Developing digital competence or exploring teaching with digital technologies? : An organizational study of municipalities' development of upper secondary school students' digital competence

Abstract: The European Parliament and the European Council have developed eight key competences for lifelong learning that each member country should provide its citizens. The purpose of this master’s thesis was to describe and understand how two Swedish municipalities organize the work of developing upper secondary school students’ digital competence. Qualitative semi-structured interviews were used to gather data from four principals and five school office representatives. Results showed that the municipalities do not specifically organize for the development of students’ digital competence and little evaluation was conducted in terms of this development. Primarily, teaching with digital technologies was believed to develop students’ digital competence. The 4I framework for strategic renewal was used to analyze 6 difficulties that arise in this development. In conclusion, for new teaching practices to develop students’ digital competence, arguments were made that major organizational changes are required to facilitate strategic renewal