No TIME!!!!

Although I have two planning periods for my content and grade level and two planning periods as department chair, there is still no time for planning or completing task.  Being in an Achievement Zone is hard because of the demands of "getting it together."  Everyday, is planned for us as teachers with the following schedule:

Monday-Professional Learning (the whole planning period)
Tuesday-Content Collaboration (the whole planning period)
Wednesday- Parent Conferences
Thursday-Parent Conferences
Friday-Grade Level Planning/meeting (the whole planning period)

As you can see, there is clearly no time for real planning or even opportunity to plan or prepare for execution of the plans discussed.  Our parent conferences are actually taken place on both days given all of the behavior and failure issues we have at my school.  Also, there are times when admin plan things on those days because they think we are free.  The same holds true for my department chair planning periods.  Some feel as if I am free with nothing to do (which is far from the truth), and find things for me to do during this time.  Where are the days of letting teachers plan they way that they need to and allowing teacher to have their teacher work days to really be work days instead of meeting days?  As a Faculty, we have expressed our concerns and feelings of being overwhelmed and the following has been proposed by our principal: 

Monday-professional learning for 55 minutes and the remaining time for grade level meetings.
Tuesday-protected planning
Wednesday-parent conferences
Thursday-content collaboration
Friday-personal planning (not protected)

I'm curious to know how your week looks in terms of planning etc.  I know we are in different positions, but I'm also certain others are overwhelmed with not having enough time!

New app Nearpod

Nearpod is an app that can be used in the classroom with your students on any device.  This app is good for interactive lessons and real time assessments.  I really like this app for engaging my special education students. This app allows me to see each students' response and check for comprehension.  The down side is that Nearpod sometimes buffers a lot.  Are there any other apps that you would recommend for student engagement and assessment? 

Check out this article on Nearpod

http://www.learninginspired.com/10-ways-of-using-nearpod-in-the-classroom

Co-teaching is like an arranged marriage!

As I do my observations of the co-teaching classrooms, you can tell there is a disconnect between the teachers.  I have conferenced with the teams, gave feedback and suggestions, and suggested peer observations.  The teachers are supposed to plan together, but that is not happening either.  I have gone back to some of these same classrooms, and there is no change.  How do I get teachers to change their mindset?  Is there some good literature out there that compares marriage and co-teaching?  I truly believe a lot of the resistance is due to the teachers not being held accountable.  This is so frustrating and the students are getting the short end of the stick!

Asst. Principal Training Gaps

Hats off to APs and people who aspire to that particular position. Even more so, double hats off to those of you who want to be principals! My most sincere gratitude, appreciation, and respect go to you. If there’s one thing I’ve learned this year, it’s that the APs are truly the ones who are holding it down in the day-to-day operations of the building. A good principal is right there alongside the APs (or should be at least), but the main principal has a higher responsibility and cannot always get drug into the details of the daily grind.

Having said all of that, I am learning one thing very quickly (a costly lesson, though, in my opinion): some districts don’t have adequate training for APs. Nationwide, there seems to be a push for more training and mentorship-type of programs for aspiring principals, which is a great thing in my opinion! (See this article for an example of a good principal mentorship program.) However, I don’t see a lot of that training geared toward those who want to be assistant principals, i. e. classroom teacher to AP trajectory. By default, this means the learning curve is much steeper when one first becomes an AP versus a principal. While I acknowledge going through a program like this (an Ed. S. leadership program) is, in itself, training, the nuts and bolts of each district are different. THAT is the training I’m referring to, the “how do we do it here” question, the culture piece, as well as the “this job is going to be vastly different than anything you’ve done before” training!

Becoming an AP requires a lot more on-the-job-training than being a principal. Here’s why I make that statement. Going from classroom to AP is a huge step; the requirements and responsibilities are vastly different. Going from AP to principal is more of a natural flow, and you would have already had experience with things such as investigating fights or parents who want to sue the school or call the superintendent over their kid’s discipline tracker. 

Although I acknowledge that ANY job will require on-the-job-training, and there is NO possible way to train someone to know what to do in every scenario possible (especially in education, where each day is different and you couldn’t make up or fictionalize half the stuff you’ll deal with, even if you tried!). Still, I believe districts need to focus on training APs. It’s like telling high schoolers that we want them to have the skills to be a successful college student, but not training them to be so until they start freshman year of college and hoping it sticks. 

Lessons Learned in Letting Go

This week, our school staff had to make the difficult decision of advising alternate placement for one of our students.  We found ourselves unable to meet his needs (explosive behavior episodes) while also keeping all the other students safe.  Faced with the harsh reality that we were not the right fit for him, we let the parent know it was not going to work out for her child at our school.

As our director of admissions & counseling was relaying to me the details of her phone call with the student's mom, I became painfully aware of two lessons that I don't think we would have learned without this heartbreaking situation:

1.  We need to better communicate/advertise the "challenge" aspect of our program.  When we say we balance challenge with support, we mean we challenge students to grow by pushing them outside their comfort zones within a safe and supportive environment.  We believe there can be no progress without the discomfort that comes with pushing boundaries.  Our students come to us with social challenges.  Therefore we provide direct instruction in social skills, facilitate guided practice, encourage feedback exchange, and assess progress as students apply the skills we teach.  This is an uncomfortable process for students with social skill deficits, but without it, their progress would stagnate.  We believe in their capability enough to help them grow.  The mother on the phone insisted that if we kept her child "happy," he would not be as explosive.  However, we realize she must have misunderstood that we believe that just keeping kids "happy" is not conducive to their long-term success, and is therefore in conflict with our philosophy.

2.  We need to better communicate/advertise the school-parent partnership aspect of our program.  For some reason this year, several parents have hinted or outright stated some form of "we pay so much money in tuition, so why isn't the problem taken care of already?"  In other words, they seem to feel they are paying for a miraculous cure or instantaneous change.  They want our school to be a one-stop-shop that replaces any outside therapies or at-home efforts entirely.  I find this consumer mentality to be one of the most difficult aspects of the private school world.  I want to do a better job of emphasizing that what parents are paying for with their tuition is a specialized school environment designed to suit their child's needs, a team of educators who have expertise in special education, and a community of passionate advocates who are eager to team up and work together to accommodate and work through learning challenges.  We are in it together.  It takes a fluid school-home partnership to educate any student, let alone a student with special needs.

So, is it too late to get these messages to our current parents?  What would be the best way to communicate and clarify these points?

To Be or Not to Be.....Involved?!

November is Parent Engagement Month and I'm thinking of sending this video out to our parents. Parent Involvement Matters.  Parent involvement is one of the key components of our existence as a Title 1 school. As the Parent Involvement Coordinator (or PIC), I am constantly looking for ways to get parents into our school and to get them actively involved. I gave out surveys last spring where parents indicated that they would like more information on technology and how to help their child with math, among other things. So I set out this fall to give our parents what they had asked for. I set up a technology workshop where parents could come learn how to log on to Infinite Campus (access to their child’s grades) and some of the other technology sites that could be used at school or home. I have a database of over 450 parents who receive electronic messages and newsletters from me every week. I thought for sure that I would have a great turnout. I offered it in the morning and in the evening. We had 11 parents total in attendance! The second workshop, “How to Math with your Kids”, was set up through our local Mathnasium business partner. We really tried to hype it up with door prizes, childcare, flyers, and emails. The speaker was awesome and she gave some great tips for working with children in math. Total attendance….16 parents. Several people assured me that this was a good number for a weeknight and for Title 1, but I’m still challenging myself in this area. I want to do something that will really make our parents want to be there. We did a Mystery Math Night last year that was a huge success (over 400 people attended) and we plan to do that again this year. However, my question is how do you get parents involved for the input/feedback/stakeholder portion of a child’s education? Parents come out when their child is participating in something like a play, chorus, or a math night, but what if I really need their input and need to discuss aspects of our school with them? What is a PIC to do??

Walking a Fine Line

As some may know and I'm sure all have experienced, in Education, there is always one or two students you find yourself extremely attached to.  You find yourself showing them extra kindness, patience, love and support.  You find yourself constantly worried about his or her well-being or if he or she received a good nights rest.  With all that being said, how do you walk that line-- Especially when it has been asked if you could possibly foster and/or adopt the student(s).  

Are there are legal ramifications or boundaries for teachers taking students into custody and care?  

How does that impact your home-work relationship?  

Any advice?

