School Principals and Technology in Victoria Principals, Technology and Change Go to previous version Go to original version with critical reviews Introduction School systems worldwide face increasing pressure to use technology to enhance teaching, learning, and administration. The curriculum, from the preparatory year to year 10, has been restructured according to a centrally-prescribed curriculum and set of standards. Student assessment methods have been modified to include non-compulsory statewide testing programs at years 3 and 5, student opinion surveys, and increasing emphasis on portfolio assessment of student performance in the elementary years. School administrations have been given increased authority and responsibility, including managing most human and physical resources and responding to a school accountability framework.
Schools now control their own funding.
The school system developed new career pathways for principals and teachers, new individual appraisal systems, and new teacher certification processes. The school system also developed new programs for student transitions between preschool and the preparatory year, among years 5 to 8, and between graduation and work. In short, principals are expected to be the key leaders of increasingly self-managing schools. It is clearly a more complex world that principals now work in. Information and communication technology is an important feature of this new world.