11.22.09
Posted in Uncategorized at 9:01 pm by stilliamlearning
Professional Development Feedback: 11.19.2009
What a great PD afternoon we had Wednesday. As you all read through, analyzed, and discussed the MSIP 5 Advanced Questionnaire, it was a powerful to watch you tackle the tough truths presented in the data. The conversations in your groups were passionate, honest, and forthright. We appreciate your dedication to becoming a “learning organization” by questioning our current norms and being willing to address the uncomfortable but necessary climate of change.
Below are the issues we shared/summarized from each group (sorry about the time limits), and the subsequent “dot votes.” The staff has voted to work on issue #5. What we need to decide now is how to tackle it. Please respond here as soon as possible, and let us know how you would like to work on this issue. We need everyone’s participation to ensure all voices are heard. You don’t have to agree – remember that differing opinions are what help us grow and understand.
Voting on the Issues: 62 staff voting/3 dots each
Issue #1: We need consistent and clear rules and subsequent disciplinary action for students Accountability: Personal contact, clean up our own ranks, address problems not persons. Vote: 42 dots
Issue #2: We need a regular mechanism for feedback from students about what’s going on/how they feel. Accountability: Ask students. Publish results. Do it monthly. Vote: 26 dots
Issue #3: We need to increase accountability and expectation levels for students and staff Accountability: Bring in people to talk to students/staff, CAMP data and conferences, PowerSchool gradebook updates with expectations. Vote: 30 dots
Issue#4: We need to build student and staff esteem and awards system with mailings, comments, calls and involvement Accountability: Set # of items required per session, publicize awards/incentives, address more than just academics, market for involvement, increase opportunities. Vote: 26 dots
Issue#5: We have a safety issue we must do something about; we must remove “trouble” students that inhibit learning from classrooms Accountability: Determine what constitutes a “trouble student” and set plan for how to eliminate trouble students, have drugs, gangs, cell phone, classroom management professional development. Vote: 63 dots
PowerSchool/PowerTeacher/Gradebook Updates & Expectations:
Again – sorry about the rush with the PowerTeacher Grade book training. Just a reminder for what we are asking you to do with your grade book and class assignments before the end of the semester: (remember – these are expectations, NOT options)
- Enter the course description (should be like what you stated in your syllabus at the beginning of the semester). All similar courses should have similar course descriptions (We know this is a “duh,” but we figured we should probably make state it).
- Designate in your course description what your rule/guideline is for late work. Be clear and specific. At this time, let’s keep common courses the same – turn this information in to your department chair to discuss at the next LT meeting.
- Enter the description of your assignment. There is a HUGE difference between what you are expecting the students to DO and what you expect them to learn. The front part of the assignment can be the DO, the link should be what you expect students to LEARN. If you are confused or do not understand how or why to do this, please see your content principal. It’s pretty simple, and it won’t take you much time to get used to this BEST PRACTICE.
CAMP Requirements & Reminders
In order for you to begin your conferencing with your CAMPers, Jeanette will be emailing you (one at a time due to the size of each file) the Explore, PLAN and EOC data as well as information from ACT to explain what the benchmarks mean. Remember:
- DO NOT write on the STUDENT sheet – let the student do that. It is the ONLY step we have in place for now for the student to understand and own his or her own data. If asked by the NCA team or during a walkthrough, it’s imperative our students explain that they entered their own data and what it means.
- YOU must write the answers on the sheet for the student questions. This is important as it will slow down what the student says, make them cognizant of the IMPORTANCE of the conversation (if you are writing it, it must be important!), and be legible and understandable if the anyone else ever needs the information.
WE SET A SCHOOL RECORD!!!!
There is a ton of information included in this post. Make sure you refer to it as much as possible in order to complete everything. And remember what we said to each other in the meeting – we must hold ourselves and each other accountable to make a difference. It’s true – we must help each other to become the best we can be! The tide is turning. Our amazing and glorious Sheila Wilkinson, Counseling Center Secretary, just finished compiling our 2009 student follow-up data (months ahead of the other high schools, BTW) and we set a SCHOOL RECORD – of the 218 students counted in the class of 2009 – 70% of our students were enrolled in college!!! That is 20% more than our average. You all did this (and it hasn’t been easy), but the increase in higher and higher expectations of our students is paying off. Additionally, our ACT returns are coming back in at a higher composite this year than they did last year. They always do early, but it shows that your persistence is making a difference. Kelly Lock, Erin Nash, math department…all core departments – your work with our kids in this area HAS NOT GONE unnoticed (for those of you working on this beyond your curriculum). Thank you for all you do for our students every day (and especially before 7:30 and after 3:00). For you, we are thankful!
