Alumni Working Toward Healthy Community

Roseau Tech Initiative Takes Off with Leadership

For Roseau School Superintendent Larry Guggisberg, providing the 21st Century tools teachers of his district needed to teach students the skills necessary for a rapidly changing global environment was both a challenge and an exercise in his leadership skills.

When he decided to move forward with a classroom digital technology initiative, he knew that the project couldn’t be accomplished alone. He enlisted the support of the Blandin Community Leadership Program’s Leadership Toolbox, and the Blandin sponsored Minnesota Rural Educator Leadership Program (MNRELP).

The Leadership Toolbox is a set of leadership skills developed and promoted by the Blandin Leadership Program to assist community leaders in their efforts towards meaningful change.  The MNRELP was a collaboration of the Minnesota Association of School Administrators and the Minnesota Rural Education Association with the financial support of the Blandin Foundation.  The MNRELP provides training for participants to develop the strategies and skills needed to lead a community vision for excellence in schools.

Through those two avenues, Larry hoped to engage others around the tech initiative vision.

“It is crucial to involve those affected by change at the ground floor,” said Larry.  “Those affected by change at the beginning communicate to the next level of support resulting in expanding the knowledge, understanding, and eventual support towards meaningful change.”

The process began when a group of key Roseau K-12 school staff was invited and assembled for the purpose of participating in the MNRELP effort to promote a classroom technology initiative for teachers and to encourage community support.  The technology initiative was necessary not only to develop a 21st Century classroom but also because the existing Roseau School District’s computer technology would be best described as “aging.” The end result of the initiative identified by the group was to equip classrooms with digital technology tools that would improve teacher instruction and thereby increase student achievement.

Cost, however, was a major obstacle to be overcome. Without school board and community support, a tech initiative would fall far short of becoming reality.  To engage the needed social capital to move the project forward, the tech initiative concept was presented to the school board. The board saw that the project could be funded with a portion of a yet-to-be voter-approved November 2007 School District Bond election.

Gaining the critical mass needed to move the initiative forward didn’t stop once school board approval had been won. Before the election, teachers in the district mobilized and became some of the best advocates for the project. They provided information to families about the importance of a technology initiative and its potential positive impact to students.

The results of the initiative speak for themselves. The voters of the Roseau School District overwhelmingly (91%) approved the bond election last November. 

Even after the election was won, efforts on behalf of the tech initiative continued. The MNRELP participants worked together to determine the specific equipment that would be needed and training that would have to take place to make the tech initiative a success.

Through staff collaboration and community support, Roseau School District’s classrooms are scheduled to have laptop computers, video projection devices, and inter-active white boards beginning in the fall of 2008. 

The tech initiative was not only a victory for the students of the school district but for those who helped moved the project from concept to reality.

One MNRELP participant told Larry:  “I really appreciated being a part of this process.  It is an exciting time in education and for our school.  Thanks!

  * Larry would love to hear from you so please share your questions and comments with him below.