Leadership of Accountability- End of Final Week

I have truly enjoyed this class.  It has opened my eyes to many aspects of a successful campus.  A campus should be putting the educational needs of students in front of their own wants and desires, clear and open communication, trust, collaboration, accountability, data analysis are all important components of continuous improvement (for the campus as a whole, the students, and individual teachers).

Action Planning and Professional Growth

During the 4th week of my Leadership for Accoutnability class, the assignments included creating a campus action plan and completing an agenda for one professional development day.  Both assignments gave me perspective on what will be expected of me as a principal. 

The campus action plan required a S.M.A.R.T. goal and S.M.A.R.T. objective, identifying the target group(s), three activities/strategies, person(s) responsible, timeline, resources needed, estimated cost, and formative evaluations.

The professional development agenda required an action goal and objective, topic, subtopic, grade level, faciliator(s), location, start and stop times, 9 strategies/activities and within them the purpose, description, steps, and estimated time was explained.

I like that these assignments are broken down into parts.  I will use this as a guideline to set up staff development trainings when I become a principal.  This week's assignments focused on my campus needs and I found it to be very relevant to the future goals of my campus.

3rd Week for the Leadership for Accountability Class

Data, data, data...  this week's readings and assignments discussed the importance of data and how to work with it. 

It was mentioned in one of the readings (I have noticed this about my campus as well)- that schools are data-rich but do not utilze the data to its fullest potential.  A couple of reasons for this is because there is too much data to work with (it is hard to know what needs to be analyzed) and campuses do not know what to do with it (no follow through).

This week's assignment was to make a S.M.A.R.T. goal and an objective for one of my campus' weaknesses.  S.M.A.R.T. stands for S.- Specific, M.- Measurable, A.- Achieveable, R.- Realistic/Results- oriented/Research-based, and T.- Time-bound.  I like that the S.M.A.R.T. approach is a step by step guidelilne to make goals and objectives. 

Last week's assignment was a little overwhelming, but this week it was nice to use a guideline.  It is easier to work with data with a step by step approach.

Mining for Data

This is the 2nd week into the Leadership for Accountability class.  The assignment had many parts which all had to do with milling through data.  The AEIS (Academic Excellence Indicator System) and AYP (Annual Yearly Progress) reports were the two main sources of the data.  So much information is in both reports.  Although the assignments (filling out many charts) was difficult at times, I have an appreciation for what my principal has to look through each year.  I also have a foundation on how to work through the data to help me stir the direction of my campus once I become a principal.

EDLD 5333- Leadership for Accountability

This is the first week for the Leadership for Accountability class.  The assignment included writing a personal vision for leadership in one sentence.  It sounds easy but it was quite difficult.  I want to accomplish many goals as a leader.  I even want to accomplish goals while working towards becoming a leader (now) but to express my "picture for the future" in one sentence was challenging.  I know my statement will evolve over time but I think this is a good start.

My personal vision of leadership is to serve others by putting their needs before my own, to be a person of true integrity, and to do what I ask others to do.

The Completion of My Third Class- EDLD 5344 (Business Law)

Wow, this class was jammed-packed with valid information in regards to school law.  I like that the last assignment had to do with reflection.  It is important to look back on the information presented in this course and reflect upon what was learned and how I plan to apply it in my administrative career. 

The hardest part of this class was the assigned readings.  Some of the readings were hard to stay interested in like the ones having to do with percentages and statistics. 

Overall, I enjoyed this class.  I am surprised that this information isn't taught in bachelor level courses.

EDLD 5344- School Law 4th Week

Wow, there are so many laws, court cases, and expectations pertaining to providing a FAPE (free, appropriate public education).  I appreciate the fact that I'm learning so much school law but it is also scary that this wasn't taught in my bachelor level classes.  I'm glad I'm learning it now instead of later.  This class has been challenging especially while reading about the court cases.  There is not a clear, cut and dry way to handle each situation; there seems to be a lot of gray area.