Sustainability of the School Leadership in the Digital Era Under the Shadow of Crisis

Introduction

Today, the fount of learning goes beyond the scope of schools and teachers. With the increasing use of digital technology in social life, learners find the opportunity to reach information whenever and wherever they want. Although Industry 4.0 ensures golden opportunities for people who are well educated and prepared to develop skills, it also presents various challenges for disadvantaged students, traditional educational systems, and routine professions. Thanks to information and communication technologies, we can experience new knowledge. However, they change repeatedly and continuously. Thus, the focus is now on school leadership in the complex and dynamic school environment in the 21st century. In this respect, the main issues are to adapt to the new normal, straighten the challenges, cope with the Covid-19 pandemic, and transform schools. The global world, changing dynamically with developments in information and communication technology, has resulted in a new term called Industry 4.0. This era has led to transform the industrial society into a knowledge society. Because its scope was very broad and worldwide, the winds of change blew hard in the field of education, as well (Leahy, Holland, & Ward, 2019). The world of education has endeavored to react to this revolutionary phenomenon with Education 4.0 to harmonize and integrate digital technology into instructional processes (Priatmoko, 2018). Today, the waves of this ‘innovative era’ paradigm named the 4th Industrial Revolution (4^thIR) have deeply changed and prominently affected many lifestyles, organizational structures, and job profiles. It also includes an educational setting which cannot be considered independent from the environment, institutions, and school leaders. In this digital era, the lifestyle has been reshaped. Therefore, school systems and leadership should be redesigned expediently according to Education 4.0.

The society in which we live and school organizations in which individuals are shaped according to the educational goals require its citizens/students to exhibit several competencies such as 21st-century skills to deal with the challenges of today and the future. Without a doubt, digital technologies are configured to attain these goals. Thus, the education systems worldwide have to actualize their educational transformation according to the 4^thIR as the workforce is extremely the tendency to change with the advancement of digital life, the internet of things (IoT), robotics, artificial intelligence, and automation technology. The great news is that there is an increasing interest concerning the application of Education 4.0 and its management in educational settings. However, very limited research by now has been realized about its advantages, limitations, effectiveness, challenges, and characteristics in educational environments.