High School Principal Search

LYS Executive Search

~ High School Principal ~

A Gulf Coast Texas school district is searching for its next high school principal

The successful candidate will have

• Demonstrated leadership success as a secondary campus administrator
•  Demonstrated success educating at-risk student populations
• LYS training and experience, preferred

Information of note

• Enrollment - 1,000 students
• Suburban setting
• Diverse student population
•  Competitive salary and benefits

Qualified and interested candidates submit the following to Search@LeadYourSchool.com

• Letter of interest
• Resume
• Administrator’s certifications
•  Recent campus performance data

Application Deadline: March 27, 2015

Search Consultant: E. Don Brown

LYS Executive Search

(832) 477-5323

LYS Nation, once again a school district want YOU!

Think. Work. Achieve.

The Attrition Plan Doom Loop

If there is a universal truth in school leadership it is this: Run away from “Attrition” plans for professional staff. At best, they stop capacity building almost immediately.  At worst, they throw the organization into a doom loom.  So what is an “Attrition Plan?”  Simply put it is a staffing plan that either balances the budget or pays for a program by not replacing vacancies.  So why is that bad?

Attrition plans are bad because they violate the Whitaker Rule.  Todd Whitaker states (correctly, hence “Rule”) that the greatest asset a campus or district leader can possess is a staff vacancy.  A vacancy gives the leader the singular opportunity to hire a better employee than the one who was in the position previously.  He follows this up with the truism that there are only two ways to improve an organization:

1. Hire better people.

2. Improve your current people. 

I’ll add that any leader of a learning organization that isn’t working on both #1 and #2 concurrently really isn’t much of a leader.

Now here is how an attrition plan throws a learning organization (schools) into a doom loop.  Let’s assume you have four teacher and their skill levels are distinct, giving you an “A” teacher, “B” teacher, “C” teacher and “F” teacher. If you lose the “F” teacher you haven’t lost much in terms of talent and the rest of the teachers can probably pick up the slack with little trouble.  That is how the attrition plan is sold. But this ignores the fact that you have lost the chance to hire another “A” teacher.

But real life doesn’t work the way the plan is drawn on paper.  Of all the above listed teachers (A-B-C-D-F), which one has the greatest possibility of leaving the organization?

The correct answer is the “A” teacher.  And the reason why is that your “A” teacher has the most options.  The “A” teacher is the one most likely to get a promotion and the most likely to get recruited to another campus or district, because they have the most marketable skill set.  And where an A-B-C team may very well outperform an A-B-C-F team.  I can promise you that a B-C-F team will not.  Plus, the more “A” teachers that leave, the more likely that even more “A” and “B” teachers will leave. 

And the best description of attrition driven C-F teams is “Self-Inflicted Doom Loop.”

Which means if you are considering an attrition plan, find a better solution.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TMSA Winter Conference; ASCD Annual Conference; TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook

A Reader Asks... Fundamental 5 Support

In response to the 11/3/2011 post, “PowerWalks and Fundamental 5 Support,” a LYS Teacher asks:

SC,

I am a Kindergarten teacher also looking for more help with Lesson Framing. Do you know any teachers that blog and share examples? Our Kindergarten team would love some help!

SC Response

I see that you have been scrolling back through the blog archives.  Thank you!  Personally, I’m not aware of anyone who is devoting blog space to Lesson Framing.  I do know that you can Google “Lesson Frames,” and see some examples.  Obviously some are better than others.  There are also Fundamental 5 chats and book studies that occur on Twitter on a semi-regular basis.

We (LYS) present at conferences across the country (there is list of upcoming conference at the end of this post) and train teachers in schools and districts, almost daily.  Have your Principal contact us and we will come to your campus.

Other than that, if anyone in the LYS Nation knows of an elementary school that is sharing real time resources, send me a link and I will pass it on.  

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TMSA Winter Conference; ASCD Annual Conference; TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook

Vouchers and "School Choice" - Yet Another Inconvenient Truth

Voucher / School Choice proponents hold themselves up as the saviors of the victims of public schools.  The victims being the poor children that are forced to attend failing schools that evidently no one else has any concern for.  The sound bite is, “No child should be forced to attend a failing school;” (semi-colon on purpose)

The conclusion of the sentence should be, “failing do to arbitrary and capricious policies the Legislature created and/or supports.”

But here is the inconvenient truth, the statement “No child should be forced to attend a failing school,” has no merit. The state already has a solution that has been used successfully for the past 20 years. That solution, already in place, is the PEG (Public Education Grant) Program. 

The PEG Program works in this fashion.  “School Choicers” may want to take notes.

If a public school, by either performance formula or accountability label, is identified as low performing, that school is placed on the PEG list. (Note: Charter schools and private schools aren’t subject to the PEG list because a parent chooses to enroll his/her child in those schools. So for the Texas Legislature, the performance of charter schools and private schools evidently... doesn’t matter.)  

Any student attending any of the 1,199 public schools on the 2014/2015 PEG list can attend any of the 7,327 public schools that are not on the PEG list, tuition free.  The only constraints are that the student may have to provide his/her own transportation and the receiving school must have room. (Another Note: Not all of the 1,199 schools on the PEG List were labeled “Low Performing.” Over half of them are on the list because they were previously “Low Performing” or a formula predicts they may eventually become low performing.  If that sounds like “Double Secret Accountability,” it is.)