All Aboard or Jump Ship

On Saturday, I was teaching the coaching endorsement class for Griffin RESA here in Fulton and an interesting question was posed. Can a principal be coached? Well the obvious answer to that is yes, but... I told the story of our recent World Cafe here at my school. The teachers were placed into four groups and each group was given a question to discuss. The questions were:

1. What qualities and attributes does the ideal McClarin principal possess?
2. What qualities and attributes do the ideal teachers at McClarin possess?
3. What qualities and attributes do the ideal students at McClarin possess?
4. What qualities and attributes does the ideal student support team at McClarin possess?

When the interim principal reviewed the presentation of the principal group, she made no apologies for her "soft on crime" approach to leadership. In essence she told everyone that she is who she is and to get on board or let her know how she can help you move on.

One of the first things we study in the coaching endorsement are the 7 Norms for Collaboration with an emphasis on "Presuming Positive Intentions." Every principal has an agenda. We have to assume that his/her actions are based on what they believe to be the best for their student body. What happens with you disagree with the principal's direction? We have all been there either hired in a school under false pretenses or suffered through a regime change that turns the school in a different direction. What do you do?

When the question was posed in class, I told the gentleman that I saw three options:

1. Suck it up and ride the wave.
2. Provide new experiences for the administrator that might change the course of his/her plan. "You can't change what people believe, but you can give them new experiences (that change what they believe)." Unknown
3. Seek new employment.

As educators, we make difficult decisions every day. When trying to change the direction of a school without the support of the administration, what do you do? How do you re-educate an administrator to change the flow in a building? We have to be willing to make a few people uncomfortable in their position to start the change process.

Ode to Classroom Dojo

Oh Classroom DoJo, how I love thee…Let me count the ways…

First, I love that there is instant feedback to parents and family members – in a way that is most efficient. Parents no longer have to wait until the end of the day to receive a colored face calendar reporting behavior; instead, they receive minute to minute behavior reports on their student.

Second, I can report the good, the bad, and the ugly on just about EVERY STUDENT EVER! Want that positive note home, or just a quick reminder about how your student is doing during specials, then Dojo can provide it.

Third, it allows a team, administrator, or anyone to track the habits of any single team or the entire school. The only problem is that I haven’t had whole school buy in.

I honestly see a great potential with whole school management and Classroom Dojo. If students and families are exposed to it in Kindergarten, and they stick with it throughout their entire tenure at a school, then the buy in from families and students is immediate. Schools can really leverage a universal system to track not only behavior but provide intensive support where behavior is now trackable. Trends like issues in the cafeteria, on buses, or in bathrooms can be addressed and data can support administrative decisions. I am also hoping and believe that it is a way to progress monitor students with behavior issues because it allows any person to pull up longitudinal data on a student (i.e. they seem to always have issues during math. This may be indicative of a larger problem).

But not everyone likes it. The New York Times reported an article last year about privacy concerns regarding student information in the use of Classroom DoJo: (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/technology/privacy-concerns-for-classdojo-and-other-tracking-apps-for-schoolchildren.html?_r=0)

Another large pickle the article addresses is that parents have to request from the teacher or the company to have their student’s account taken down – ouch! That doesn’t bode well for buy in, but still I believe that the positives outweigh the negatives. I am a big fan of Dojo and I would love to hear from anyone else who is or who isn’t. But, I believe that a whole school management system like that one can truly be beneficial to families and the entire school community. Want to know more? Check it out: https://www.classdojo.com/ So for me, there is a vision in the use of Dojo and I am hoping that others in my school would fall in love with it just as I have. 

Sitting On My Hands

Since returning to the Atlanta area in the spring and being afforded the chance to once again pursue my interest in and passion for leadership, I have been chomping at the bit to obtain a position as an assistant principal, which I believe is my next step. I took my current job because it would facilitate my quest toward this goal by both allowing me to apply to the Ed.S. program and affording me new leadership opportunities.

At this moment, I feel that I’m in the midst of performing a very uncomfortable balancing act - doing my job - teaching - while looking for another job - assistant principal. My resolution to this has been to figuratively sit on my hands, and I’m really getting antsy.

I know that many school districts are beginning the process of looking to fill next year’s AP positions, and I would really like to put myself out there in the pools, but I just got hired in my school and district, and I can’t help but be hesitant to begin applying for positions outside of the school and district out of fear that it looks like I’m jumping ship.

