Running head: LEADERSHIP PLATFORM

Leadership Platform Sara Whinnie University of Mount Union Organizational Profile

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Abstract Each organization has its own way of establishing collective community, collaboration, and change. In order for a school to perform effectively it needs not only well performing staff members but a group of well-developed leaders. Leaders and leadership styles all differ, however, there are still some characteristic that benefit a school setting more than others. This paper will look at an organization, its vision, and how this vision came to life. It is important to remember that as a leader, change is essential, becoming stagnant is not an option.

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Organizational Profile Rootstown Elementary School resides in Rootstown Township, Ohio and is one of the eighteen townships in Portage County. Rootstown Elementary boarders eight other townships, therefore, students come from a number of different cities other than Rootstown. Rootstown Local School District serves approximately 1,322 students in total and is divided between three schools: Rootstown Elementary School, Rootstown Middle School, and Rootstown High School. The elementary schools houses students K-5 and has approximately 35 staff members including an intervention specialist for each grade level. The middle school houses grades 6-8, while the high school houses students 9-12. Across the street on State Route 44 is the Northeast Ohio Medical University ( NEOMED), students in grades 9- 12 may attend the Bio-Med Science Academy a STEM+M ( Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics & Medicine) Academy instead of the public Rootstown high school. Students who attend Rootstown Elementary School experience a traditional school setting. The school is broken into two main wings. Students in grades K-3 are housed in the rear of the school while students in grades 4-5 are located in the front of the school in their own hallway. Students in grades 4-5 are given lockers and are asked to rotate between two teachers throughout the day; this schedule is utilized in an attempt to prepare these students for the atmosphere that will take place within the middle school. The school houses one counselor, a speech therapist, and a school nurse who splits time between the middle and elementary school. Students within the elementary school take part in four main subject; language arts, social

LEADERSHIP PLATFORM studies, math, and science. All students attend specials (gym, art, music, and library) for 50 minutes on a rotated schedule. According to the Rootstown Elementary School report card for the 2012-2013 school year, the student enrollment is 553 students. The population is comprised of mostly Caucasian students totaling 515 students or 93.2%. There are 154 students or 27.8% who are considered

economically disadvantaged making this schools poverty level low. The minority of this school is 3.7%. Of our minority students, the 3.7% is made up of 20 multiracial students. Students with disabilities total 11.7%. English is the primary language of 100%. Students who come from economically disadvantaged families are provided the opportunity to apply for free and reduced lunches, the school also provides breakfast every morning for all elementary students who arrive early. Prices usually range from 2 dollars 2.50 depending on what the student decides to eat. With regard to our population of low socioeconomic students, the guidance department puts on many different events and programs in which to provide food, clothes, and school supplies. The staff also takes part in this by donating 50 dollars at the beginning of the school year to a fund of their choice, examples include: shop with a cop, coats for our kids, the sunshine club, and many more. Students who are on IEPs and economically disadvantaged students can take part in two programs offered by the elementary school; i-ready and Rovers Club. I-ready is a program that was given to the school through a grant which allows struggling students to take part in an online program that assess and works to enhance their learning at their appropriate speed. Rovers Club is an after-school program run by two teachers who specialize in math and reading. In this program students spend time after school getting extra support and help on both subjects. The PTA within the school is very active and puts on many events to help all students within the school along with staff members. The