Once again, the "Lack of School Choice" is a manufactured Problem / Travesty that is neither a real problem nor a travesty.  Which begs the question:

Are the advocates of vouchers ignorant of public school solutions (inexcusable for our elected officials), or pursuing a specific, non-democratic agenda (which would be... Anti-American)? 

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TMSA Winter Conference; ASCD Annual Conference; TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook

LYS Blog and Daily E-mail Update: A Review of Functions

Some of you have seen a version of this post before, but since I wrote it, we have added over 100 new members to the LYS Nation blog roll.  Therefore, I thought a refresher might be in order.  The following is my attempt to explain the features that are embedded in the blog site and the e-mail updates.

Note: This section relates to the blog site (not the e-mail updates)
On the left side of the page, E-Mail Updates: If you enter your e-mail address in the subscribe box, you will get a daily e-mail update of all the postings within the last 24 hours, after you respond to the confirmation e-mail (a spam preventative).

On the left side of the page, under the E-Mail Updates area:  UpTweet – If you like a post, click UpTweet and it takes you to your twitter account so you can post a link on your timeline.

On the left side of the page, under the UpTweet area:  Lead Your School Resources and Tools - Links to the Lead Your School campus support site; PowerWalks site; Amazon.com page for “The Fundamental Five: The Formula for Quality Instruction”; Amazon.com page for “Look at Me: A Cautionary School Leadership Tale”; and the Amazon.com page for “Jump Start Your School”.

On the left side of the page, under the Lead Your School Resources and Tools area: Current School News - Click on any of the four key words and the most current news stories that relate to that key word will be displayed.

On the left side of the page, under the Current School News area: Popular Posts – Shows the four most viewed blog posts from the last thirty days.

On the left side of the page, under the Popular Posts area: RSS Subscriptions

On the left side of the page, under RSS Feeds:  RSS Followers

On the left side of the page, under RSS Followers:  Contact Lead Your School – Allows you to email a request to us.

At the bottom of the blog page, under the last post of the week: Blog Archives - Click on a week, and all the posts from that week will be displayed.

Note: This section relates to the actual posts (on the blog site)
If you click on a post title, it will pull up a comment box at the end of the post. Just type in your comment and click the "post comment" button.

At the bottom of each post, click "comment" and you can leave a comment or read comments others have left. However, the majority of the comments, I post under the heading, "A Reader Writes."

At the bottom of each post, click the envelope if you want to e-mail that post to another person.

At the bottom of each post, if you click a "Label" word, it will pull up all the other posts that have the same label words.

Note: This section relates to the E-mail updatesIf you click on "Lead Your School," it will take you to the blog site.

If you click on a post title, it will take you to the post and there will be a comment box at the bottom of the screen. Just type in your comment and click the "post comment" button.

Note: This section relates to Reader Comments

This is how all comments are handled:

Your comments, opinions and question are welcomed and encouraged.  Keep them coming.

All comments opinions and questions are reviewed by me.

Comments, opinions and questions, where it is asked that the information not be shared, receive a private response from me.

One liners and comments that do not require a response are just posted as a comment.

Comments, opinions and questions of merit are posted as, “A Reader Writes…”  They are posted in a first come, first serve fashion.  So sometimes it takes a while to get to yours.

I don’t know if it is proper blog etiquette or not, but I spell and grammar check comments before I post them.

Comments are handled with a modified FERPA procedure.  I will and do mask the identities of some writers, their schools and their districts.  I do this to protect the writer and who or what they are writing about.

Post format

Text in italics is the comment of the reader.

Your turn… This is your invitation to weigh in and join the conversation.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TMSA Winter Conference; ASCD Annual Conference; TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook

Top LYS Tweets From the Week of February 15, 2015

A number of you in the LYS Nation are now Twitter users.  If you haven’t done so yet, we want you to join us.  To let you see what you are missing, here are the Top 10 LYS Tweets from the week of February 15, 2015.

1. Congratulations to LYSer, Dr. Chris Granger! He is the new principal at Vernon High School!! Who will be next?  (By @LYSNation)

2. Congratulations to LYSer, Jayne Ellspermann! She is the new President Elect of NASSP! (By @LYSNation)

3. When it comes to vouchers, "there are plenty of reasons to question the numbers and argue about the actual savings" (By @RYHTexas)

4. When politicians praise "school choice," ask specifically if they mean sending public monies to private schools. Pin them down. (By @johnkuhntx)

5. The Fundamental 5 (Cain & Laird) has vertically aligned our district's instructional practices.  Love seeing it all in action in every class! (By @amyjeanblan)

6. Leadership focuses on doing the right thing. Management is focused on doing things right. (By @vhsaldana)

7. Leadership malpractice: Holding teachers accountable to assessments that are not aligned to the scope and sequence. (By @LYSNation)

8. Ditch the long and huge assessments; use the minimum number of questions you need to get the information you need... no more. (By @justintarte)

9. An important reminder to all instructional leaders and teachers: Technology will not solve your performance issues. Better instruction will. (By @LYSNation)

10. Great news! The Fundamental 5 (Cain & Laird) has now sold more than 71,000 copies!!! Thank you, LYS Nation!!!! (By @LYSNation)

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TMSA Winter Conference; ASCD Annual Conference; TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook