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Contact: Susan Hardy Brooks,
Edmond Educator Named Oklahoma’s Digital Principal of the Year
May 10, 2017
Oklahoma City, OK – Cordell Ehrich, principal of Cimarron Middle School in Edmond, has been named the Digital Principal of the Year by the Oklahoma Association of Secondary School Principals (OASSP).
“Cordell Ehrich has provided visionary leadership, both at his own school site and across the district,” said Edmond School’s Superintendent Bret Towne. “He has very purposely led and inspired his teachers and peers to integrate technology in the pursuit of transformative learning.”
Ehrich led a collaborative effort involving the Parent Teacher Organization, teachers and staff members in training and creating a vision and goals for technology at Cimarron Middle School, including “bring your own device” (BYOD) practices for the staff and students.
Starting with a technology team of teachers, Ehrich led training on iPads and relevant apps available for all content areas. The team then created a list of apps for the staff to use on the iPads when they were checked out for instruction. Prior to the start of school, teachers were trained on using instructional apps through hands-on guided practice.
Implementation of the technology plan at Cimarron Middle School has led to amazing results. “At the end of the year, we saw 35 percent growth for our struggling learners, an eight percent growth for advanced students in reading and a 45 percent increase in eighth-grade math scores on state tests,” Ehrich said. “We have continued to modify and evolve our implementation and use of the iPads in the school and have had increased growth in all of our student populations, resulting in a B+ Report Card grade last year.”
A few examples of the iPad uses include remediation with struggling learners using word recognition, phonetics and fluency applications, music writing and note recognition for music students, computation and calculation applications for math and a wide variety of other applications.
“There is much to admire in Cordell’s leadership style, but as much as anything, I have grown to appreciate his patient, generous spirit of collaboration, especially when it comes to sharing his applications of instructional technology as a digital leader,” said Debbie Bendick, association superintendent for secondary education.
“Effectively using relevant technology for instruction and remediation is necessary for any school focused on improving results for children,” said award sponsor Jan Barrick, CEO of Alpha Plus Educational Systems in Oklahoma City. “Clearly, Mr. Ehrich uses digital tools to make academic growth a priority at Cimarron, and we are inspired by his efforts.”
Ehrich will be honored at the statewide Cooperative Council of School Administrators (CCOSA) Summer Conference June 7-8 at the Embassy Suites Hotel and Conference Center in Norman. He is now eligible to be a finalist for the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) Digital Principal of the Year Award.
The Oklahoma Association of Secondary School Principals is under the umbrella of CCOSA, an incorporated non-profit organization which establishes close and continuous communication and cooperation between educators, taxpayers and legislators to improve the effectiveness of professional school administrators and to communicate the needs of the schools. CCOSA serves over 2800 superintendents, assistant superintendents, principals, special education directors and central office administrators.
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For more information about OASSP, visit CCOSA’s website at www.ccosa.org.