INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN THE ORGANISATION AND MANAGEMENT IN SECONDARY EDUCATION: A STUDY OF THE DIGITAL PROFILE OF HIGH SCHOOLS’ DIRECTORS IN THE PREFECTURE OF THESSALONIKI

The school management is regarded as one of the most important functions of the educational institutions which ensures the most efficient materialization of its objectives. The task of school management is to continually seek for innovative methods in order to increase the quality of the daily educational work. The Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) are a means of modernizing not only the educational process but the completion of administrative tasks as well. The schools’ managers in Secondary Education increasingly use ICT to facilitate the handling of their administrative obligations, which is consistent with the requirements of a modern "digital" reality. This study aims to analyze the managers’ digital profile and to interpret their attitudes and perceptions regarding the integration and use of ICT in the administrative process of a school unit. It focuses on the managers’ familiarization concerning the implementation of ICT and on the research of their specific training needs. A combination of quantitative and qualitative methodologies was adopted. The methodological data collection instruments that were used were the structured questionnaire and the semi - structured interview respectively. The current study surveyed a random sample of 107 High School principals during the school year of 2014-2015 for the quantitative part and a purposive sample of 9 principals for the qualitative part of the research. The findings of the research reveal that managers are ardent supporters of the use of ICT in the organization and administration of their schools and they present a rich digital profile, while they definitely recognize the importance of ICT for the improvement of the administrative process in schools. Although the respondents of the research are very familiar with the use of ICT, this does not mean that there are no educational training needs which must be taken seriously into consideration by the policy makers of the training programs.