Unlearning is a leadership competency, not a slogan
Mike and coauthor Superintendent Nick Polyak have written extensively about the unlearning leader: our brains are great at acquiring new information, less great at letting go of what no longer serves us. Waiting 15–20 years for old practices to fade (the average time it took medicine to adopt H. pylori as the ulcer cause) would rob a generation of students. We don’t have that luxury.
Try this: Host a 45-minute Unlearn/Keep/Prototype session.
- Unlearn: Name one practice you do “because we’ve always done it.” Sunset it.
- Keep: Identify a high-trust ritual (e.g., weekly wins, learning walks). Protect it.
- Prototype: Pick one instructional or operational workflow to redesign with AI (e.g., lesson planning, substitute plans, transportation routes).
Move beyond “ban or boost” to balance with technology
Keith’s take: we’ve drifted into simplistic narratives such as “all screens are bad” vs. “tech solves everything.” Banning personal cell phones during instruction may be sensible, but “technology/screens” is broader: accessibility tools, adaptive platforms, data systems, teacher productivity aids, and now AI copilots. The question is not if we use tech, but how, when, and why—anchored to instructional theory and student needs.
Leader move: Publish a one-page Balanced Use Brief for staff and families.
- Clarify the difference between personal devices and instructional technology.
- Describe the learning theory behind your choices (e.g., UDL, personalization).
- List non-negotiables (e.g., movement, arts, hands-on work, and outdoor time).
Pro Tip: Check out CoSN’s new Screens in Balance report and useful tools on how to communicate with your parents/community.
Treat technology as a strategic asset. Put it in the cabinet.
CoSN’s counsel is clear: districts benefit when a cabinet-level leader bridges instructional and operational technology the way a CFO bridges accounting and strategy. That role is less “fix the Wi-Fi” and more “co-design learning + operations with digital tools,” from classroom models to routing, procurement, data privacy, and cybersecurity.
Leader move: Define the CTO/CIO remit with three domains:
- Teaching & Learning (curriculum, PD, classroom pilots)
- Data & Systems (privacy, interoperability, analytics)
- Operations & Innovation (transportation, food service, facilities, AI use cases)
Schedule bi-weekly alignment with academics and business services.
Protip: Here are Questions to Ask when hiring a Chief Technology Officer.
Ethics, disclosure, and critical use are the new basics
AI is a “calculator for the humanities,” Mike noted powerful, normal, and here. Ethics is not a mystery: disclose what you used, when you used it, and how you verified it. Students need instruction in recognizing bias, evaluating sources, and using appropriate cases, not fear or silence.
Leader move: Update three policies with plain-language addenda:
- Academic Integrity: When AI is permitted/encouraged vs. prohibited; expectations for disclosure and citation.
- Acceptable Use: Privacy, data sharing, and staff responsibilities when using AI systems.
- Assessment Guidelines: Examples of AI-supported process (brainstorming, feedback, rubrics) vs. AI-substituted product (final essays without attribution).
Add a short companion lesson for students and a parent FAQ.
Pro Tip: Check out TeachAI’s AI Guidance for School Leaders.
Build conditions, not just mandates
Change sticks when people feel safe to try, learn, and iterate. Education Elements calls this “real change, made local.” Mike’s framing: create conditions including trust, role clarity, quick feedback loops so adults who support adults who support kids can do their best work.
Leader move: Launch 60-day “micro-pilots” with teacher choice.
- Pick two problems of practice (e.g., formative feedback; multilingual family comms).
- Offer 2–3 vetted tools/workflows.
- Provide a 30-minute kickoff, a midpoint huddle, and a share-out of what to scale or stop.
Policy is catching up. Help it along.
CoSN’s latest pulse checks show districts updating acceptable use and academic integrity policies; fewer are writing standalone “AI policies.” Many are landing on a situational stance: it depends on the use case. That nuance is healthy and needs communication.