Photos found on Flickr: “Analyzing the Data” by by jproeber
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10.11.09
Posted in Uncategorized at 10:48 pm by stilliamlearning
We live in an era of change. President Obama won his leadership with it. Our city council was reinvented for lack of it. 
Our School Board and Superintendent are attacked because they dare speak of it. Our country is in a medical outrage considering it. No matter where you look – change happens and reactions to such changes are as different as the leaves on the trees in fall.
Benton High School, St. Joseph School District, MO
Benton High School is in the midst of substantive change. We are moving forward as an academic institution challenging practices where data shows us we can decidedly improve. We are challenging ourselves with technology and constructivism. We are challenging our grading practices and assessments. We are challenging the very manner in which we offer education to our students and communication to our parents.
In the midst of these changes, I realized how much each individual staff member plays a part. And then, especially recently, I realized there are some staff members who are not necessarily on board with the changes. Some are open with concerns over change and open share their ideas in order to be analyzed, scrutinized, and revised or adopted by our leadership team and staff. Yet there are others on the staff who operate with covert action – defending their opposition to change based on emotional instead of rational thinking. This emotion comes in the form of loss of personal comfort, attachment to an established daily routine, or resistance to the possibility of giving up some personal power.
Insanity Defined
“Albert Einstein is quoted as saying that insanity is defined as ‘doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result (Tangredi, 2005). An organization that does not change and evolve does not improve. An organization that does not improve is doomed to fail” (Muhammad, 2009). Where do you stand in the paradigm of change? One thing we know for sure is that unless an entire team is pulling on the same end of the rope and in the same direction, movement (which I see as improvement) is not assured. As you reflect on our your department’s and our school’s journey of improvement, are you pulling with us and in the same direction as the team?
Share your story – it will inspire us all.
Images from Google Images: www.autumnwebquest.com/images/fallTree.jpg; www.allposters.com/-sp/Albert-Einstein-Poster.
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09.07.09
Posted in Uncategorized at 10:37 pm by stilliamlearning
This week begins our school’s first session of job-embedded professional development in year two of our technology integration and constructivist classroom instruction pilot. I am as excited about the learning possibilities as I am about the idea of growing the most highly educated staff of TPACK teachers on the planet.
As the instructional leader of our school, it is a personal promise to grow each and every teacher in our building into the most excellent educator possible, and I will never apologize for that promise. If you are a professional educator at Benton High School, when you leave you will be a stronger, smarter, and more situationally-aware teacher than when you arrived. Promise.
In Disrupting Class, (Christensen, 2008) the author states that we all learn at different paces and have different strengths as learners. This is nothing new to us as educators. But, what I find most interesting in this book and in additional readings that Benton’s instructional coach feeds me, is that technology (laptops and web tools) offers an “interface” that facilitates differentiated learning in a classroom more than any other. The problem with that facilitation is that our teachers have never had the opportunity to learn themselves how to use them in a classroom, let alone as a learner.
Chapter Four in our The Case for Constructivist Classrooms book study, (Brooks & Brooks, 1999) we will be reading about “Posing Problems of Emerging Relevance to Students.” These are the eight pages you will be reading this month as we practice what the authors call, “learning for transfer.” Constructivist teachers, and therefore constructivist principals, pose/seek to answer ONE BIG QUESTION, give learners time to think about it, and lead learners to resources to answer it. In following this guiding principle in constructivist pedagogy, the ONE BIG QUESTION will be, “How does Wednesday’s learning fits into your practice?”
As departments, you will share your ideas to the staff, but take time to “play” with the big question first. If you haven’t done so already, Nash offers great insight to the value of play in the classroom. As you begin to try new ideas, implement new strategies, and create new problems – I suggest you seek out Mrs. Corey, our Library Media Specialist. She has an infinite volume of resources that will truly amaze you. You will not sacrifice rigor in your classroom, that’s her promise. When your department is ready, you should comment on THIS POST so that we all may learn from your experiences. I am looking forward to learning from each department in the next month!