From my vantage point, my school and district could use my experience as an instructional leader, but I’ve been told that there is a hidden list of characteristics that district leadership is looking for when it comes to their assistant principals. I understand that these unwritten qualities keep candidates from gaming the system by using all the right buzz words in an interview, but it also keeps  in the dark those candidates who would want to garner experience with and authentically develop those qualities.

The principal who hired me did so with the understanding that I was looking to move into an assistant principal role, and she even mentioned that she believed she would be lucky to keep me for a year before being snatched up by another school, but she’s gone and I feel that by looking for AP positions outside my school and district I look more like a ladder-climber rather than an instructional leader who wants to effect change.

Paradoxically, I do good work, but I’m my own worst critic. I would rather someone see what a great job I do rather than me tell them what a great job I do, but I feel that if I continue in that mindset that I will get nowhere.

My career is important to me, but I truly want to help do school better, and I have this intense desire to be in a position to have a wider impact outside of my classroom, and even my school building.

Crowd Control and Chaos

            We all know that lunch duty in the cafeteria is not a popular job, but I have it nonetheless! At my school, students come to lunch by grade level in 30 minute increments; usually 5 minutes in line to get food, 15 minutes of eating/talking (mostly talking), 5 minutes to buy ice cream, and then 5 minutes to dismiss and line up outside. Teachers have a duty free lunch and we don't do staggered lunch times. 

            So when you are working with 100-120 students at a time, lunch duty can be quite the challenge. Add a few visiting parents, a crying student who forgot his/her ice cream money, students who are commissioned to silent lunch, and the students who manage to get their food and drink everywhere but in their mouth, and you have a recipe for chaos. We have tried stop light monitors, music, lights out, whistles, and more. You just can’t keep the volume down in the cafeteria. How do you maintain order at your school during lunch time? Some parents have complained that they do not want a whistle blown at their child. Some parents think the stop light is too sensitive. Some parents frown on a few minutes of silent lunch. My question is…what works? What techniques do you have for getting students in and out of the cafeteria in an orderly and somewhat quiet manner? How do you maintain order among a large group of students when everything you try gets met with disapproval, so much so, that you constantly have to look for new techniques? I'm searching for a happy medium; something that parents, students, and administrators could all live with. I found one school's success story of Bringing Calm to the Cafeteria but not so sure that's the right solution for my school. I would like to weigh all my options for good crowd control. The wasting of food will be saved for another post!

New Teacher Takeover?

I absolutely love teaching. I almost pursued a doctorate in curriculum and instruction (probably shouldn't say that since I'm in a different program). I love unpacking standards, developing assessments, differentiating, observing classrooms and conducting professional development for teachers. My project this year is focused on new teacher induction and support and so far has gone extremely well. I threw a "mixer" where I met with new teachers and mentors over happy hour and discussed the program and did a few get know you icebreakers.  Since then, mentees have met with mentors and discussed expectations, observations and some have even started reading a book together on teaching. I received a few notes saying they enjoyed the mixer and think highly of the new initiative. So what's the problem? I don't know.
I feel like I want to get more involved in new teacher's classrooms but how do I do that without taking over? I sit and observe teachers and see something I want to correct immediately but instead I leave detailed feedback and invite teachers to talk about it. I send suggestions on lesson plans but not regularly because what if I overwhelm them. Five of our new teachers are in science,math, and health and I have some really great ideas. Would teachers be open to a model lesson? How do I even ask without offending them?
At the beginning of the school year I conducted a survey to find out what areas new teachers needed help with and when they wanted to get help. Should I use that as a basis and just tell them the time we will meet to discuss instructional strategies? Maybe I am getting in my own way of making the changes I want to see. Maybe its me being in my first year as an administrator and not understanding my own authority. There are plenty of articles on the principal as instructional leader but what exactly is my role as AP in leading instruction?
I talked with two math teachers last week and offered to unpack a standard with them or help them differentiate a lesson. They seemed genuinely thankful and open to the help. I guess this is a good start. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

I have a good idea!

I feel like I see a distinctive line in the world of assistant principal leadership (not the head principal) between being a productive agent of change (a.k.a. hitting the LKES marks) or just simply being a person who helps put the train back on the functionally operational tracks. In my head, these are 2 very important tasks, and they should be the full responsibility of different people. Follow me here….I have a good idea!

