Diversity is Our Strength: Moving from Vision to Mission

“We all should know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry, and we must understand that all the threads of the tapestry are equal in value no matter what their color.”― Maya Angelou

As we end week 3 of #ptcamp and our Beyond the Bake Sale study of Linking to Learning (Chapter 3) and Addressing Differences (Chapter 4), I’ve been astounded by the high level of collaboration, brainstorming and deep reflection among the campers as we continue to focus on authentic family engagement beliefs and practices.  As we consider how we approach issues of race, class and and culture, I must say that I'm proud to work and live in a diverse community.  

• There are more than 70 languages represented in our schools.

• Approximately 20% of our students live in homes where English is not the home language.  

• Almost 18% of residents were born in another country.

• The ethnic diversity in our town is about 38% (American Indian or Alaska Native, Black, Hispanic, Asian or Pacific Islander, and two or more races).

• 10% of our students receive special education services

• Approximately 19% of students are eligible for free/reduced-price meals.

Needless to say, we are a multitude of threads creating a rich tapestry. However, what most excites/warms/fulfills me is the fact that our community values the rich diversity in our community and attempts to operate on the belief that "diversity is our strength."   

Over years, there have been a number of efforts to have courageous conversations about race and diversity at the town and school level. Our district is committed to closing the achievement gap. Our Board of Education and our District have identified diversifying our staff "to more closely match the diversity of our student population" as a strategic initiative knowing that in doing so "we will deepen our understanding, capacity, and effectiveness in helping all students realize their full potential."   Within our schools, we have worked to look at our curriculum to make sure the experiences and activities make students aware of different cultures and diverse individual experiences. In addition, there are several programs and opportunities for students and families to celebrate, appreciate, and support the various types of diversity represented in our community.  Yet with all of the great things happening, we know that there is more we can and should be doing to demonstrate that "all families, no matter what their income, race, education, language, or culture, want their children to do well in school--and can make an important contribution to their children's learning."  

Educating students to become global citizens means equipping them with the tools to respectfully interact with people who look, sound, think, behave, and believe differently than they do.  We continue to need professional development to reexamine our assumptions and practices, to make sure that we are teaching and responding in culturally responsive ways to our students and families.  Our challenge is creating the professional learning experience that goes beyond a visiting speaker or one day workshop, because that doesn't promote the level of reflection and conversation necessary to go the distance.  In order to continually keep our cultural lens (think beyond the traditional definitions) fixed and clear, we need to consider how we invite parents/guardians and students into the conversation about respecting differences and bridging the divides.  Working together (school staff, teachers, students and families) we can and will operationalize the strength of our diversity in ways that not only make all members of our community feel welcomed, accepted, and appreciated, but also actively engaged in our school and greater community.

Parent Engagement: Building a Strong Foundation

"I want all parents to be real partners in education with their children’s teachers, from cradle to career. In this partnership, students and parents should feel connected—and teachers should feel supported."—ARNE DUNCAN, U.S. SECRETARY OF EDUCATION, MAY 3, 2010

Core Belief 1: 

All families have dreams for their children and want the best for them.

Core Belief 2: 

All parents have the capacity to support their children’s learning.

Core Belief 3: 

Parents and school staff should be equal partners.

Core Belief 4: 

The responsibility for building partnerships between school and home 

rests primarily with school staff, especially school leaders.

As I consider my daily work as a leader to ensure the social/emotional and academic success of our students, the four core beliefs identified in Beyond the Bake Sale: The Essential Guide to Family -School Partnerships  is a wonderful lens through which we can view and evaluate our work as a school community to actively engage families. 

