Expanding Leadership Capacity

One of a principal's most important roles is to nurture leadership skills among school staff. It involves creating a school with a variety of leadership roles, opportunity for inquiry and reflection, and the change to learn and develop new skills.

There are many ways to help others develop their leadership capacity. They include:

• Inviting them to work on a project outside their area of expertise;
• Asking them to help screen and interview new hires;
• Encouraging them to attend district meetings with you;
• Asking them to work with you to deal with a challenging parent or instruction issue;
• Inviting them to lead a book study group;
• Asking them to serve on the school leadership team;
• Asking them to serve as a mentor for a new teacher;
• Encouraging them to become a member of a professional organization;
• Asking them to present information to the staff after attending a conference or other professional development activity;
• Inviting them to maintain a journal and reflect on the "good," "bad," or "flawed" leaders they know and observe.

These ideas and others are discussed in Practical Suggestions for Developing Leadership Capacity (NASSP, 2009).

I'd enjoy hearing from you about how you work to expand the leadership capacity in your school. I'm always interested in practical ideas I can share with my students and other leaders with whom I work.

Dealing with Declining Resources

No school is immune from the need to plan for a future impacted by declining, or at the best, stable resources. Schools are caught between expectations for improved student performance and the reality that there are fewer human and financial resources to support the program. Almost universally the issue is one of how to be both efficient and more effective.

There are generally three responses. First, you can identify areas where you might reduce expenses by eliminating programs or reducing budgets. But in many schools these efficiencies have already been achieved. Second, you can consider alternative ways of doing things you're already doing. For example, some rural schools have shifted to a four-day week to reduced costs of transportation, food service, and office support. Some have begun to work together by combining programs, sharing teachers, or sharing central office resources. In Michigan one district contracted with a nearby district for a portion of the superintendent's time. Others consolidated human resources or business services. Third, you can prioritize what you are doing. This is often difficult, even when you use data, because it is often seen as valuing one program more than others. If you prioritize be sure to anchor your decisions in your school's vision and mission. Some schools have learned that reducing every program a little isn't very effective. It may be necessary to focus on fewer things and do them really well. Always be sure someone is advocating for the neediest students, those requiring the most support.

Some schools have begun to work together to share professional development. Others have worked with local business leaders to sponsor professional development. Or you might want to increase efforts to identify volunteers, such as senior citizens, to work with students.

These challenging decisions are almost always better when teachers, families and other stakeholders are included.

These are challenging times for schools and their leaders. I'd enjoy hearing form you about how you and your community are dealing with your declining resources.

Advocacy and Emerging Technology

Principals and other school leaders are advocates. They are always advocating for their schools and ways to improve the educational experience of their students. Advocacy can be an effective way to press for change. It is also an important part of our democratic system and allows ordinary people to shape and influence policy at all levels.

Technology has changed the way we advocate, the way we share information about our schools. A recent story in the NY Times discussed how parents increasingly crave timely information about their children's schools. While traditional media will remain part of any advocacy plan, emerging technology is increasingly used by schools to communicate with parents. Many schools have created Facebook pages and Twitter accounts as a tool to quickly share information with families and others about their school and its successes.

Here are some things you might want to consider as you assess your use of technology to advocate for your school.

• How often is your school website updated? Is the information current and easily accessible to families?
• Does your website include information about your vision for your school?
• Does the website provide information that families can use to become involved in the education of their children?
• Does your school have a presence on social networking sites (Twitter, Facebook)?
• If so, what sort of messages and information do you share? Doe you use it regularly to communicate?
• Do families and community know your school has a presence on these sites?

As I work with my friend Howard Johnston to finish our book on social media we are looking for examples of principals using emerging technology to advocate for their school. We'd enjoy hearing from you about your successes and your challenges.

Rigor in Your School: A Toolkit for Leaders

This week I'll be in San Francisco to speak at the NASSP Annual Conference. In addition to speaking on Friday about leadership strategies for creating rigorous schools and classrooms, my latest book, co-authored with Barbara Blackburn will be released by Eye on Education.

Rigor in Your School: A Toolkit for Leaders complements Rigorous Schools and Classrooms: Leading the Way. It is organized around our COMPASS model of change and provides over ninety tools that school leaders can use to work with their teachers, families and community to improve the rigor of their school.

