I am guessing that this can be taken in a couple of different ways.
1. I have a bit of a situation on my hands and I want some advice as to "what to do".
2. What is it that I do at my job.
I am going with the second option for this post.
My Superintendent came into my office the other day. There was nothing odd about this as he often stops by to harass or bother me on a regular basis. This time he had a genuine question for me, and one that caused me to stop and think for a bit. "What is your role in the district?" He wanted to know if I did any evaluating of staff.
I have always been on the fringe of administration, not a full administrator, but not faculty either. I lay in that no-man's land between the two and often act as a liaison between the two groups. Faculty talks to me regularly about issues that they would like to see brought to the administrators and the administrative team includes me in the majority of their meetings. But I am not a "full" administrator. I am not even sure I know what that means.
So I answered his question in the following manner. I see Technology Directors in a very hard spot. They are charged with the duties of making all the "equipment" work, put out the fires, introduce new technologies and assist the faculty in integrating that technology into the curriculum. We are part IT, part Curriculum Coordinator, part Integrationist, and all geek . We need to be able to teach teachers, administrators and students, help support staff, learn almost every and all applications and "new" technologies for our staff. We must have interpersonal skills, along with IT knowledge that far exceeds what the common person has. I liken our profession to the "leatherman" multi tool. It can do a lot, but not everything. A screw driver is more handy to use than the multi-tool. A single purpose knife is also better than the blade on the multi-tool. The leatherman is a handy device, because it combines adequate tools that are most often needed, not the best of every tool needed.
So What do I do?
In simplest terms, I make things work so that my teachers can make kids think who in turn will make the world a better place.