All successful relationships require a strong foundation. As a staff, we work together to build strong relationships with one another and our students and value the support of our families.  We have the privilege of teaching amazing students who carry their parents'/guardians' hopes and dream. We have a responsibility to cultivate strong and healthy partnerships with families to support these dreams by providing opportunities for parents/guardians to share these dreams and identify how we will equip students with the tools to achieve them along with ways that families can support students at home. In order for this to happen, we have to believe that "all parents have the capacity to support their children’s learning."  If we believe that each adult in a student's life has "funds of knowledge" about their children and their community, then it is our responsibility to respect this knowledge and value their input by partnering with families to equally support our students. We have to actively seek to build these partnerships as a school community. 

We are ready for this opportunity to embed these core beliefs into our learning community's strong foundation of support.  Our first step will be to evaluate our current practices and create an action plan to better connect parents/guardians to our community "through a focus on the children and their learning."  As I consider our next steps, I'm excited about this journey, and I know that we will continue to enrich the lives of our students by building strong active relationships with our families.  

I look forward to sharing our progress with my fellow #ptcamp'ers and learning your journey toward strong family partnerships.  

Family Engagement: Moving from Theory to Practice

Photo Credit: found on blog bachwards by Tracy Bachellie

“…partnerships among schools, families and community groups are not a luxury – they are a necessity.” (Henderson, Mapp, Johnson, and  Davies 1)

 

In every middle school I've worked in we've struggled with how to effectively engage parents at the secondary level.  Some parents were so involved in their elementary school that they want a break when their child enters 6th grade and end up taking a middle school hiatus.  Yet others feel like (in the words of a parent) "their right arm has been lopped off" because there aren't opportunities for them to spend time in the school during the day supporting staff and students like they did when their children were in elementary school.  While developmentally students' needs change and the role of the family member in the school should be different,  I do not believe the parent/guardian's impact on the student's learning is any less important.  They continue to be the expert on their child, and  we need parents/guardians to share their knowledge as we endeavor to provide a successful learning experience in the classroom.  If we need parents/guardians to support student learning effectively they should be in our building witnessing the teaching and learning.  Finally, if we see ourselves as a learning organization, we have to create opportunities to learn with and from one another.  

In order to make this happen, we have to move from not only understanding the importance of partnerships with families, but also to making it a part of our school's core belief and action plan.  In assessing where our school is on the Family-School partnerships rubric in the book Beyond the Bake Sale: The Essential Guide to Family/school Partnerships, we fall solidly in the Open Door category  of the Family Engagement Rubric with a clear eye toward Partnership.  In our spring survey 86% of parents identified that they felt there were opportunities for involvement at our school and 73% noted that they feel well informed about what is happening in the classroom.  I believe this response (from 23% of our families) is a result of what we already have in place.

Parent/Guardian Teacher Meetings

• We hold two official Parent/Guardian teacher conferences twice a year with our fall conference being student-led.  
• Parents are invited and encouraged to set up teacher or team conferences throughout the year as needed or desired.
• Our teams often invite parents in when they feel it is important to go beyond a phone call or an e-mail. 

Frequent Communication

• Teachers and teams keep updated blogs and e-mail families regularly about the learning occurring or social/team events.  
• Teachers and parents use e-mail often to communicate about student progress.
• All families and students have access to Power School where they can monitor student progress.  
• A weekly electronic newsletter is sent home highlighting school happenings and opportunities both within the school and in the community along with parent/guardian resources regarding our students.  
• We have bi-monthly PTO meetings and Principal Coffees around topics parents identified as needs/want to knows in a fall survey. 
• We started a school and library Twitter account this year.

Some Opportunities for Involvement

• Parents/guardians can attend a limited number of field trips as chaperons.
• There are some tutoring opportunities during the day in certain subject areas.
• Volunteers are invited to bake for/chaperone school social events.

I sign all of my school correspondence to parents with the closing "Your Partner in Education" because I want them to understand that I/we cannot do what we do for our students without them. We have a good foundation;  however,  there is still more to be done to become a Partnership School.  I am excited to go to #ptcamp with 100 educators  participating in a global read for 6 weeks this summer on Beyond the  Bake Sale.  The conversations during this first week via Voxer, Twitter and Appernet have been inspiring and have opened my eyes to the possibilities of what we can do to move to the next level of work.    Based on this first week at #ptcamp, I know that I'm going to walk away with a knowledge base and resources to partner in meaningful ways. 

