The Balance Beam

The class tonight was an opportunity for us to share our OD projects for the first time. The mini-protocol was very valuable as a way to calibrate my efforts and set objectives for finishing up mu work. Both of my colleagues have done great work and offered solid feedback that will help my efforts. In addition, we began to work on the next set of principal standards. I am going to share the Google Docs work with the class next week so we can create a common document that will be useful to all of us. I need to review my systems scan and get the graphic organizers from class to do my histomap.

Today’s session allowed us the opportunity to become more familiar with the Colorado Laws that govern education. We dug into the law books and resources and engaged in useful conversations around the complexity and responsibility of leading a school from a legal viewpoint. The time spent also included doing a protocol where we asked to respond to the article, “What Young Principals Need to Know” and then discussing its use and application. I needed to leave early and will add info after I see everyone next week.

Today at BC I was able to have a very productive meeting with Audrey around the upcoming planning and implementation of Tier 2 support. We have lined up all the PD and prepared the designated classroom for diagnostic testing. Once the planning was completed I took the remainder of the morning to write the Late Start planning document for the first session. Additionally I requested necessary data from Assessment and Research to create the excel spreadsheet. The classrooms were all engaged in Junior Achievement today.

Today I had an opportunity to participate with Beach Court in a data team meeting. They were looking at a writing sample and scoring them in grade level teams. The teams did very well looking at work and discussing the strengths and obstacles they saw. The goal was to generate SMART goals around what they found to work on in the upcoming weeks. In the early stages of conversation the staff discussed many strategies that they could work on. The group worked well together and I was able to provide some support around maintaining the fidelity of the SMART goal process. Audrey and Frank were quite receptive and I continue to see opportunity to focus my leadership action in the direction of data/RtI/ SIT. If I am able to create a more solid understanding of how these ideas play off each other. The Beach Court team would benefit from seeing the integrated elements of these concepts.

As we talked about the budget process we were given some great information by the principal from Godsman, a former Ritchie. Her practical and honest feedback about completing budgets was very useful in thinking about how we might engage in this process when the opportunity arose. As we listened and asked questions it became clear that it is both a complex and essential part of successful leadership. Some of the key conclusions included:

• Use prior years budgets for context
• Get support from district professional and colleagues
• Ask LOTS of questions
• Always put kids first
• When possible/practical give staff opportunities to be involved and take ownership of decisions
• Start early
• Use SIP to make decisions

During this session we reviewed the various graphic organizers that we could use to manage our data. This data will be the foundation of the work we do on the organizational diagnosis. As I worked with each of the tools I found myself drawn back to my experience with the data coding process I used to complete my action research project. It seemed to connect and extend many of the features of the tools we were using. It is my hope that I can extend my work with data coding and incorporate elements of the other organizers to deepen the work that I do on the OD. The ability to connect the graphic organizers to past practice will allow me to contextualize the idea of collecting and analyzing qualitative data more effectively into the work I do. This process was facilitated by the thoughtful work of my teachers and colleagues. We consistently work to find commonality in what we do with what we will do/should do. I am hoping that I will open myself up to using some aspects of the other tools and that I will not rely on the tool that I am most familiar with. I also think I will need to generate a more visual representation of the data I collected.

The work of session 10 connects very much to the blog I am using to record the work of the program. We discussed the value and use of reflective journaling. I have been “blogging” for quite awhile now as a component of practice and reflection for quite some time now for grad school, Network 5, and to some degree for the math and science leadership groups. I have changed the “reflective questions” I had been using in the past to the ones that were shared at this session. Over the coming weeks I hope to grow my skills at using these questions to generate some clarity out of the confusion of new learning. The process of reflective journaling is one that I feel that we woefully underutilize in our schools and district in general. I made this case strongly in my grad program and my work with Network 5 but resistance is strong due to the seeming need to take “extra” time to do it. However, once the process is developed, streamlined and effectively managed it can serve to greatly increase the productivity of a learning organization.

This session positioned culture at the center of our values, beliefs, assumptions and language. We assessed how culture forms in within and along with and outside of our learning organizations. We are influenced by and influencing of other cultures. One of the most meaningful aspects of the sessions was assessing the role of sheroes, rituals, ceremonies, etc. on the culture of a school. As I develop myself as a leader it would be easy to dismiss the idea of culture as superfluous; however the “sleuth roles” outlined at the end of the session materials will be useful in directing action to take stock in my school. Culture will make or break any school that intends to undertake the kind of complex change that is necessary for all students to be successful.

This session introduced the concepts and underlying framework that supports system thinking. As leaders we are expected to work on the system with the idea of making it work more effectively for those we serve. System thinking is challenging and complex but we can do it if we are thoughtful and reflective about how we operate. I think that my role as an instructional specialist has allowed me to become much more acutely aware of the complexities and challenges of working in a systems orientation. My role places me in a change agent position in multiple systems at all levels of the hierarchy. This can often cause frustration as my influence and control ebb and flow within each of these contexts. I must maintain constant vigilance to be prepared to leverage opportunities to impact and lubricate change. The introduction and use of the systems tools during this session was extremely supportive in developing and extending my mental model around system thinking. I enjoyed “running up” the ladder of inference in our example to the group as a way to demonstrate one of the “tools”.

Finally, I must also try to reconcile the reality that although we are moving forward, DPS is still struggling to adopt a true learning organizational model as a focus of their system model.