In the past, I’ve generally been of the mindset that APs are in the least useful position in terms of being an agent of change, because I viewed AP duties as primarily operational and logistical. Now that I am in the actual position, I see that part of my old thinking was flawed, but I also see that I was not completely off-base. On paper, administrators are charged with being instructional leaders (the LKES), but are all leaders actually good at instructional leadership? Maybe some leaders are just better at putting out fires and don’t need to be the instructional boss for a group of teachers? Everyone has a strength. Furthermore, if there are 4 APs in a building, then 2 should be instructional and 2 should be operational, with the head principal being the ring leader. This idea makes total sense to me, because not all APs want to become a head principal. Some are content with just having an AP role. And that should be allowed!

Perhaps one day (maybe sooner than later) I will get off my tangent rant of the upside down way I view AP responsibilities; however, that day is not today. J I remain pretty frustrated with the current state of separation from reality that exists between the LKES standards (what is expected) and what goes on from day to day and what APs are actually capable of achieving. Don’t get me wrong…I agree with the LKES standards, and I definitely believe these are the things we should be focusing on; it’s just not a practical reality for all APs in all buildings. The LKES standards promote administrators being agents of change, but, at the end of the day, some people are not actually good at being an agent of change. Why not let those of us who love instruction focus just on instruction, and let the operational gurus focus on operations? Why not let us play to our strengths?

The group that presented in class last week (the HR group) talked about the cost of replacing exiting teachers. This article talks about the cost of replacing exiting principals ($75 K), and the alarming trend of leaders who are leaving after less than five years. Just food for thought, because we talk a lot about teacher turnover, but what about administration turnover?!? Why is there not a heavier focus on that and what is causing that? Could it be that leaders are misplaced and not able to play to their strengths? I think I’m on to something…

From REactive to PROactive... how do I make the jump?

Hi fellow leaders!

I am faced with a leadership conundrum that I need your input on.  Every leadership book, blog, article, etc. talks about being proactive instead of reactive.  We need to be ahead of the curve, looking into the future, two steps ahead of the problem, seeing the big picture.  I wholeheartedly believe in those things.  Yet, I find myself stuck in a cycle of reactivity, and I do not know how to get out.

When I stepped into my role as executive director and principal this year, it was the first time in the school's (short) history that we've had someone in the role who is qualified (and even I am brand new and thus have little experience).  As a tiny nonprofit school for special needs, I feel like we've spent most of our existence just fighting for survival.  Establishing ourselves in the special education landscape has been enough work on it's own, let alone establishing a highly qualified leadership team to move the school forward on a larger, more long-term scale.

Given this history, it has been rather frustrating to feel like I am cleaning up leftover messes from the last director instead of moving the school in a positive, ground-breaking direction.  I badly want to be the kind of leader I read about, but the daily "fires" that crop up often get in the way.  And the fires that haven't been put out from years past still smolder and need addressing.  When handed a pile of financial books in disarray, unpaid insurance plans, unissued employment contracts, a legal issue with a former bookkeeper, a second legal issue with a former accountant, and a staff who have never known what good leadership looks like, I am struggling to get out from under it-- reactive mode-- and instead preventing these things from ever happening again-- proactive mode.

So my question to you is, how do I break the cycle?  How do I get from REactive to PROactive?  

Please let me know your thoughts in the comments.  Thank you!

-Jen

When Enough is Enough

As I was thinking about what I should post, it dawned on me that I think this blog could really benefit me in that I can ask other colleagues who are in leadership positions for advice and tips to help build my leadership tool-kit.

As someone who works closely with the leadership team at my school, there are somethings that are very unclear to me.   My main concern is, as an administration, what options do you have when you have exhausted all your options with a challenging student?  

He is a primary grades student who was recently diagnosed with a mental illness.  He is a master manipulator-- extremely smart, but exhibits extremely, extremely challenging behaviors.  The teacher is to the point where she is ready to quit.

As the administration staff,  we have exhausted all our options:  RTI, SST, Referrals, Conferences (and what makes it worse, the parent KNOWS what goes on),  Psychological Intake Referrals, BAPS, Behavior Analyst Observations etc.   As the RTI/SST Specialist, everyone turns to me and I am like-  I am not a behavior analyst.

At what point does enough become enough?  What is one to do?