Focus Matters: A Lesson from Star Wars

Remember: Your focus determines your reality Qui-Gon-Jinn

Based on my son's growing interest, my husband was excited to realize that he was ready to watch Star Wars.  With some convincing of my 8 year-old daughter to at least try the first one in the series, "The Phantom Menace" was our feature film for a recent family movie night.  When Qui-Gon-Jinn tells Anakin "Your focus determines your reality," I had an ah-ha moment.  It struck me as good advice that I needed to heed and share. 

Amidst the avalanche of education reform (Common Core, Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium and mandated Teacher/Administrator evaluation) it is easy to lose focus on what matters.  Let's face it, even rooted in the best of intentions and the need to close the achievement gap by ensuring the highest quality of instruction for all students, there is a lot to question about the grounding of these reforms, their impact, and the roll out (ahem...all at the same time). The inability to approach these questions in a thoughtful systemic way has created a culture of stress and concern not only in our school community, but across the nation.  It was clear that something needed to change.  

I realized to ensure the complete success of our students, the growth of our staff, and the moral of our building, it was time to change our focus.  It had to be on something other than Common Core State Standards, TEVAL/Admin Evaluation, and SBAC.  It had to be on relationship building, providing learning centered instruction, creating opportunities for students to become change agents in our school, and engaging our families in authentic ways. We needed to shift our chair and try to see more of those sunsets Jon Harper wrote about in his recent 44 Sunsets post.

So I did something that I hoped my staff wouldn't find crazy.  First, I apologized.  I explained that I was shortsighted for establishing the wrong priorities by choosing TEVAL and CCSS/Rigor as two of our three big rocks. I apologized for putting the focus on what should not be our reality.  Next, I told them it was time for a mid-course correction where we, as a community, would choose the big rocks that mattered. And then, I invited them to create the reality we wanted by focusing on what will empower and prepare our students, on a culture and climate that makes EVERYONE excited to be in our school, and on measurements beyond the "big" assessment. CCSS,  TEVAL/Admin Eval, and SBAC, under current regulations, are still a part of our requirements but there is more to a school, to its culture, to its success than these things.  Last week, we made a decision not to wait any longer to choose a new vantage point. We shifted the position of our chair to see a few more sunsets.

"But we must wait," I said. "Wait? For what?"

"For the sunset. We must wait until it is time."

At first you seemed to be very much surprised. 

And then you laughed to yourself. You said to me:

"I am always thinking that I am at home!"

Just so. Everybody knows that when it is noon in the United States the sun is setting over France.

If you could fly to France in one minute, you could go straight into the sunset, right from noon. Unfortunately, France is too far away for that. But on your tiny planet, my little prince, all you need do is move your chair a few steps. You can see the day end and the twilight falling whenever you like . . .

"One day," you said to me, "I saw the sunset forty-four times!" 

The Little Prince Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Why I Decided to Start Blogging

One of my Big Rocks this year is to become a "connected" principal.  One objective toward this goal is increasing my own digital literacy and use of digital tools for the benefit of my staff, students, parents, and my own professional growth.  

My first step was following  Jessica Johnson's and Dwight Carter's blogs along with their staff Friday Focus/Memos. I was inspired to create a Friday Focus for our school that  highlights "staffulty" and students and shares resources, articles, videos, blogs, or tweets from other educators related to our Big Rocks.  My next step was finally joining Twitter after years of encouragement from a very connected teacher, @PaulBogush, who inspired one of my teachers at a Dialogue 21 Conference so much with his session that she joined the Twitterverse that weekend and fully embraced how web 2.0 tools could change her teaching and students' learning.  As a result of the edchats, the very cool educators I follow, and what I hope will be a growing PLN, I've decided to embark on the next step in my digital journey and create a blog.  I'd like for this to blog to reflect my views and thinking as a leader as well as my learning journey.

