Detailed in a recent news release, seven districts honored by the 2025 Technology Innovation Awards demonstrated successful digital transformation at a range of different sizes and governance structures, from small K-8 systems to the largest public school district in the U.S. The Leadership in Education and Digital Innovation (LEAD) Awards, a new addition to the awards program this year, celebrated four administrators driving that transformation.
Up to 10,000 students
- Clark County Public Schools (KY)
- Columbia Union School District (CA)
- New Hyde Park-Garden City Park Union Free School District (NY)
- Agua Fria Union High School District (AZ)
- Township High School District 211 (IL)
- Clark County School District (NV)
- New York City Department of Education (NY)
SMALL AND RURAL DISTRICTS
Columbia Union School District, serving less than 500 K-8 students in rural California, earned a Technology Innovation Award for its instructional technology integrations and sustainable, personalized professional learning models.
Superintendent Nicolas Wade said he oversees technology strategy directly, with implementation responsibilities embedded into instructional leadership and intervention roles rather than a standalone technology office. For example, the district’s reading interventionist leads implementation of AI-supported literacy tools, and its math interventionist oversees AI-supported math tutoring platforms.
“If you have a W-2, you’re getting the training,” he said.
Tech-trained teachers have been able to expand learning opportunities for students through the district’s Opportunity Hub. The Opportunity Hub blends virtual learning, and its ability to connect students to experts anywhere, with in-person instruction in a co-teaching model. The model supports language, coding and advanced courses, leading the district to offer an honors continuum that hasn’t been available in a decade, Wade said.
“What’s really nice is, once you get past getting used to whatever the new login procedure is like, all the tools are relatively the same,” he said.
At New Hyde Park-Garden City Park Union Free School District, which serves about 1,400 students in grades K-6, a 25-member technology advisory committee (TAC) of teachers, administrators and board representatives is responsible for setting multiyear priorities for instructional technology, professional development and digital citizenship.
According to Superintendent Jennifer Morrison-Raptis, the committee structure ensures decisions reflect classroom and building-level needs.
“I can’t be everywhere,” she said. “We need to be in the building, on the ground, with the teachers and the students, because we need their input to make sure that we’re moving in the right direction.”
For example, the TAC evaluated AI-driven math education tool MagmaMath before implementation. The tool allows students to work through math problems by hand on tablets and gives teachers a simultaneous view of student work as well as analytics on class performance. Today, teachers use MagmaMath to identify student mistakes in real time, better targeting which students or topics need attention.
Jennifer Scamell, the district’s director of technology and innovation, said the follow-up after selecting a tool is just as important and collaborative.
“We don’t just get a new program,” she said. “We get the new program, we provide professional development, and then we have that instructional specialist who can go in and work with the students and the staff to show them how best to use the technology with the students.”
MIDSIZE DISTRICTS
Township High School District 211 in suburban Illinois serves 12,000 high school students across multiple campuses. According to Josh Schumacher, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, the district’s model for technology governance is a layered one that relies on leadership to set direction and school-level leaders to carry out implementation.
Schumacher said he works with technology department chairs to design AI strategy, including defining the skills and competencies the district expects students and staff to develop. School leaders like principals lead AI professional development for their buildings based on these guidelines.
“We said from the start, it’s going to be about all staff, and not just faculty or teachers,” he said. “So as we approached it, we set up a model where we said we’re going to train and grow and engage these groups in all tiers of our organization.”
In addition to school site training, in the last two years, the district has hosted five full-day AI summits that invited 60 to 70 district members across roles and campuses to participate in a conference-style experience.
The district uses a five-level continuum of AI understanding to measure staff understanding and asks participants to self-assess before and after professional development. According to Schumacher, the summits typically move staff up one level.
For example, a participant might move from “AI informed,” having sought out information and resources to learn more about AI, to “AI integrated,” where they’re incorporating AI into instructional practices. The district reported that its population considered “AI aware,” the lowest level on the continuum indicating awareness of the technology but limited understanding of its educational impact, dropped from 43 percent to 11 percent in one year.
LARGE DISTRICTS
For the New York City Department of Education (NYCDOE), serving nearly a million students across 1,600 schools, strong governance is a necessity of scale. Deputy CIO Intekhab Shakil said the district’s technology strategy starts with direct input from schools and is structured around multiyear capital projects.