Culture Shock

I’ve thought a great deal about school culture, even before receiving the syllabus for this course.  When I was hired, the principal gave me a copy of School Culture Rewired: How to Define, Assess, and Transform It by Steve Gruenert and Todd Whitaker, she stated that the school’s culture was focused on the needs of the teachers and that she wanted to refocus it on the needs of the students. The principal said that we, the leadership team, were going to read it as a book study; however, that never happened as she was relocated and another principal was appointed. The book is still sitting on my kitchen counter, but I have done little more than skim through it.

I found a TEDTalk given by Dr. Mark Wilson, former principal of Morgan County High School and the 2009 National Principal of the Year. In the talk, Dr. Wilson discusses the elements that it takes to build a culture of success in a school: vision, unity, and empowerment. Dr. Wilson spends the majority of the segment discussing the positive impact that these three components can have by highlighting several of MCHS’ successful initiatives. As I watched it, I considered my perception of those three components in my current school.

I’ve been at my school for about nine weeks, and those have been the longest nine weeks of any school year so far. At the pre-pre-planning leadership meeting, our principal began the process of crafting a vision; it’s something that - to my knowledge - had yet to be done at the school. I can’t really recall how much time we spent in each group crafting statements, but there were several that were created; after sharing each of them, we wrapped up the activity with the principal indicating that we would be coming back to the process over the course of the year.

So far, that’s not been the case.

The overwhelming majority of our students do very well on their own. This fact is why a large number of the faculty see no sense in creating PLCs are looking at student data. Some departments may share common assessments; however, there is no discussion of standards or proficiencies or instructional practices. Teachers do not see a purpose in doing so. I guess it’s the old perpetuation of the old adage “if it isn’t broken don’t fix it”; in other words, as long as our students excel on their own, we don’t need to change anything. I don’t think my peers see what this mentality is doing.

The final component of Dr. Wilson’s culture of success in schools is empowerment. I believe that without the first two, there can be no authentic empowerment - among students or faculty. Dr. Wilson cites Daniel Pink’s Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, in which Pink presents research that demonstrates our intrinsic need to be engaged in authentic tasks. The traditional approach to school - the sit-and-get - does not engage students. If a student’s grade is to mean anything beyond an average of points, then he or she needs to be actively involved in complex learning experiences and tasks. In doing so, students will be empowered to take charge of their learning. For teachers to do more than simply collect a paycheck, they also need to be engaged in complex tasks, and for most that comes in the form of designing and implementing lessons that meet the needs of all of their learners.

My school needs a culture shift, and I believe that it begins, as Dr. Wilson states, with vision. Once we have a vision then unity and empowerment will not be far behind.

Take Over, Shmake Over!

I work at a focus school. This means that the gap between our highest achieving students and our lowest achieving students is too large, and is too stagnant, and thus we must do something about it…or else! Being a Focus school means that we would fall into the category of schools eligible to be taken over in a couple of years if legislation concerning the Opportunity School District (OSD) is voted in as a amendment to the constitution. Here is some more information about it: https://gov.georgia.gov/opportunity-school-district-proposal

When I did further digging into the terms and conditions for being labeled focus or priority, my immediate thoughts turned straight towards the state’s feasibility. For instance, one condition for the approval of the bill is that no more than 20 schools a year would receive the state’s support –currently, Atlanta Public Schools has 44 schools or 60% of its entire district on the list! Seems like a bit of a pickle. Another finding is that the results are based on a school’s year-to-year CCRPI score in addition to student achievement on state tests. The lowest 10% of all Title 1 schools would then be analyzed and categorized as focus or priority– that sounds like a moving target to me! This process assumes that not every school can be doing well, and some schools are always doing poorly. Both of these conditions seems fishy to me…So my thoughts turn to two areas: (1) How do they intend to support the needs of that many schools for five to ten years, and (2) what are the specific details and determinations to get you on this list? Has no one else questioned why so many urban schools are on the list, and why such a high percent of APS schools are on both lists? Commenting on the issue, Dr. Meria Carstarphen, the Atlanta Public Schools’ Superintendent, stated her main concerns for her first year were not in school effectiveness, but were with the residual effects of the cheating scandal and addressing massive payroll problems. “I only got one year to fix what is arguably a 30-year problem,” Dr. Carstarphen stated to parents at on Opportunity School District town meeting (http://www.ajc.com/videos/news/parents-concerned-over-potential-state-takeover-of/vDby7x/) implying that her past priorities had not been on instruction and school effectiveness, but will be.