LEADERSHIP PLATFORM biggest event the PTA puts on is Race for Education, which has raised over 22,000 dollars each year. This money is used not only for students but to add new technologies to the school which would otherwise not be affordable. Of the 35 teachers, three are male making the ratio of female to male ( ). All

teachers within the elementary school possess at least a Bachelors Degree, while 65% of these teachers hold a Masters Degree of some kind. Of the 35 staff members employed at the elementary school, 100% are certified and teaching core academic subject and elementary classes. Personal Philosophy of Leadership Leadership falls under many different umbrellas, and it is my opinion that there is not one particular leadership style that is better than the other. However, there are skills and characteristics that a leader of education should and must possess in order to be an effective leader. The first characteristic a leader in education must possess, is the ability to work with others. This statement seems ridiculous, however, there are many leaders who dont and shouldnt work with other individuals. Leadership is all about collaboration and delegation. You are only as strong as your supporting staff behind you. Part of being an effective leader in education is knowing when to admit mistakes. Mistakes will happen and are part of the learning process for all leaders. Once the admission has been made the next appropriate step for an effective leader would be rectifying the mistake. Andy Hargreaves and Michael Fullan (2012) stated in their book, Professional Capital, that in order to become an effective teacher it means being fully prepared, practiced repeatedly , but it will take years to perfect until you reach the heights of proficiency ( p.79). I believe this quote can be applied to effective leadership along

LEADERSHIP PLATFORM with teaching. Finally, I believe, common sense is one of the most underrated, yet truly a necessity to being a good and effective leader. Utilizing Reflection for Effective Leadership Self- discovery and self- reflection are essential to becoming an effective leader. In

teaching, it is often hard to admit when a lesson has gone bad or did not go the way as planned. I believe many teachers avoid the reflection process because they feel this admission, or selfrealization, makes them a bad teacher; however, this is quite the opposite. Fullan and Hargreaves present two forms of reflective practice, they feel, all teachers need to be aware of. The first practice, reflective in action, is performed by everyone. Fullan and Hargreaves (2012) define reflective in actions as, the capacity to walk around a problem while you are right in the middle of it (p.98), or the choice you make during presentation, during an interview, or even while in front of your class. What truly sets a leader a part from an ordinary person is reflection on action. Reflection on action is, after the fact, once the practice has finished (Fullan & Hargreaves, p. 98, 2012). Reflection on action is the ability to stop, remove yourself and analyze critically the results of what you have just presented. Often times reflection of oneself is difficult which is why, once again, collaboration is key. Professional Capital finds both practice benefit, from having a mentor or coach who can pull you back, slow you down, give you feedback, and cause you to reflect on what you have been doing, why you have done it that way, and how you may do it differently (Fullan & Hargreaves, p. 98, 2012). Through all parts of leadership success it is collaboration that has demonstrated and brought the most success for all leaders.

LEADERSHIP PLATFORM Facilitating Change One of the hardest things for people to accept is change, and I believe this is no different for teachers. Schools change from year to year, month to month, and unfortunately they sometimes change day to day. Teachers, principals, students, and even curriculum come and go;

however, these are not what makes the school effective. Nothing cannot change. In order for any leader and staff/ teachers to grow, there must be change. It is the leaders responsibility to get the staff excited, make them feel comfortable, and show them the positive to a new process, curriculum or system. There must be effective communication to make change occur successfully; however, leaders often experience backlash from employees who are set in their ways. Many employees do not want to fix something that isnt broken, therefore, it makes it difficult to incorporate change in a unified way. Times change, rules change, therefore, leadership must change along with it. Never be a leader that stays stagnant; you want your staff to see your vision and want to go along with you. Many schools and leaders, fail when they do not have the backing of their staff, and do not have a clear vision. This ultimately hurts staff, students, and the community. One of the most important aspects of leadership is a facilitator of change. Vision Statement Rootstown Elementary adheres to the district statement (2013) which reads, Rootstown schools, in collaboration with the community, will provide a quality education in a safe environment for students to become productive, life-long learners (p.2). Because our school is committed to providing quality education to all students within the elementary school and district we have decided to focus our attention on STAR reading and math. By the end of the 2015 school year, the schools reading performance at each grade level will improve by 5% (up to

LEADERSHIP PLATFORM 100%) and within subgroups by 10% as measured by passage rates on state and local assessments. This vision remains identical for the math statement as well.

