Great Advice - More Brezina Wisdom

I mentioned this as an aside in an earlier post, so today I will officially post it as great advice.

Early in my administrative career, I was concerned about the first year turn-over rate that I had on my campus. When I mentioned this during a regular status report to the superintendent, Bob Brezina, he quickly reminded me, “Didn’t I tell you to hire on potential, retain on performance.”

“Yes, sir,” I answered.

“Good,” he said, “get back to work and keep performing.”

Meeting over. Total elapsed time, 3 minutes 23 seconds.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn…

You Are My Sunshine, My Only...

We’re in the final push until the end of this school year. Students are getting antsy, teachers are getting edgy and administrators are dangerously close to using their last nerve.

Here’s an easy and quick jump-start for everyone. Have the custodians clean every window this week (inside and out). Then, open up all the blinds (or better yet, take them down) and let the sun shine in all day. It will make everything a little bit brighter and give everyone a little more energy.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn…

The Seany Craig Plan (Apologies to Jenny)

I started to get excited when I began reading a story about 70 educators in Florida that included the following statement, “We supported each other and developed friendships that have lasted… We exchanged…”

Then reality stepped in and the statement finished with, “...recipes, health tips, provided encouragement during challenging times, and celebrated successes and fitness milestones.”

Yes, the story was about a group of teachers banding together, sharing ideas, making goals, and supporting each other - to lose weight. And they were successful, in one month, as a group, they lost 279 pounds (or about 4 pounds a person).

Yet, ask those same teachers to use that same strategy with their instructional practices and I promise you that they would fight and stonewall, all in the name of protecting their creativity and professional autonomy.

When I speak and coach, I often tell the audience that improving instruction is as simple as losing weight. And I am going to make my argument one more time, using the above mentioned teachers as the example.

The Seany Craig Campus Performance Diet Plan:

1. Adopt a common scope and sequence (the recipe book)

2. Adopt short-term common assessments (a scale)

3. Hyper-monitor (A daily calorie intake / expenditure log)

4. Share the data as a team (peer support)

5. Make adjustments based on the data (menu and exercise adjustments based on progress towards goals)

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn…

Brezina Book Recommendation

Bob Brezina recommends:

"Disrupting Class," by Clayton M. Christensen.

It's now going on my list.

Think. Work. Achieve

Recognizing Gang Tags

I was recently on a campus working with some administrators who were dealing with more and more students tagging their books with gang signs. After confirming that yes, the tags were gang related, we discussed some strategies for addressing the problem. One idea was to train all the staff on current gang tags and what specifically to look for. However, I didn’t think that was the best way to combat the problem. Here is the reason why, gang tags are like technology, by the time we figure out what to look for, we are already out of date. So I suggested an alternate strategy.

1. Let the staff know that there is a problem and show them the examples.

2. Stress that the teacher is the first line of defense. The teacher has to look at notebooks, desks, books, etc. and address anything suspicious.

3. The staff has to use the following filter when assessing doodles and drawings. If you saw the words and/or drawings on the side of a building near your home, what would you think? If it wouldn’t bother you, it is probably okay. If it would make you uncomfortable, then the teacher needs to take some action.

This advice obviously isn’t the end all in addressing gang issues, it’s just a way to build some first level awareness and initial response. If you need some other ideas or resources, send me a comment.

Think. Work, Achieve.

Your turn…

Chef Wayne, or How Do You Interview?

First, a disclaimer. In general, living on the road is a combination of the mundane, punctuated by random irritation. After the first two weeks, all illusions of glamour have disappeared. However, sometimes there are perks…

Recently, I the was guest of Chef Wayne, the Executive Chef of the Chart House, in San Antonio, for a tasting menu dinner. The Chart House is one of the top three restaurants in the city and the whole experience for incredible, but that is not the point of the story. Here’s the point. We were test subjects.

Chef Wayne was in the process of hiring a new chef for the kitchen and we were part of the try-out. So what is a chef interview like? At a 5-star restaurant, with a boss like Chef Wayne, it goes a little something like this. The interviewee is provided with all the fresh ingredients to cook a meal (it this case: appetizers, soup, salad, side dishes, main course, and dessert). The chef then tells the candidate, “Impress me.”

The interviewee then begins cooking. The Chef is judging him on organization, timeliness, taste and presentation. If the Chef is impressed, the interviewee is hired. If the Chef isn’t impressed, the interviewee hits the bricks.

Talk about being results oriented. What if we were able to hire teachers in a similar manner? "Here’s the class, here’s the lesson plan and resources, now teach a mini-lesson and impress me."

I would ask, what if we could hire administrators the same way? But, in some places we already are. The Leadership Development Academy (LDA) in San Antonio is a one year interview for aspiring assistant principals and principals. These aspiring leaders are working everyday with the toughest kids in San Antonio, with this mandate: teach the toughest of the tough and show that you have what it takes to move to the next level. And it works.

Some staff are being plucked from the program to fill leadership positions as they open up, some staff are on the “A” list to move up soon, and some staff have shown that though they were willing to talk the talk, they are either unwilling or unable to walk the walk.

Bob Brezina, taught me to hire based on potential, retain based on performance. Chef Wayne and the LDA take this to the next level; hire based on performance, retain based on performance.

So what happened to the chef who was being interviewed? In a unique turn of events, he was asked to come back and interview again the next night. As those of us in the dinner party can attest, he nailed the crab stuffed mushrooms, pear and goat cheese salad, lobster bisque, potatoes, grilled sea bass and chocolate soufflé. However, he fried the spinach. Evidently, you don’t fry spinach in Chef Wayne’s kitchen.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your Turn…