Managing Educational Resources (EDEM 628)

Education Resource Management (EDEM 628) is a Department of Integrated Studies in Education graduate course given in the Faculty of Education at McGill University. The course starts on Thursday, January 18 at PECC (in room C201).

Calendar Description:

"An exploration of the concepts and skills necessary to manage the human and financial resources of small organizations (schools, NGOs, departments). Among the areas to be explored are labour contracts, supervision, grantsmanship, use of volunteers, managing site-based budgets."

Learning Outcomes:

This course is intended to provide teachers the opportunity to develop the knowledge and skills needed to identify and effective/efficiently use various resources to achieve personal and organizational goals.

The course is interactive and a variety of instructional strategies (lecture, plenary/small group discussion, peer teaching, exercises, videos, case studies, and guest speakers) will be used to achieve its learning outcomes. As a result of taking this course, your should be able to:

  1. Distinguish between educational resource management & leadership.
  2. Develop an understanding of various approaches to resource leadership/management; and
  3. Apply your learning in various in-class activities and assignments that reflect higher-order thinking (application, analysis, synthesis).
  4. Demonstrate critical thinking through the group discussions and by keeping a personal journal (blog).
  5. Develop/improve your leadership/managment skills to lead the human and financial resources of your school board effectively and efficiently.
  6. Develop an appreciation for the concepts and issues related to education resource management.
  7. Consider leading the management of resources in your local setting, if the opportunity arises.
  8. It is important to note that, for each of broad themes outlined by week, issues related to the day- to-day running of a school will be incorporated into the course program.

The 'BIG' Ideas & questions that might emerge:

    • What is it?
      • What is education resource management?
      • What is the link to leadership and accountability?
    • Why is it like that?
      • How does one's approach/philosophy/understanding/style influence the management of resources?
    • How else can it be?
      • What should it “look and feel like” in my local setting… should that differ from other settings?
      • How can I influence the leadership/management of education resources?

Hope you join me on this great adventure. While we will use a lot of technology throughout the course you don't need to be a 'techie' to benefit from the course :)

Sam Bruzzese

Twitter: @sam_bruzzese Email: Website:

If you have any questions please contact me via email or Twitter.

Required Texts:

You're the Principal! Now What! by Jen Schwanke

Cheapest price is on KOBO: (approx. $32)

You may buy a paperback version from Amazon Canada for approx. $43

The rest of the readings will be provided via Google Classroom and/or My Courses.

The Principal by MIchael Fullan

You may purchase on Kobo by clicking on the book cover.

Paperback ($25) or Kindle version also available ($23) on Amazon Canada. Either version is fine.

You may also borrow a copy from your school principal as they all received a copy this past August.

Systems Thinking (inputs & outputs)