NYCDOE’s Division of Instructional and Information Technology includes a group of nine deputy CIOs with different focuses, from system development to infrastructure and operations.
“All of them put forward their needs based on what they hear from different constituents, schools, central staff, and then we decide on what is the best way to use funds so that we can get the maximum utilization of our investment,” Shakil said.
CDE and NSBA recognized New York City schools for their work expanding infrastructure redundancy in connectivity and district systems. The district built an off-site disaster recovery data center three years ago and is in the process of rebuilding its primary data center to support more than 600 systems, Shakil said.
“If our student information system goes down in one data center, we are able to revive it on the other secondary data center, and the schools and central staff can work seamlessly with minimal or no impact at all,” he said. “So, that is the business outcome of these initiatives.”
Shakil said the district’s plans for the future include room for flexibility as needed. For example, the district started work on an AI teaching assistant with Microsoft, aimed at supporting use of ChatGPT in a responsible way. However, the district paused development on the tool with pilot feedback and as technology evolved to offer more safeguards out of the box. Now, the district is more focused on vendor agreements and internal safeguards, and developing an AI advisory council with staff and industry input.
Shakil said New York City schools rely on usage data in addition to collaborative feedback to ensure initiatives are effective and have a broad reach. For example, the district used data to identify which students would benefit most from 350,000 LTE-enabled Chromebooks.
The district’s Safer Access program, which focuses on physical security and emergency response across school systems, was rolled out more widely, with camera systems and door-locking mechanisms across 1,383 schools.
RECOGNIZING LEADERSHIP
In addition to recognizing districtwide initiatives, CDE and NSBA introduced a new set of honors this year recognizing individual leadership with the inaugural LEAD Awards. These awards recognize superintendents and senior district leaders whose strategic vision and execution helped build sustained, systemwide technology innovation.
“The inaugural LEAD Award underscores the critical role of leadership and governance in ensuring technology serves learning, not the other way around,” Verjeana McCotter-Jacobs, executive director of the National School Boards Association, said in a public statement. “These recipients demonstrate how strong school board leadership and superintendent collaboration create systems that are resilient, inclusive, and prepared for the future.”
Four winners from small, midsize and large districts include:
- Marnie Hazelton, superintendent of Englewood Public School District (NJ)
- Matthew Joseph, assistant superintendent of technology and learning at New Bedford Public Schools (MA)
- Josh Schumacher, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction at Township High School District 211 (IL)
- Marc Smith, superintendent of Fort Bend Independent School District (TX)
Englewood Public School District Superintendent Marnie Hazelton was recognized for her leadership in aligning technology decisions with districtwide instructional priorities in a small district. Under her leadership, schools adopted a formal AI policy and updated professional development to cultivate creativity and responsible use.
According to the award submission, Hazelton spearheaded partnerships with local industry leaders and big names like Apple to generate resources and mentorship — part of a larger push to expand students’ 1:1 device access and modernize classrooms.
Matthew Joseph, assistant superintendent of technology and learning at New Bedford Public Schools, improved digital learning systems and professional development in his midsize district. He led the adoption of ClassLink as a single sign-on platform, simplifying access and providing analytics on digital investments, according to the submission.
Joseph also helped create roles to bridge the gap between instructors and technology tools. One new position, the “edtech integration manager,” involves coaching teachers on how to use Google Workspace and other instructional tools.
Josh Schumacher, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction at Township High School District 211, was recognized for his use of data and digital tools. The district’s submission said Schumacher leads by example, showing his colleagues how he uses ChatGPT to analyze data sets, draft strategic plans and see multiple perspectives. Schumacher designed custom GPTs to support leadership and administrative work.
“I am up in front in a lot of our professional learning,” he said. “I will tell you I’m a daily ChatGPT user. I use it on a daily basis as a thought partner.”
NSBA and CDE recognized Fort Bend Independent School District Superintendent Marc Smith for his policy-first approach to technology leadership in a large district. Under his leadership, Fort Bend schools recently launched the Datahub project, consolidating data from district systems for operations and accountability into one centralized platform. According to the submission, the platform is already helping save time on reporting and resource planning.
Smith also led the development of formal AI governance, including an AI handbook and board-aligned policies addressing data protection, acceptable use and human oversight.
“Real transformation doesn’t come from what you purchase,” Smith wrote in an email to the Center for Digital Education. “It comes from how thoughtfully you plan and lead.”