I will admit that I was pretty nervous when I heard that we were a focus school, but  I was less nervous after I heard how many APS schools were also identified as focus or priority. With over 50% of a single district’s schools on these two lists, there needs to be some changes and larger issues handled. What is the CCRPI index missing or what can be done to better support urban and rural schools? I hope this is addressed prior to any legislation passing in 2016. Until then, my school team and I will rest assured that there is safety in numbers…

Timmy's Dilemma

I have been in education for twenty-nine years and have a degree from Emory which Georgia equates to a Specialist Degree. As a result, I am a very expensive hire. One might think that after 29 years I would retire soon; however, only sixteen of my 29 years were in Georgia and include contributions to TRS. The other thirteen years were spread between Europe, South America, and Florida. I can't afford to retire next year. Here is my dilemma:

• Although I am employed through Fulton County, my salary is funded from McClarin's School Improvement Grant provided by the Georgia DoE. I am not guaranteed any position with Fulton County beyond May 2016. So what do I do?

Here are my options as I see them:

1. Find a position in another Fulton County school as an instructional coach? Sounds good, but  all FCS instructional coaches are funded through Title 1. Would you, as a principal, want to use a significant portion of you Title 1 funds to pay for my salary and benefits even if I am worth the money?
2. Apply to the AP pool of Fulton County and hope for a position to become available? Great idea, but take a look at the salary scale for FCS Assistant Principals. Year one of an assistant principal at any level is only 75% of my current salary. They will give me experience for the years I was a department chair, coach, team leader, etc., but even then it will still be a pay cut of at least 10%.
3. Return to the classroom. If I choose to return to the classroom, I will still receive a 5% pay cut as I currently receive additional money to be an instructional coach.
4. Leave FCS. I have started the process of applying for administrative positions outside of Fulton County. I am going to a job fair in December for the Association of American Schools in South America looking for an AP position. I am not opposed to moving for the right job. I will update my application in APS as well. But again. all of these positions may come with a salary cut especially if I leave the state as other states do not recognize my degree from Emory as an EdS.

Interestingly, I feel as though I will be in some way discriminated against as a school would gladly hire an instructional coach with half my experience and perhaps a Masters. I feel as though my experience will count against me rather than for me. I have even seen an ideal position advertised in FCS where they specifically mention limited experience and a salary cap that would prevent me from pursuing the position. I understand the need to save money and use resources wisely, but my experience and insight should be sought after rather than turned away.

Thoughts? Suggestions? Advice?

Monkey in the middle

I have the privilege of working with two of the best leaders I know. One is a school founder who has won numerous awards and achieved distinguished school status many times. The other is a seasoned teacher and administrator who is well versed in professional development for teachers and school operations. So what could possibly be the problem?

Imagine a mother who decides after becoming pregnant that she is not fit to raise a child and begins seeking a qualified parent to stand in her stead. After the child is born, the mother immediately places the child in the hands of the carefully sought out adoptive parent and trusts that parent to raise the child right. Now imagine a parent of a fourteen year old child who is told that she must give up her child because soon she may not be fit to continue raising the child. She would be devastated even if the new parent were dependable and completely trustworthy.

This is where I find myself everyday. My CEO who is the school founder is very hands on and actively involved in running the school. My principal is new to the school but had the impression that she would run the show. This dynamic causes confusion when one person decides a thing but the other decides something different. Or when daily operations need to run through both the principal and CEO before decisions are made. I have dropped the ball or communicated wrong information because I was told two different things by my leaders. In the end it's my responsibility to know policy and act accordingly. But it's difficult feeling like the monkey in the middle.

 According to a research study by the Hawaii Educational Policy Center"... others feel the CEO model is not applicable to school principals because CEO’s have much more control. If principals are to be held accountable, they reason, then they must also be given full authority. Some say trust is an issue. They do not trust the system, and the system does not trust or respect them." 

I don't feel the CEO model works here because principals are the school leaders and faculty and staff must see them as such. Discussions and training between myself, my principal and CEO must be held behind doors not on the job for every follower to see. I feel that maybe the trust is not fully there and it limits the training I received and the confidence to make sound decisions. This is an ongoing debacle, any suggestions much appreciated! 

Link to article: Does Principal As CEO Work?