Department Chair Meetings and 2016-2017 SY

I am currently in the process of determining sections for the 2016-2017 SY. In other words, determining teacher needs based on student requests, part year teacher hires, teachers' transfer requests to and from our school and finalizing the 2016-2017 Master schedule with department chairs, department APs and my principal. I am trying to leverage the leadership skills of the department chairs while building their capacity by including them in the process. Interestingly enough, this is the time of the year that some teachers are starting to "become more endearing" towards me hoping to determine early what they will be teaching during the next school year.

Death of a Teacher

Teaching programs prepare us for teaching  students and provides us with the content knowledge to be a successful teacher.  However,  what these  programs cannot prepare is life.  Last week, my school lost a teacher and I lost a friend.  We received the news around noon on Monday. I along with other staff members met with the principal to discuss a plan.  My principal asked us to set our feelings aside to support the staff and students. This was not going to being an easy task.  However, we proceeded with the plan, which consisted of being visual and releasing teachers as need be.  Once we delivered the news to the teachers, we proceeded to meet with individual classrooms to discuss with students.   We called upon the school district crisis team to assist.  I held one of the crisis rooms that students could come to discuss their feelings or perhaps sit in silence to gather their thoughts.   We relocated the teacher's classroom to help ease those the students grieving process. We made it through the week, by going into survival mode and allowing students to grieve.  On Friday, we the students shared moments they had with the teacher and released balloons in honor of her memory.  As a staff, we traveled out of state to her funeral during the  weekend.  Reflecting on the week and this week,  I've realized as a leader, there are things that you deal with that may appear to be in sensitive and seem harsh to some. However, I do not think if we had remained in our feelings rather than focusing on the students and the staff, the transition through this ordeal would have been as smooth.  As a leader, there will be times, where difficult times, will require a mindset not clouded by feelings in order to work for the betterment of all.  As we discussed school crisis, I noticed that school crisis teams normally do not think of the death of a faculty member  as a crisis that a school may need to address.  Hopefully, this blog will serve as a reflection for school leaders to consider as you plan for crisis.                                          

Student Registration

Looking for suggestions! Registration for next year has started and I am seeking ways to get everyone on board. For a month, we have been notifying teachers on the registration process. Students have a registration form that they present to each teacher. The teacher looks at it and determines placement for students and then signs off. Elective classes are also listed and students choose their elective. Again, it is checked and signed off.  Students who have an incomplete schedule will participate in ‘Elective Arena’ that is over a 2 day period during student lunch time. During this time, counselors are available to look at student schedules and determine any class(es) that a student is needing or missing.

As we wrapped up this process, we identified over 450 students that have incomplete schedules. The majority of the missing classes for these students is NOT electives but core classes. This means that core teachers did not do what was asked of them. Again, teachers were notified for over a month and reminded daily of the process. Now this grueling task falls on administration to look at course history, ask teachers, and complete the schedule. Our administrative team is happy to help however it is frustrating that we have to now clean up what some teachers should have handled. We understand that there will be a few ‘stragglers’ but 450 students is a lot of students.

So I am looking for suggestions of how to get teachers (not all teachers) on board with the process and help them understand the importance of this. How do other schools tackle this process? Any suggestions are welcomed!!! 

Veteran Teachers Teaching Upper vs. Lower Levels - Building the Master Schedule

As we begin to think about planning for next year, I feel stuck as an Administrator when planning the master schedule for our teachers.  We have many veteran teachers who only want to teach upper level because that has been the attitude and "culture" of the school.  The feeling is that beginning teachers and teachers with minimal experience should have to be "baptized by fire" and learn the ropes.  It's almost like buying their time before they move up the ladder and the "low man on the totem pole" philosophy.  I am struggling with having the conversation with our veterans that they are the ones that belong in the lower level/college prep classes because they are to better prepare our students for upper levels.  They are the ones with the classroom management that have the procedures and rules that our beginning teachers just don't have yet.  But then we also don't have the experience and knowledge in our beginning teachers to teach upper level courses as well.  I am just trying to figure out how to start the conversations with the upper level teachers and getting them change their mindset in regards to teaching the lower levels.

Timeline Beginning Week of February 29, 2016

	Blog Post	Comment on Post
February 29	Skinner, Watson, Wright, Braddy, Bankston	S. Howard, P. Howard, Ward, Popoola
March 7	S. Howard, P. Howard, Ward, Popoola	Skinner, Watson, Wright, Braddy, Bankston
March 21	Skinner, Watson, Wright, Braddy, Bankston	S. Howard, P. Howard, Ward, Popoola
March 28	S. Howard, P. Howard, Ward, Popoola	Skinner, Watson, Wright, Braddy, Bankston
April 4	Makeup Week-Submit a comment or post if you missed a week during the semester.

Skill Recovery and Credit Repair Options

I currently developed an intervention plan for Skill Recovery and Credit Repair option using our teacher developed online courses in our eClass system.  eClass is our online portal used for communications between parent, teachers and students. The gist of the plan is that teachers will give students access core academic courses in the portal to attempt learning targets that they were not successful during the regular school day. I am hoping to roll it out in January. Does anyone have ideas on something similar at their school and any suggestions on Credit and Skill Recovery

Teacher Retention and the Retention of New Teachers

A few weeks ago our school had two teachers quit with only one week's notice.  One was from the department that I support.  This happened to me last year as well right before the end of first semester.  It baffles me how some teachers think that this is corporate America and that they can just give a two weeks notice (if that) and not give one care in the world.  This directly affects the students as well as every other teacher in the department.  We had to have 4 teachers and myself the AP go on extended day for two weeks before we found someone.  Although I enjoyed being back in the classroom teaching one period each day, it was beyond stressful to find someone remotely qualified to teach the kids.  What worries me is that many of our veteran teachers are suffering burn out and we are not even done with first semester and we have brand new teachers to the profession who just up and quit and think it's okay not to push through and finish out the year.  We are a Title I school with somewhat challenging students so our teachers bust their tails every day to may learning engaging and personal for each student.  Our teachers are consistently going to trainings done in house by highly qualified teachers who specialize in certain areas.  They work day in and day out and it's driving our very strong teachers out of our school as well as out of the profession.  For me, I lost eight teachers last year in my department for various reasons and this was just my first year as an AP at this school.  I at first thought it was me, but they assured me it was other reasons which I will not mention.  We are trying very hard to change the culture and climate but we are struggling right now.  I know that I cannot do another year of hiring eight new teachers.  I worked from February through June trying to find the most qualified teachers.  I will say this year has been awesome with the teachers I have hired as well as keeping our veteran teachers positive.  It truly has been a change for the best.  But I do not want any of my teachers leaving because we have finally found ourselves in a very upbeat and positive climate within my department.  But my teachers still are burnt out no matter how positive they appear.