Organizational Goals Our school is committed to providing a quality education for all students within the district, therefore, we have begun working as grade levels to assess data collected from the STAR reading and math tests. We will then use this data to implement changes consistently across all classrooms to improve student learning by implementing Teacher Based Teams (TBT). The steps listed below are part of a five step process the school will begin working towards. We feel these steps will help all teachers within the district better understand specific data, assessments, and collaboration. 1. Collect and chart data to identify how students are performing/ progressing 2. Analyze student work specific to the data 3. Each grade level will establish shared expectations for implementing specific effective changes in the classroom.

Implementation of Goal #2 Our district has struggled to meet the needs of students who are considered gifted, on IEPs, and a part of free and reduced lunches. Our school has focused greatly on professional developments for the individual teacher within the classroom; however, this year, the school has decided to bring each grade level together to analyze commonalities in all student data from their respective

LEADERSHIP PLATFORM grade level. This process, as stated above, is known as a TBT. TBTs can be seen as contrived collegiality which explained by Fullan and Hargreaves (2012) is, characterized by formal, specific bureaucratic procedures to increase attention being given to join teacher planning and other forms of working together (p.118). This means grades will shift the focus from an individual teacher to a team of teachers who can function as a purposeful community to better serve all students. TBTs support Fullan and Hargreaves contrived collegiality, they are meant to encourage greater association among teachers and to foster more sharing, learning, and improvement of skills and expertise ( Fullan & Hargreaves, p. 118, 2013). Each grade level is in charge of presenting and creating their own goals based on the data compiled from common formative assessments, pre-assessments, and post assessments. The teams are composed of teachers in the same grade level and an intervention specialist; one member from each grade level is in constant communication with the principal. This member articulates the work of the team and builds consensus among team members. The facilitator will be in charge of keeping a meeting agenda, minutes log, and detailed account of the date and time each step was implemented. In a recent staff meeting, teachers unanimously decided that more needed to be done to bridge the gap between students. The facilitators of each grade level, along with the principal, and curriculum director met to begin discussing proper ways in which to implement step two properly. The grade levels decided that step two would be best implemented by first collecting pre and post assessments on each unit of study for the third nine weeks of school. Teachers will also begin giving common formative assessment daily; recording students strengths and needs. This implementation process has not been completed smoothly thus far. The

implementation began slowly as this process of collaboration was attempting to be started during

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the completion of OTES, and Student Learning Objectives. Many teachers felt overwhelmed and were not receptive to begin this process at the once intended date. After many failed attempts to begin this process, each grade level facilitator decided it would be best to begin this process from step one after the first of the year. This result should not be one of surprise as Fullan and Hargreaves (2012) state, collaborative cultures take much more time, care, and sensitivity than speedily implemented changes or hurriedly assembled teams allow (p. 119). A new schedule has been set, and all teachers have received the new schedule well in advance. To further this, all staff members attended an informational meeting where all details and dates were provided and explained in greater detail. Although this process did not originally go as planned and all implementation of goals had to be stopped, it demonstrated the need for more structured guidance within the faculty, as well as, a teacher community that relays information accordingly and in a timely matter. In December TBTs will start to meet. During this month the TBTs will learn to use the 5 step process which will analyze the most recent data from STAR reports. We have decided to use reading only. Beginning in January, the TBTs will meet twice a month to continue using the 5 step process to analyze data from STAR. The schedule will be to spend two meetings to analyze reading data, two meetings to analyze math data, and so on. We feel if this process is followed and all teachers participate properly our goal for improving performance at each grade level by 5% (up to 100%) and within subgroups by 10% will be met by 2015.

LEADERSHIP PLATFORM References Fullan, M. & Hargreaves, A. (2012) Professional capital: Transforming teaching in every school. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Hess, F. (2013). Cage-busting leadership. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press. Rootstown elementary school staff handbook 2013-2014. (2013). Unpublished manuscript. Rootstown elementary school 2012-2013 school year report card. (2012). (NAEP).Ohio Department of Education.