A Reader Writes... (Dress Code Yet Again - Part 1)

In response to the post, “Dress Code Yet Again,” a reader writes:

"Sean,

I can’t agree more with you. One of the situations that I have come across is the younger teachers on my staff not dressing professionally. When I address the situation with them, one of the responses that I get is “I dressed this exact way when I student taught and they didn’t have a problem with it.”

As a profession, we must always model for our students, and I am including student teachers. We are the best example they have, and if we don’t expect the best from ourselves then why expect the best from our students."

SC Response
So bad habits start with the student teaching process? I can see that. Again what we model teaches more powerfully that we say. Before I went to work for the state, I took a lead role in staff recruiting. After all, why would I trust someone else to get the groceries when I’m responsible for the quality of the cooking? There is a major Texas university that shall remain nameless whose job fairs we quit attending. Not because of the number of candidates, but because of the lack of professionalism of the candidates. If you show up to the job fair in a t-shirt, shorts and flip-flops, it’s hard to be convincing when you claim to understand hard work and quality instruction. Impressions and perception matter.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

A Reader Submits... Thanks

A LYS teacher submits:

I have to admit that not only was I skeptical about what you had to say (you made it sound too easy), being told “How to Teach,” made me angry at you. But we just got our initial TAKS results back and they are the best we have ever had. Since I didn’t say it when you were here working with us, “Thank you.”

SC Response
No hard feelings. Most campuses aren’t real happy with me when I first arrive. It goes with the territory. The exciting thing is that your story is not unique. The calls are pouring in right now and the results are overwhelmingly positive. Increased scores and improved ratings are the story of the day. So congratulations to all of those schools.

And if the results on your campus aren’t where you want them to be, don’t lose hope. Remember, adult practice is the leading indicator; student performance is the lagging indicator. The deeper the hole you started in and/or the less frequent the staff as a whole executed the “science” of instruction, the longer it takes to get the improvement engine started.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

Disguised Opprotunity

Recently, I was talking to a group of principals that work in a district that is going through both planned and unplanned transitions (no, I’m not talking about your district).

A number of the principals were stressed, concerned, scared, and/or completely freaked out about dealing with all the unknowns. My advice, “Don’t be.”

Now before you decide that I’m being glib, understand that I am completely serious. One of the best things that can happen to you and your staff is to be thrust unexpectedly into a crisis situation. Crisis sharpens the senses, forces you to disregard the unimportant, forces you to rely on your team, forces you to be creative under a deadline, and forces you to face and conquer your fears. In short it forces you and your team to ignore what is petty and deal with the issues that are critical to survival.

If you manage a crisis correctly and you will build a motivated team that will find “routine” problems a piece of cake. The technical term for this is "shared ordeal," and it creates powerful and lasting bonds. In practical terms, this means that a good crisis is a gift. Don’t waste it.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

A Reader Writes... (Game On!)

In response to the post, “Game On!” another LYS and Game On! Principal writes:

"Thanks for sharing this awesome story! I read it over the announcements this morning and am getting incredible feedback. Game On! works if you are willing to work it yourself. Kudos to you and your staff for being brave and courageous!!"

SC Response
You hit the nail on the head. Brave and courageous are critical character traits of the Game On! school. You have to set aside ego, self interest, and fear, and fully engage in transparent, professional accountability and dialogue. Which why everyone can’t do it, and the first year is so tough. But with great adversity and great effort, comes great reward. As your school is now proving year in and year out.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

A Reader Writes... (PowerWalks - Part 3)

In response to the post, “PowerWalks – Part 2,” a reader writes:

"You mention sniping teachers. Perhaps this is where we disagree. I asked E. Don Brown once, “What should I do if I am conducting a PowerWalk and observe something over the top, bad?”

E. Don told me that you never take off your “principal hat” when you are doing your PowerWalks. So, how is the teacher to know the purpose of my visit to the classroom?

What if I walk in and find a free day pizza party going on with the movie “The Hangover,” playing? Blow that off because my presence is for coaching purposes and I wouldn't want to "snipe" a teacher? I live with myself by defining non-negotiable issues up front. For example, we will not have “no instruction” at the end of class with students lined up at the door. If I do a PowerWalk and find a non-negotiable being violated, I address the issue. By doing so, your definition would call that sniping. That is where we either disagree or need to clarify the details."

SC Response
I guess I need to present my definition of “sniping.” I consider “sniping” to be when the reason for the principal being in the classroom is unclear and what is observed that is construed to be negative is documented for evaluation purposes, without a prior conversation or coaching session to give the teacher an opportunity to correct the situation. Here is an example:

An administrator comes into the classroom to observe the teacher. The teacher thinks everything is fine until she finds a memo in her box the next morning, documenting everything that was wrong and/or absent during the three minutes of the observation. I consider that “sniping.”

E. Don is right (when is he not). You can not divorce yourself from your role and responsibility, especially if you are the Principal. But the role of principal is multi-faceted. Cheerleader, coach, resource provider, and hammer are just a few of these roles. My position is that the principal is most effective when she is in the coach role. To be an effective coach requires a lot of observations, analysis and purposeful conversation. So our advice is to explain to staff that when you are in the classroom, unless specifically noted, you are there for coaching purposes. But you do reserve the right to address blatant procedural and expectation violations, and/or safety concerns. That also means that for sub-par and marginal teachers, you are clear that until they can significantly improve their daily practice, they can assume that every time you are in the room, they are being evaluated. Again, the key is clear communication of purpose.