Thanks to Google Images and salamsmkserian.blogspot.com for images used in this blog.
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08.23.09
Posted in Uncategorized at 11:17 pm by stilliamlearning
We started high school last Wednesday in my school district. Students eagerly, if not with a little trepidation, entered their classrooms with high hopes and fresh expectations. That is – most students.
The week prior to school starting, Missouri state exam testing results were released. The results were depressing.
In our state of 554 school districts, 74% did not make AYP. In my school district, all but five schools are on some level of the MO School Improvement “watch list.” My school is one of those schools.
As the gatekeeper of students entering my school, I feel a great obligation to protect the learning environment for the students who are by law assigned to our school. As a lifelong educator, I feel a great obligation to teaching students – all students. And it is here that East meets West. It is here where legal intentions are beginning to cause greater harm than good. 
In order to attempt to make AYP for the next school year, my school must have around 60% of all testing students score advanced or proficient in Algebra 1 and English 2. If I can’t create a situation where that occurs, Missouri’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (MO DESE) offers specifically and mathematically determined thresholds to help us “make” our AYP Target – these thresholds are titled “confidence intervals (CI),” “safe harbor,” and “growth.” These thresholds are determined by student attendance (total population) and graduation rate. This is where we struggle on the journey – but it is trails West for us. We worked hard this year in both subjects, we knew we made significant progress with our students – and with the CI we survived in English. We were ambushed in Algebra.
Even if we change modes of travel, there will be no safe harbor for us.
And then, riding in from the East, are all the students who want to attend our great school. They are weary travelers with tales to match those of Canterbury – these student travelers are mad at their parents and have left home, they are pregnant and met Missouri “Romeos” on-line who offered them residence, they want to attend school with their summer friends so badly they offer addresses that don’t exist in order to come to our school. Test scores don’t worry them – they never have. Attendance doesn’t worry them – they are willing souls in August and September. Graduation doesn’t worry them – they hope they will, one way or another. And the tales grow. 
The educator in me screams “Yes! Let the children be educated.” The principal in me screams, “No! These children have homes, and their resident schools must educate them.” And McKinney-Vento says, “Yes. These children shared their sad, weary stories, and they are “considered” homeless.” And AYP says, “No. When the children leave your school for a destination unknown, you will be held accountable for their journey, and the students you legally educate will be labeled as not making adequate progress.”
If only No Child Left Behind gave credit for schools attempting to bring every child along on the journey of learning. Then every school in the nation would be clamoring for the ones left behind.
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08.13.09
Posted in Uncategorized tagged Benton, governance structure, Leadership Team at 12:51 am by stilliamlearning
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”
I was selected to be an assistant principal – a coveted position in my district for sure – as my first step into administration. One month into the school year, I knew I was in a professional situation that would test my ability to apply my carefully studied ISLLC standards to the real test. With my new position as an AP, I felt like I had landed myself on one great vacation spot at the beach looking at one huge, impending storm.
Impending Storm
One month later, my principal was removed from duty. Our staff was surprised, but not really. Our district leadership decided it was best to allow the two assistants to lead the school as co-principals. I do believe I lived one of the shortest assistant principal tenures on the planet.
“…it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness…”
Armed with three solid months of AP experience, two years of instructional coaching background, and an ABD in Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis from the University of Missouri (Go Tigers!), I knew the first thing we needed to do as co-principals was get a leadership team up and running. Up to that year, the situational leadership of the school allowed for department chair meetings that were often canceled and an administrative team of three that split itself to facilitate discipline, instruction and management. It was not an odd set-up; probably relatively standard for the time period. Our assistant superintendent challenged us to design a leadership team and create a concept map of our vision of a governance structure for our school. I was never so glad as at that moment to have read Bolman and Deal’s Reframing Organizations
“…it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity…”
The conversations were rigorous about who we bring to the table to lead the school in such tough times. The school had departments with powerful and politically aligned department chairs – an old guard of sorts – that protected the traditions of our locally popular high school. The school had also started down a path of transition to become a Professional Learning Community with identified coaches who were not necessarily department chairs but carried a clique of teachers with them on an appropriately identified track of learning. How did we organize this team? What personal agendas did we allow or disallow in leading the school? What would be the fallout if we did not include a known “Big Fish?” What teachers and teacher leaders were truly qualified to be decision makers for their peers. The options were endless.