If you're attending the NASSP conference I'd enjoy meeting you in our session on Friday morning or in the bookstore following the session. A copy of the handout used at the conference is available on my website at www.ronwilliamson.com. As always, I'd enjoy hearing from you about the book or about your efforts to improve the rigor of your school.

Myths About Rigor

When Barbara Blackburn and I were writing Rigorous Schools and Classrooms we spent a lot of time talking about the challenges that principals face when working to improve the rigor of their schools. The conversation led us to talk about the myths that are associated with rigor in schools. We identified four of them that we think impact the way parents, teachers and administrators think about rigor.

• Myth #1: Lots of Homework is a Sign of Rigor - For many people this is the most prevalent indicator. Many teachers are proud of the amount of homework they expect of their students. It is often built on the idea that "more is better." Unfortunately the evidence is that "more" often means doing more low-level activities, often repetition of things done earlier. Because students learn differently it is important to vary the instruction with the student and to use homework as an opportunity to deepen understanding of what has been learned.
• Myth #2: Rigor Means Doing More - There is also a belief that students need to do more than they are currently doing. Tony Wagner of Harvard found that classrooms are often characterized by low-level, rote activity. A study by Howard Johnston and me found that parents saw rigor as doing less but doing it more in-depth. That is often difficult for principals to reconcile when talking with teachers and other school personnel. True rigor is expecting every student to learn and perform at high levels and requires that students delve deeply into their learning, engage in critical thinking and problem solving, and be curious and imaginative.
• Myth #3: Rigor is Not For Everyone - There is a belief that if everyone is engaging in rigorous activity, it somehow lowers standards and lessens the value. There is growing recognition that all students must be provided an opportunity for a rigorous educational experience that is more than just a set of courses. It is anchored in the belief that every student can be successful if given adequate time and sufficient support.
• Myth #4: Providing Support Means Lessening Rigor - Rugged individualism characterizes the fourth myth. It is that if students are provided and accept support, it is a sign of weakness. We've found that providing support is an essential component of a rigorous school. Students are motivated to do well when they value what they are doing and when they believe they have a chance for success. When Howard and I talked with teachers and parents about their own rigorous experiences they invariably shared the support that they were provided.

I'd like to hear your reaction to these four myths and about your experience increasing the rigor of your school and classrooms. I look forward to hearing from you.

A New Look at Classroom Observations

As a principal I always struggled to balance the legal requirement to observe teachers and write evaluations with the desire to engage teachers in thoughtful conversation about their teaching. I'm always looking for new ways to accomplish that task.

In The Principalship from A to Z I describe a three-step process that you can use to promote teacher growth. It includes a planning or pre-observation conference, the observation itself, and a post-observation conference. A suggested process and prompts are included in Chapter "Q."

A recent article in Educational Leadership (Dec 2010/Jan 2011) provided another way to engage in really thoughtful feedback and support. Jenne Calasacco, a principal in Hyde Park, MA schedules a week of observations. It provides an extended observation over the course of a week and a set of conferences with the teacher. While my initial reaction was the challenge of allotting so much time to a single teacher, I'm persuaded that such a structure provides a more complete look at the teaching process and how the teacher monitors and adjusts their work.

I'd enjoy hearing from you about how you provide teachers with meaningful feedback about their work and how you engage them in thoughtful conversation about ways to refine and strengthen their teaching.

Social Media and You

Over the last year I've become acutely aware of the power of social media to improve the educational experience of students and to transform the way schools interact and communicate with families and community. My good friend, Howard Johnston, and I are writing a book that will serve as a principal's guide to the use of social media in their school.

We're very aware of both the use and abuse of social media, of concerns about cyberbullying and other forms of harassment. But we've also grown attentive to the ways that principals use Facebook and Twitter to share information about their school and to keep families informed about school accomplishments and events.

Both of us have read, and recommend, a book by Charlene Li titled Open Leadership. It's a powerful book and describes the way social technology has created a more transparent environment, one in which leaders must behave quite differently.

As Howard and I continue to work on the book we would enjoy hearing from you about both the issues and concerns you have with social media, and the way you and your teachers use it to improve classroom instruction. We look forward to hearing from you.