Friday Focus - 10/11/13

My New Focus

I've been putting myself under a bit of pressure every week to write a witty post entailing deep observations about the world and education and Sauk Prairie. (I know, right? It's amazing that even with that pressure I've been so bad at it.) In any case, that has sometime prevented me from sending out a post every week, just to keep you all in the loop. So to rectify that, I am instituting the "Friday Focus," a kind of weekly newsletter from the principal's desk with the goings on for the week ahead. It might also include a thought or two about the week just past, but basically, the "Friday Focus"  will be the kinds of informational items that clutter up your email or our staff meetings. Hopefully this format will allow us to be more efficient with our time, with our inbox space, and more effective at keeping everyone up-to-date. If you have items for the "Friday Focus" please send them to Chad or Marcia by 8:00 am each Friday.

Long-term Sub for Teresa

While we are all missing Teresa, we can be super happy to welcome Kirsten Johnson to our high school family. Kirsten is very well qualified to attempt to fill in for Teresa in her absence. I know worry over having a qualified sub was weighing on Teresa's mind, so great job by Shane to secure the services of this outstanding young educator. Stop by and welcome her to the building when you get a chance. 

ACT/PLAN/EXPLORE

On Wednesday, we will be administering the 3 different tests to almost 650 students. Because of the three tests and the varying levels of accommodations needed for Special Education, 504, and ELL, we have nearly 50 different testing environments. Laurie, Tonya, and especially Owen, with a big assist from Laura Lang have been working to make this schedule as problem free as possible.

However, we have never had a testing environment anywhere near this complex. What that means is that just about every adult in the building will play a role in the testing. It also means that, because there are three test going on simultaneously, all proctors will be responsible for the administration of the test in their rooms with their group of students. I understand that this will be radically different from our WKCE testing environment, especially in the level of responsibility for each staff member. I trust that each of us will do the best we can, and I plan to spend as much time as we need in our staff meeting on Monday going over everyone's assignments and the test administration procedures. 

I also fully expect that even with all of this planning, something is likely to go very wrong. It has the possibility to be a chaotic day. I rely on your professional judgement to help us limit that chaos and for your feedback to improve. Remember, this is a trial run. Next year we will likely have to do exactly this, only the results will have lasting consequences for our students, our district, and with Educator Effectiveness, each of us. I am very happy we have the foresight to practice this chaos. I hope you are too.

ARP Updates

Thanks for making a smooth transition to the next modification of ARP. I haven't heard any feedback, positive or negative, this week. I have heard some questions about whether we still need to use written passes. The revision committee talked about this very thing and decided to leave written passes as part of the travel plan. Their rationale for doing this was to provide the "receiving teacher" with a means to control which and how many students came to them during ARP. If we no longer think this is an issue, we can talk about modifying that piece, but please continue to use passes until we come to consensus for the sake of consistency. Also, please remember and respect that the other prohibitions against movement during ARP still exist. Movement should be very restricted except at the very beginning and at the half-way point. Lastly, if a student goes for help during the first half of ARP and wants to return to their ARP room, it seems to me this should be allowed. What does the group think? Maybe we can take a quick "fist-five" on this in the staff meeting on Monday.

Managing Chad's Schedule

I love having the opportunity to chat with each of you, either to hear a new idea about how to meet a kid's needs or to laugh or to problem solve an issue you are having. However, through 1 and 1/2 months of the school year, I am as yet unable to get on top of both the management of our school and the instructional leadership that I feel is the most important part of my job. That isn't anyone else's fault except mine. The reality is that I am so excited to be here and I see such potential for greatness around every corner, that I just want to tackle everything.  As a result, I feel I am truly effective in almost nothing I do right now. 

Over the next few months, that will start to change. Both because my newness here will have faded and because I will be better in tune with our needs and our future. However, I also feel I need to make some modifications to how I conduct business, so that I can carve out the necessary time to be with you in your classrooms where the really important work of our school takes place. 

To that end, I am turning over all responsibility for my schedule to Marcia. She will set my appointments, schedule my time in class, and end meetings when the have run over schedule. Marcia is thankfully willing to take on this responsibility and I am sure that she is going to do it better than I ever could. To make that possible, I must ask the following things from you:

• if you need to meet with me, simply make that request of Marcia. (she will know my schedule better than I will)
• please share with Marcia a quick summary of what you want to meet with me about (she and I are going to work to have a common set of priorities for how long to meet and how urgent a request to meet is so that we can better schedule and serve you)
• please understand if Marcia asks if I can meet with you in your room instead of you coming to my office (this will at least get me into your classroom, even if it is when there are no students there.)
• please understand that Marcia will be the new "decider" on the "Do you have a minute?" questions (I'm afraid that if it is left to me the answer is always yes, even when it should be no) while this may be temporarily frustrating for you, you will also get my full attention when you have it, instead of the distracted me many of you are often getting now.

Thanks to all of you for honoring these requests. Following a week where I was in the office after 9:00pm three times and completely spaced on a department meeting I was to be at at 7:15am, on top of only spending about 35 minutes in classrooms in the last two weeks combined, I have to make some changes...or I'm not being the principal you all deserve. This plan shouldn't make me less accessible to you. It is designed to make me more effective in the time we are together. If it is not working after a trial period, like everything else we do, this will be revised. Let me know if you have any questions.

Request to Attend Form Procedures

Please remember to place these in Marcia's mailbox. Very often she needs to fill out a requisition/P.O. associated with it and if you just give it to me and then mail it over to District Office that step is missed. Put them in Marcia's mailbox and she will take care of getting my signature and routing them appropriately. 

Packing Slips

Please make sure that the packing slips for any orders you receive find their way to Marcia in a timely fashion. We were scolded this week and reminded that bills cannot and will not paid until we verify receipt of the order. Thanks for your attention to this. 

Junior Class Advisor (interim)

In Teresa's absence, we are in need of a interim Junior class advisor. If you are interested, please let me know and we can chat about what that interim position might look like.

Things I am reading and thinking about this week: 

Program Halted After LA Students Breach School Ipads' Security In A Week by Fox News
When I read this article, I am struck by how much educators miss the point of tech integration as a goal. The devices I know how to use effectively, are the devices I have integrated into my life: my smartphone, my tablets, and now my Chromebook. If a tool is only "ok" to be used in one aspect of my life, I will replace it with one that I can use anywhere. This is even more true of kids. So, if you feel the need to control everything a kid does on a tech tool you give them, you probably shouldn't give them the tool in the first place. Even if you can figure out how to exercise that control, the tool will never be fully utilized by kids anyway, and thus will, by definition, be a waste of resources.

Leading Innovative Change Series: Excellence Lies Within by George Couros
I've mentioned before that I have a bit of a principal-crush on George Couros. I just really like the way he thinks about leadership and education. Reading him can give you a glimpse into how I think about the world. Caution: That can be scary!!


It's Time to Stop Averaging Grades by Rick Wormeli
Grading and reporting reform has been a topic of debate, and often argument. Rick Wormeli, one of the first National Board Certified teachers, writes compellingly from one side of the debate.


Learning and Failure by David Truss
A great info-graphic to consider the relationship between learning and failure and we as educators can interject ourselves into the relationship to facilitate success.


A Bit About Blogging by Lyn Hilt
Another great look at reasons for students to blog. I know I keep beating this drum, but the power unleashed by allowing, encouraging, forcing students to become creators of content instead of just consumers, cannot be overstated in my humble opinion.