“…it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness…”
Our decision was to center our leadership team around the department chairs. We felt these individuals were, or at least should be, strong content knowledge teacher leaders who would help us keep our decision-making focused on what was best for our students academically. Our school has 12 department chairs on the team – four core (MA, LA, SS, SC), five electives (FL, FA, IT, FACS, PE, BUS), counseling and library. We obviously added our admin team, which included our Activities Director and an assistant principal in the subsequent years), on the leadership team as well as our instructional coach. As it turned out, the PLC coaches were not pleased with our decision. The tough conversations about our decided leadership direction provided a first conversation in what was about to become one exhausting marathon of conversations.
“…it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…”
We brought the team together. We studied how to be a good team. We studied how dysfunction would affect us. We studied data. We wrote our School Improvement Plan using our leadership team to lead the staff. We believed in a vision and mission and made it our own. Together, we suffered through a pounding by the press and a drop in state testing scores. We developed policy (cell phone usage and tardy) together that began to change the way we offered learning and managed classroom behavior. We grew as a team, but it often felt like we were rowing the Titantic.
“…we had everything before us, we had nothing before us…”
We felt like we were moving. We added an “At Large” member to our leadership team who was a teacher voted on by all the teachers to represent them on the Leadership Team. The tenure of that position was one year to offer the opportunity for any teacher looking to grow leadership experience. We also made a super smart decision to add our Professional Development Committee members to the leadership team. This decision was made based simply on the fact that the leadership team was making PD decisions they didn’t want denied. It was logical to include the voting PDC members a part of the decisions and save a step. Smart leaders, eh?
“…we were all going directly to Heaven, we were all going the other way.” ~ Charles Dickens
So, despite NCLB goals increasing at an unprecedented rate (or at least it felt like it), our leadership team stayed focused on our school improvement and continued to study how to make our students better learners and more successful community members. We pulled together to earn NCA-CASI accreditation – a team building experience if I’ve ever met one – and we earned a humbling US News & World Reports Best High Schools 2009 Bronze Award. We were selected by the district to pilot technology integration with pedagogy and content knowledge, and Virtual Southside was born with ensuing success and a tremendous professional impact. The leadership team was pulling the staff to earn some great wins. Then, with little warning, much of our hope was dashed when our community decided to withdraw their financial support and not renew a 63 cent levy our district used for basic operations and salaries. When a strong leadership team exists in a high school, adversity only makes you stronger. We were rock solid.
Leadership Team: The best of times in the worst of times
We had our third start of school leadership team retreat today. We battled over our literacy plan. We focused on reaching each student personally with our ready-to-launch CAMP (Cardinal Mentoring & Advisement Program). We will grow our school spirit by including every teacher and every child in activities and class acclimation. We grow every time we meet together — we have a plan for that which includes bi-monthly leadership team meetings, monthly department meetings, and monthly job embedded professional development on TPACK. Our conversations are vocal and passionate now — the transformation to instructional leadership within the team is exciting and dynamic. We will succeed, hopefully with the levy, because we believe in our vision: Success for all through education!
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07.24.09
Posted in Uncategorized tagged VirtualSouthside Benton Cardinalconnection professional at 9:49 pm by stilliamlearning
This is where I used to live in the blogsphere. I originally created the site about 15 months ago for the Benton High School staff to interact with the administration. It worked for an information delivery system of sorts. There was very little interaction, albeit some, with staff members. I would say it wasn’t a bad 1.0 experience. I am ready to move on.
Our staff has had amazing success in transforming the world of professional development with this website. We have increased staff interactions by dropping walls and workdays in a phenomenal way. “VSS,” as it is fondly referred to, has taken over the need for the Cardinal Connections blog and has been instrumental in flattening decision-making and building operations in a way I could never have imagined.
Michaelangelo: “Still, I am learning.”
At 87 years old, the master wrote the words Ancora Imparo on a sketch he was working. He embraced learning during his entire life. He was a model of genius for all learners.
With that need met for our staff, I have decided to create “Ancora Imparo” to fulfill my need to grow, learn and share my thinking with any educators who might desire to collaborate with a teacher-leader learner.
Thanks for use of Image from http://www.fineartprintsondemand.com/artists/michelangelo/hands_of_god_and_adam.htm
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