STANDARD ONE - Strategic Leadership
School leaders will create functions and processes that result in a vivid description of the school's vision, mission and goals.
1A: School Vision, Mission and Strategic Goals
The school's identity, in part, is derived from the vision, mission, values, beliefs and goals of the school, the processes used to establish these attributes, and the ways they are embodied in the life of the school.
Vision of Self as a School Leader
All students deserve an equitable education, supported by quality instruction, consistent communication and teachers who care about them. I will meet the needs of students and staff members through the use of innovative instruction, profound professional development and data-driven practices that will cultivate our success. It is important that we have a safe and caring environment that promotes continuous learning. As the school leader, I will work to empower students and staff members to be the best, and to set and reach goals that produce optimal outcomes
Analyze a Professional Development Project
Students in the Wake Principal Leadership Program received the task to examine and analyze a professional development session in our school during the 2018-2019 school year. Because of this assignment, I learned to be more intentional in planning a professional development experience and ensuring that participants recognize the relevancy of the topics and the exercise being applicable to their practice.
School Improvement Project Reflection
I shared my reflections on the experience of examining the school improvement plan of my school. The school improvement plan is our guiding compass for the school, including the goals we have for our building and community. The SIP plan assignment provided me with greater insight into the framework of our school and as an item of accountability that community stakeholders may reference to inform us of our work with their students. As a result of completing this assignment, I am more informed that school improvement plan process is a connected process that comprises of inquiry, a comprehensive needs assessment and setting SMART goals. By using an inquiry-based framework to learn about the school and pairing it with a needs assessment, to obtain data about the school's functions from staff, the school improvement team then develops SMART goals that address the needs with action steps that all stakeholders have agreed to enact.
Professional Growth Plan
1B: Leading Change
The school executive articulates a vision and implementation strategies for improvements and changes which result in improved achievement for all students.
Problem of Practice
Fellows are tasked with examining a Problem of Practice to explore and develop an intervention program for at our residency site. Fellows may have discovered this Problem of Practice upon conducting observations and through review of the school's outcome data. This is a program that fellows create that will address the issue of concern and support the function and structures of the residency. My Problem of Practice focuses on ensuring that all students at Moore Square are knowledgeable of and participants in our advanced math model from 6th through 8th grade. The Problem of Practice encompasses data review of students who started middle school in advanced math and noting a decrease for students of color into Math 1 during 8th grade. Our administrative team developed an analysis tool comprised of data to determine student enrollment into Math 1 with and without an intervention support course. Additionally, the administrative team developed communication strategies to parents to inform them of the advanced math model to ensure we have full involvement from families in their students' academic decisions. The Math 8 Intervention Plan became an action step of our Problem of Practice in addition to a Math Night we held for students enrolled in Math 8 and their families. During this Math Night, our administrative team, instructional facilitator, and math teachers, provided each student with their proficiency scores and the explained the results to them.
Math 8 Intervention Plan
The Moore Square Middle administrative team assessed academic data of the current performance by 8th grade students enrolled in Math 8 this school year. The team noticed the need for students to receive intervention support built into the Math 8 class due to students experiencing challenges that led to low grades in the class. The team met with the entire math department to share this data and engage in dialogue about a plan to grow students to be successful in Math 8 and for future students who matriculate through math courses during their time at Moore Square. We created a Math Night inviting parents of our students to attend in which the students' teacher will review the students' progress and relay strategies and model the use of resources to use for their students to be proficient in Math 8. As a result of this math intervention plan, I grew in my strategic leadership, because I realize the impact that collaboratively working with administrators, teachers and interventionists on a concern such as academic performance, produces significant results when many stakeholders are informed of the dilemma and actively participate in reaching a solution.
This flyer was made and provided to the families of our Math 8 students. Upon speaking with students about the event, we provided a copy of the flyer to each student. Our Math 8 instructor also provided this flyer to each student in his class. By making this flyer, I became more active in modeling parent contact for staff members and supporting our teachers' efforts in reaching their students. I also began to develop more experience in using digital tools to develop communication materials to families.
This button contains the list of contacts for parents.
Math 8 Night Script
The Moore Square administrative team used this personalized script for contacting families ahead of our Math 8 Night event. We also shared this script with the Family Academy in Wake County Public School System to use in translated phone calls made to families. I learned more about the active role the Family Academy has in our district in partnering with schools to provide families with programming that intentionally honors their current reality.
This button details the planning process by the administrative team for the Math 8 Night with families of our Math 8 students. Because of this experience in planning for the Math 8 Night, I look at logistics differently and realize the vitality in long-term planning for events prior to any incidental events taking place that may hinder the event from occurring. I also learned that having a wide-ranging team whose members have different perspectives is very beneficial in the team meeting its goals.
Culture Professional Development
I created a presentation about the strategies in which I will lead professional development sessions about establishing a positive culture at my school. This presentation provides the audience with my introduction and realistic steps to build connections as a school among staff that also positively impacts students.
1C: School Improvement Plan
The school improvement plan (SIP) provides the structure for the vision, values, goals, and changes necessary for improved achievement for all students. Our school improvement plan team comprises of teachers from each team, administrators, counselors, magnet coordinator and instructional facilitator. The school improvement team also serves as the leadership team. The school improvement plan follows the planning, implementing, monitoring, and evaluating stages and is a living document that evolves over the course of the year. The school improvement plan team reviews the SIP plan and progress made in each indicator quarterly. The school improvement plan was created with a inquiry model comprising of a comprehensive needs assessment provided by the school leader to each teacher leader to ascertain the strengths and areas of growth for Moore Square. In addition to using an inquiry, the school improvement plan team implements the plan to all staff in our second staff meeting for the year and we provide professional learning around each SIP indicator and the actions we conduct as a school that support the SIP goal. As we monitor the SIP plan and evaluate its progress through surveying staff with the use of the chart talk protocol, we update the plan.
1D: Distributive Leadership
The school executive creates and utilizes processes to distribute leadership and decision making throughout the school
The teacher empowerment artifact consists of my philosophy of leadership, my assessment of practices in my former school of building a teacher-leader pipeline and lastly, my aspirations for establishing a teacher-leader pipeline in my future school. The philosophy of leadership contains my personal beliefs about effective leadership practices that support my staff. I used my observations of teacher-leaders at my former school and interviewed staff members about the demography of the school, particularly in relation to cultivating teacher-leaders who became school leaders, and provided this information into a narrative. I also composed my plan for creating for a teacher-leader pipeline that fluidly empowered teachers to recognize their strengths and and become school leaders in a cohesive manner that supports student learning in the administrator role.
The Moore Square leadership team created the duty schedule with an agreed-upon set of duties for each staff member to occupy. The duty schedule honors instructional time of teachers as the schedule does not require a teacher to engage in a duty during their planning period nor their instructional period. The experience in creating the duty schedule increased my logistical skills in determining time availability for staff members to be assigned a duty to complete.