I am blessed to work in a district that supports technology for learning.  BYOD was adopted the year before I arrived; each team has a Google Chrome book cart; and I have an amazing LMS/Tech Ninja (Denise) who is constantly demonstrating ways for students and teachers to integrate technology through co-teaching, modeling, and embedded PD.  We also have the privilege of having district Tech Ninjas (Denise and Jeanne) who push our thinking and practice and keep us current.  However, in order for transformation to happen, I know that I have to be a digital leader who models the use of social media and other tools to share and encourage learning and to connect with and inform stakeholders about all facets of our school.  This means being open to change, taking some risks, and sharing the lessons of the inevitable missteps along the way.  I say bring it on!
 

Inspired by a Neal Shusterman Novel --A Note to My Staff

     In preparation for our author visit with Neal Shusterman, I committed to reading at least two of his novels.  Last week I finished Bruiser.  I have to say I was so engaged with the characters that I acted like a YA and read it in one night.  I enjoyed the book for its handling of tough subjects (divorce, isolation, bullying, friendship) and the journey the characters take to accepting the pain involved in dealing with these situations.  The best part of reading a novel is connecting it to past or current experiences.  In thinking about our school's Big Rocks, I was struck by this quote from the character Brontë. 

     "In horse racing they put these slats on either side of the horse’s head, blocking the creature’s peripheral vision. They’re called blinders. They don’t actually blind  the horse, but they allow the horse to see only what’s right in front of it; otherwise it might freak out and lose the race.
     People live with blinders too; but ours are invisible, and much more sophisticated. Most of the time we don’t even know they’re there. Maybe we need them, though, because if we took in everything all at once, we’d lose our minds. Or worse, our souls. We’d see, we’d hear, we’d feel so deeply that we might never resurface.
     So we make decisions and base our lives on those decisions, never realizing we’re only seeing one-tenth of the whole. Then we cling to our narrow conclusions like our lives depend on it.
     Remember how they imprisoned Galileo for insisting the earth revolved around the sun? You can call those people ignorant, but it was more than mere ignorance. They had a lot to lose if they took off their blinders. Can you imagine how terrifying it must be to suddenly realize that everything you believe about the nature of the universe is wrong? Most people don’t realize how terrifying that is until their world is the one being threatened." (Shusterman, 85)

     Last week we were part of department CSIs whose topics ranged from reviewing summer curriculum work, creating assessments, aligning curriculum to CCSS, to digging further into the teacher evaluation plan.  I can imagine that the influx of knowledge and change in some ways felt, at the very least, unnerving to what we know.  So when I read this, I could not help but think about how our Big Rocks are helpful blinders to keep us focused on what is most important in front of us so that we do not feel as if we will not resurface from the onslaught of changes.  Unlike Brontë who is about to witness a family "nuclear fission" that she didn't see coming, we know the big picture.  

CCSS and TEVAL for those who see the big picture, is an opportunity to take our teaching and learning and professional growth to a new level. Implementing the standards themselves will not bring about new waves of student achievement, but the creation of lessons that allow students to analyze, exercise critical thinking skills, and apply their knowledge and understanding using technology and performance based assessments will.  The TEVAL plan while new in someways, overall is similar in so many others to what we already have done as it allows for teachers and administrators to identify and create smart goals, a plan of action, and opportunities to assess progress.  For all of the concern about an end rating, WHPS' approach to TEVAL is what it should be: an opportunity for us to grow as professionals and discuss those areas of need and strength with other professionals who can serve as resources and coaches to continue our growth.   

As we go through the year, I want us to wear the blinders not to keep out the "threats" to our way  of doing things, but to help us focus on the goal of supporting students to grow and achieve academically, socially, and emotionally with razor like precision so the we are not swallowed up by the avalanche of reform.

Image from Venosdale