooks that there is a new technology revolution afoot. This includes traditional textbook companies moving into digital curriculum creation and software application development (Davis, 2013) and students becoming increasingly powerful, informed consumers who expect real-time, meaningful uses of technology in their schooling, as in every other aspect of their lives. Without effective school leadership, therefore, not only will our teachers and students miss out on powerful and meaningful technology-suffused learning experiences, but other people and corporations also are ready to fill the void and to make public PK-12 schooling, as McLeod (2015) notes, “dangerously irrelevant.”