If I walk into the room and they are showing “The Hangover,” that stops right now, and the teacher and I will probably have a conversation in the hallway and will definitely have a conversation either during their conference period or after school, with some sort of documentation to follow soon after. Wrong is wrong. But blatantly wrong is the exception. On the other hard, if you suddenly notice or don’t see something that you may not like, I recommend holding off at first. Remember three minutes is a random wisp of time. I need to make sure there is a pattern before I open my mouth. And then I need to have had a conversation before I document something. Do enough PowerWalks (1000’s) and you can see a lot in three minutes, but you still can’t see it all.

Finally, I’ll close with this. When E. Don and I created the concept of hyper-frequent classroom monitoring (now PowerWalks) and support in motion eight years ago, the conversation was centered on “Why do it.” Now the conversation is centered on “How to do it.” That is progress and our schools, students and profession are all better for it.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

A Reader Shares... Game On!

A LYS (and first year Game On!) Principal shares the following:

Sean,

One of my initially skeptical teachers shared the following with me this week.

“Partly because I'm the one who spoke up about negative feelings about Game On, I wanted to share something a student said today. After taking a district math quiz, one student found out that another had passed, and he exclaimed, "Way to go! You helped the team!"

I couldn't have been more floored or more proud. FINALLY, here right at the end, some are starting to get it. So now I've decided to do away with the words pass or fail... instead we will be described as helping the team or not helping the team.”

I responded, “I can't tell you how much I appreciate you telling me about this. What a great way to prove one of the key elements behind the whole Game On philosophy! This has certainly been a year of learning for ALL of us -- and it is so affirming to see that the kids are getting it. Now, we can use this type of momentum to go into next year, making even more progress. It is teachers like you who will really make the difference.”

Just thought you might want to know.

SC Response
Darn right I wanted to know. I have visited over 30 campuses this month. And they divide into two distinct groups. The large group consists of campuses where the staff is counting the days for school to end and is about to crash and burn from stress. We’ll call these campuses the self imposed victims of fate, otherwise known as non Game On! campuses.

The much smaller group of campuses have staff that are still running at full speed, working with motivated students and striving to teach and learn more before they run out of days. These campuses are disappointed that the year is coming to a close because they can sense that they are close to accomplishing something special. We’ll call these campuses the self-aware masters of their own destiny, otherwise known as Game On! campuses. The difference is as distinct as night and day.

However, as you are well aware Game On! isn’t’ for everybody. It takes one to two years of prep work just to get a campus to the point of tackling the semester of Hell that is the beginnings of Game On! Because Game On! is a pure, action oriented professional learning community. And as you have seen, though everyone talks about PLC’s, walking the walk is an entirely different matter.

So congratulations to you, your staff, and your students. It takes the first year to learn the system and see the initial results, which are career changing. From this point on, your campus is blazing a new trail into unchartered territory.

Hoo Rah!

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

A Reader Writes... (Teacher Stress - Part 22)

In response to the post, “Teacher Stress – Part 20," an old school LYS High School Principal writes:

“I suppose focusing on good apples or bad apple is a matter of perspective. I don't consider taking an honest look at our profession "bashing." You say the blog's focus is on a "few". Really? I assure you the general public is not aware that a Texas high school is considered Acceptable if a mere 60% of the students meet MINIMUM standards in some subjects. Move up to Recognized and you are "merely" leaving 25% behind the minimum standards. And this is since the state government stepped in and made us improve. We didn’t decide to do it on our own.

Let’s go back a few years. Many principals like to brag about their exemplary high schools under the old Texas TAAS standard. Under TAAS, schools placed huge numbers of kids into special education so as to avoid accountability and to make the numbers look better. It didn't hurt that we got more money for special education too, but I'm sure none of us in our profession ever let fact cloud our judgment. The result? Thousands of kids received an extremely sub-par education and since the schools were not accountable for them, next to no one cared.

Under TAAS, you could be acceptable failing 50% of your kids, but on top of that, you could place an additional 20% in special education (or more) so that those students didn't even count towards your required 50%. This trick persists to this day although it is being rapidly mitigated by the government.
A few bad apples??? No sir or ma’am. I say that few of our schools, do an adequate job for each individual student. Schools truly pushing themselves to serve students are the exception, not the norm."

SC Response
For those who think that the pendulum has swung too far, true or not, we only have ourselves to blame. I’ll come back to this thought in a second.

You forgot to mention TPM, exceptions and exemptions. I was working with a campus earlier this year that had two sub-pops that scored below acceptable levels. But an exemption negated one set of scores and TPM negated the other. When I was addressing what wasn’t working and what we had to do to fix it now, the Principal looked at me and said, “Don’t you understand we are a “Recognized” campus?”

I looked at him and said, “Don’t you understand that if it wasn’t for luck and politics, you are an Unacceptable campus?”

As a profession, we find it way too easy to convince ourselves that we are OK, that the responsibility for any problems resides elsewhere. I, on the other hand, believe that those of us in our profession have a higher calling. That it is our job to solve the problems of society. After all, if not us, then who else is going to step up and do it?

Now back to the pendulum of accountability. At one time, I was beginning to waiver in my belief that increasing accountability was a good thing. That perhaps we had gone too far. Then Hurricane Katrina showed up. I had a role in the transitioning of Louisiana students into Texas schools. Texas, for those of you in other states, has been one of the early adopters of most accountability practices. Louisiana on the other hand, has not. What was quickly evident was that the students from the “best” Louisiana schools were less prepared and significantly behind the students from even the “struggling” Texas schools. And that the Texas poor, black and brown students were out performing the displaced white Louisiana students. Why? Not because Texas students were smarter, not because Texas educators were more motivated, but because Texas schools were accountable for higher minimum performance standards for disaggregated students populations than our neighbors to the east. We were better because our jobs depended on it.

It’s hard to argue that the entire profession is truly focused on student performance and student needs when the data contradicts that. So a small group of us staked a position and began to blaze a trail, which begat Lead Your School, which begat you - the LYS Nation.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...