Leader move: Create a “policy in practice” one-pager with classroom scenarios:
- Permitted with disclosure: lesson plan drafts, exemplar rubrics, and reading-level rewrites.
- Teacher-directed: brainstorming and outlines for essays with sources cited.
- Not permitted: submitting AI-generated final work as original without attribution.
Pro Tip: Check out CoSN’s State of Ed Tech Leadership Survey and Teach AI’s Sample Guidance
Equity is design, not a footnote
Both leaders pressed this point. Access (devices, connectivity) still matters. But equity in AI goes deeper. Foundation models reflect the data they’re trained on; many communities, languages, and histories are underrepresented. That’s not a reason to retreat; it’s a call to teach critical reading of outputs, diversify tools (including community-built models), and co-design with families and students furthest from opportunity.
Leader move: Add an Equity Check to every AI/edtech decision:
- Who benefits? Who could be excluded?
- How will multilingual families engage?
- Which student voices have shaped this pilot?
- What’s our fallback if the tool fails or is biased?
Funding headwinds? Get scrappy, focused, and communal
With federal uncertainty, some districts will face hard choices. Mike’s advice: lean into foundations, business/civic partners, and low- or no-cost tools; revive EdCamp-style professional learning as a necessity, not a novelty. The goal isn’t “more tech.” It’s “better outcomes with the resources we have.”
Leader move: Run a 90-day “Time Back” sprint.
- Challenge every team to save 10–20% of time on one recurring task (e.g., newsletter creation, lesson plan templates, IEP meeting prep).
- Share before/after workflows, templates, and tool settings district-wide.
- Reinvest saved time into feedback, family contact, or student conferences.
Pro Tip: Check out CoSN’s AI Maturity Framework and self-assess where you are and where you want to go with AI.
Go practical: AI for the unglamorous, high-impact problems
The fastest wins aren’t sci-fi. They're schedules, routes, supervision rosters, procurement language, and consistent comms. As Keith put it, scenario-running that once took weeks can now be generated in minutes, then refined by humans.
Leader move: Pick one operational use case to automate with human oversight:
- Master schedule options aligned to staffing constraints
- Bus routing scenarios that reduce deadhead time
- Drafting vendor RFPs with privacy and interoperability clauses
- Translation and tone-check for family messages
- Publish the time saved and how you used it for students.
Pro Tip: Explore CoSN’s member survey on AI & Operations for ideas on how AI can be used to modernize operations.
Culture beats novelty: celebrate small wins, keep learning
Change fatigue is real. So are micro-celebrations. We need to share stories of a teacher who shaved 30 minutes off grading then used that time for student feedback. So does admitting what didn’t work. The through-line from both leaders: humility, iteration, humanity.
Leader move: End every month with a 20-minute Learning Stand-Up:
Three prompts: What did we try? What did we learn? What’s next?
Post highlights publicly. Recognize a teacher, a student, and a support staff member who modeled smart, ethical, and better use of tools.
The through-line
- Unlearning frees capacity for what students need now.
- Balance beats binary thinking—especially when it comes to AI.
- Ethics and equity are practices we build, not boxes we check.
- Conditions and culture make change stick.
- Practical wins build momentum and trust.
Education will always be human work. The point of technology, like that old slide rule on Mort’s desk, or the AI copilot in your browser, is not to replace us, but to help us listen better, personalize more, and spend more time on what only humans can do: relationships, judgment, empathy, care.
We’re optimistic. And we’re unfinished.
Pro Tip: Use the annual Driving K-12 Innovation report to spark a conversation on the Hurdles, Accelerators, and Tech Enablers that make sense in your school/district.
Try This Tomorrow
- Publish a Balanced Use Brief for staff and families (one page).
- Run a 60-day micro-pilot with teacher choice and mid-course huddles.
- Update integrity & AUP addenda with disclosure norms and scenarios.
- Kick off a “Time Back” sprint focused on saving 10–20% on one task.
- Host an Unlearn/Keep/Prototype session—then celebrate a small win.
