Educational Administration

Leadership at the Core

Learning about this leadership eye-opening!  Seeing the roles, responsibilities, and qualities of good leaders really had me reflecting on my own preparations towards becoming a successful administrator.  Good administrators have so many of the qualities discussed it's almost scary to think I can become like that.  My respect for my current and past administrators has increased at least twofold.  

The other night, I was chatting with my district's assistant superintendent, and he was very kind and helpful.   He posed a question to me, one that he's heard many a time from parents and community members throughout his career, "Why do the best teachers always become administrators?" He then answered his own question with, "Aren't you glad our administrators aren't the worst teachers?"  I find it interesting that most administrators do come from the best teachers around.  And I believe they are the best teachers because they don't bind themselves down with all the restrictions, they still find a way to be creative, inventive, and fun for their students.  They make the decision to be that way.  On page 53, Larry Cuban states that, "Autonomy is the necessary condition for leadership to arise... Without autonomy, there is no leadership."  These teachers use what little autonomy there is and cultivate qualities of leadership.  

As I learn more about the core of leadership - who they are, what they do, how they deal, etc., I am glad that I have time to prepare.  I plan to take on a few more administrative roles this coming year and strive to develop the qualities I lack.  The more I learn, the more I'm aware, thus the more I can improve.  The more I improve, the more ingrained these qualities become, which will make me a better person, teacher, and administrator.  This chapter was truly eye-opening - daunting, yes, but also gave valuable insight.

Issues on Shaping Policy

Balance in Education

The words balance means equilibrium, or to arrange, adjust, or proportion the parts to bring stability.  As I was reading this chapter, the main concept I noticed was that good administrators, schools, and districts find some sort of balance.   Every new concept change or standards upgrade or system will claim to be the 'one-size-fits-all' method that we all should adopt.  Every aspect of education is constantly being pulled one direction or another (or many).  Our job, as administrators, looks to be to understand our school, community, and issues and find the balance that works for our particular body of work.  If we can find the balance, we can implement changes, good or bad, but still learn from and not completely leave our roots - what got us there, and we won't be thrown off our forward course too much.

On page 32, when talking about how each school must wage and win its own battle for excellence, John Goodlad states, "Too often school improvement efforts are conceived at the district level and implemented uniformly by all schools in a district at the same time."  He encourages individual schools to develop plans for improvement by analyzing their own problems.  I haven't been teaching all that long, but I hear (each week it seems) that, "We've done this already;" "That didn't last long when we tried it 20 years ago;" "This again?" "This will just fade out in a couple years, so I'm not going to buy-in to it."  Our school is mandated by the district to implement this program, and a couple years later, along comes another bandwagon, and we, inevitably, hop on.  The principal, teachers and staff, PTA, SCC, and involved parents and even students know the issues surrounding the school better than the district.  I would like to see more autonomy at the school level and allow for site-based management. 

Looking towards my future as an administrator, I almost see my administration as a Pinocchio figure, being pulled by strings, yet striving to become a "real boy," where I'd be able move on my own, but with guidance and direction from those around me.  I'll need to be able to find the balance, wherever that may be, so that my school and community can continue moving forward towards excellence.  Knowledge of these issues and topics surrounding administration is power, and provides me with necessary schema to help me tackle these as I confront them.  I look forward to the challenge.

The Roots of Conflict

What exactly do we consider educational progress?

I feel that throughout history, the United States has always been a beacon of hope, a place where freedom prevails, and where the “American dream” can be realized.  However, it seems that in the educational realm, we are always playing catch-up with the others.  Ever since the Russians beat us into space, we’ve been comparing ourselves to the rest of the world.  The policies and demands placed upon education have sought to help us close that gap and to show our prowess and progress.  But where do they fall short?

The 4 values of equity, efficiency, choice, and excellence are great ways to structure the foundation of measuring greatness, but, as the text mentioned, too much focus on one value may hinder the other three.  I think that, if we get to the root of the conflict, we do need educational reform, we do need to focus on the four values, but we need to do it based on where we as a country have come from and where we need to go.  Too much time is spent on comparing ourselves to everyone else.  Some country will always be better than us at something, so why do lawmakers continually push for us to receive better grades on tests than those countries? 

The main insight I received when reading through this was that, yes, we need to improve, and yes, there is a way to do it, but that what we’ve done really hasn’t improved us all that much.  But if we can constantly be improving ourselves from day-to-day, year-to-year, then we can consider that to be progress.  If we can again become our best self, we won’t have to worry if others are beating us, because we’ll know that we are great. 

Rothstein, Jacobsen, and Wilder’s quoting on page 17 that, “It is impossible for a goal to be ‘challenging to and achievable by all students across the entire achievement distribution’” is blunt and beautiful.  I’ve always argued that NCLB is trying to make us all the same, while America has thrived on creativity and uniqueness.  How can we raise every student, not just the low ones?

I think that understanding our past will help me greatly in my future.  I always want to be improving, while using the one measuring tool that works for each of us: ourselves.  This new knowledge will help me assess where a school is at, so I can help push it along and hopefully reach its potential.