About SLN
The Superintendents Leadership Network was initiated in 1997 with support from the BellSouth Foundation to offer a high-profile response to the need in the Southeast for a focus on leadership development in the region’s public school districts. The uniqueness of this network lay in its focus on district-level leadership; the network was launched with the understanding that strong school-site leadership, while essential for successful schools and high-achieving students, would last only as long as the school district could support, sustain, nurture, and continually develop that leadership. Thanks to support from Cisco, the SLN evolved from a regional presence to a national one. Currently the Network is sustained with membership fees.
Upcoming Institutes
April 23–25, 2025, Charlotte, NC
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Our session will open on Wednesday, April 23. This SLN institute will be held at the Doubletree Charlotte City Center with a field trip to NASCAR, an industry that is continuously reinventing itself. Our opening meeting will begin at 4:00 p.m. at the hotel, followed by an opening member dinner. On Thursday, we’ll board the bus for a field trip to several NASCAR facilities including a production facility tour and a race shop tour. Our institute will conclude on Friday, April 25 by 11:30 a.m. Please join us for breakfast that morning and activities to synthesize our learning from the many speakers and visits we’ll have had over the course of the institute.
July 8–11, 2025, Palm Beach, Florida
In 2001, Dr. Phillip Schlechty stressed the importance of understanding that we are experiencing and will continue to experience major shifts in the structure of the larger society in which schools are embedded. Schlechty wrote. “one such shift that we see evidence of today is a shift from a society in which powerful commercial interests are seeking to attract students to their wares, even at the expense of distracting students from schoolwork.” pg 27 Shaking Up the Schoolhouse
Twenty-five years later, Jonathon Haidt in The Anxious Generation, shares research showing that social media harms adolescents, especially girls going through puberty. He cautions that in doing research for his book, he realized the causes of the problem are broader than he initially thought. “It’s not just about smartphones and social media; it’s about a historic and unprecedented transformation of human childhood. The transformation is affecting boys as much as girls”.
The concern for the digital health of our children and youth will be the focus of our Superintendent Leadership Network Institute, July 8-11, 2025. Dr. Lynn Fiellin will share what she and her team of behavioral and medical scientists, community and adolescent partners, and serious game developers have developed for adolescents nationally and globally. These video game interventions target the most critical health issues for teens such as mental health, substance misuse, and sexual health. Dr. Fiellin and her team have demonstrated using the most rigorous scientific methods, the significant impact of their games.
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Logistics: We will begin on Tuesday, July 8, at 4:00 p.m. with a reception immediately following the opening session. Our institute will conclude by 11:30 a.m. on Friday.