Umeå universitets logga

One work task that face Nordic school leaders, not least during the precarious time of the pandemic, is digitalization in schools. This task is related both to the work activities of organizational change and improvement traditionally associated with the school leader role (Harris et al., 2003), and to the changing work activities that “the digital age” imposes on schools (Fischer et al., 2020). Political responses to digitalization in schools include developing notions such as “school leaders’ digital competence” and policy instruments that put the notions to work. For example, Nordic countries regularly and increasingly see national strategies and action plans regarding digitalization in schools.

Present paper aims to contribute with a critical perspective regarding one Swedish policy instrument. The contribution may be particularly relevant for educational researchers interested in digitalized school leadership practice. The instrument is theoretically understood as (a) an active device (Lascoumes & Le Gales, 2007) that attempts to steer Swedish school leaders regarding digitalization in schools, and (b) a policy instrument in today’s digital education governance (Williamson, 2017).

The instrument can be described as a school improvement intervention, created by Swedish National Agency of Education (SNAE), and called Leading Digitalization (LD). SNAE describes LD as a step-wise process tool and guide to, for example, superintendents and principals in leading digitalization in Swedish schools. The outcome of LD is that school leaders and teachers together formulate a concrete development plan. However, given what research on public policy instruments has concluded for many years, LD is not simply a guiding tool, but an active socio-technological device. Moreover, a device that contains abstract notions and steering of school leaders thinking and actions.

However, working as a school leader, and relating the concrete work tasks of digitalization in schools to abstract political notions inscribed in policy instruments, leaves room for a process of translation. This translation process includes embodiment, agency and beliefs that impact the enactment (Freeman & Sturdy, 2015) of digitalized school leadership practice.

The unique contribution of the study is a synthesis of (a) analyses of LD documents as policy inscriptions, (b) analyses of Swedish school leaders’ beliefs in an interview179study regarding LD, and analyses of the new inscriptions that the same school leaders have created in their own policy instruments (i.e., their LD development plans).