After, Afterthoughts for School Board Members: What is the Main Mission for the School Board?
Note: Training Guides will soon be available for each major learning starting with chapter 1. These guides will enable groups or individuals to self-study or for use in a facilitated workshop.
Chapter 1 – The Beginning: The Rookie is Hired
- Meet the anxious Rookie and the sage
Mentor
as they face real start-up situations.
- Learn about board hiring tendencies.
- Begin to define the territory of the new job.
- Be introduced to systems thinking.
- Be able to apply the five-phase backward thinking methodology in different situations.
- Have the opportunity to apply these skills in your own situation.
Chapter 2 – July: Gotta Know the Territory
- Better understand the first steps in working with a new board.
- Continue to apply systems thinking to real problems.
- Go slow but make critical changes as necessary.
- Establishing trust right away.
- Use a priority setting model.
- Begin planning for teacher negotiations.
- Reflect on why you got where you are in your career.
Chapter 3 – August: Problems in
Paradise
- Set up goals and an evaluation system.
- Establish meeting protocols with the union.
- Review the superintendent’s role and expectations for school startup.
- Define what is important for the staff to know about the new kid on the block.
- Decide on procedures for administrative cabinet meetings.
- Learn more about the territory by walking around.
- Revisit the topic of when the CEO should start making personnel changes.
Chapter 4 – September: Leadership and You
- What is it you need to know about being a leader?
- Is there a difference between leading and managing? Does it make a practical difference?
- What do followers want in their leader?
- Are you managing your folks appropriately for the situation?
- Do you understand and are you using models that should become part of your leadership system?
Chapter 5 – October: Do You Know the Principal Players?
- Elements of Effective Schools research, including the Effective Schools correlates.
- Ideas and components for delegated site-based management.
- Thoughts about vision and mission.
- One way to get feedback from your principals.
- Being part of a Situational Leadership workshop follow-up.
Chapter 6 – November: Making Stylish Decisions
- Learn more about yourself and how others perceive you.
- Understand more about the TRACOM Social Style Model.
- Learn more about the concepts in the development of the model.
- Begin planning to integrate these concepts into the organizational culture.
- Learn about another decision-making model.
Chapter 7 – December: Let’s Get Personnel
- Some components of the personnel sub-system.
- A beginning-teacher induction system with a second-year follow-up.
- Strategies for working effectively with the teachers’ union.
- A tenured-teacher assistance program.
- A management-union program for alternative teacher evaluations
- A value-driven perspective defining staff expectations.
- Developing the accomplished teacher and some ideas about motivating employees.
Chapter 8 – January: Should you Win-Win?
- Learn to apply the principles of a win-win strategy.
- Consider ideas for handling a board-recall election.
- Learn about labor-management trust agreements.
- Review a model for establishing and managing a non-adversarial labor union relationship.
- Gain an understanding of the labor subsystem and its intersection with that of the school system.
Chapter 9 – February: What Business Are you Really In? Does It Matter?
- Consider the role of the superintendent in school board elections.
- Understand the business you think you are in.
- Reaffirm your main mission.
- Understand the roles and relationships of mission, values, and vision and their power for change in the organization.
- Understand an effective strategic thinking model focusing on change and improvement.
- Begin the planning-to-plan phase to achieve an organizational mission.
Chapter 10 – March: Measuring the
Mission
- Learn how to more clearly define KSAs.
- Understand the assessment needs of a system aligned with instructional standards.
- Understand the need and purposes for assessment.
- Be able to define for your system the Why, What, How, How Well, Where, and Who of your learning system.
- Understand the relationship among academic standards, curriculum alignment, and assessment.
Chapter 11 – April: do You Know How to Change? And Why Should You?
- Deal with a serious student situation.
- Review some crisis management ideas in dealing with the press.
- Get some more ideas on delegated site-based management.
- Have the opportunity to review change theory and practice related to a district change effort.
- Begin to integrate selected criteria for improving the system.
- Learn how to use Herzberg’s thinking in negotiations.
Chapter 12 – May: Is the
Mission
Possible?
- Learn how to change a flat tire while going 60 miles an hour.
- Learn from the change experts.
- Learn about the elements of a positive communication plan.
- Review what to do before 60 Minutes arrives.
- Learn how to shorten the planning time in building a new school.
- Share some thoughts on technology issues.
Chapter 13 – June: Thank Goodness It’s Nearly Over. Will I Survive?
- Discover more about a learning organization.
- Find more ideas about staff development.
- Review a technology plan.
- Find out more about employee transition planning.
- Look at creating the corporate future.
Chapter 14 – Afterthoughts: Will Your Difference Make a Difference?
- Will I ever be able to make a difference and leave a legacy? Am I prepared or even thinking about doing so?
- What are the career challenges and dilemmas facing you as a chief executive officer and superintendent?
- Will I ever be able to achieve my impossible dream? And more importantly do I have a dream?
- What is your level of commitment to all students learning, whatever it takes. You are challenged to do something about it—starting today.
- The survival skills and development of an action plan for self-improvement and preparation for your next big life changing step.
Chapter 15 – After, Afterthoughts for School board Members: What is the Main Mission for the School Board?
- Challenged to think about new superintendent transitions.
- Able to review some ideas on effective board functioning.
- Able to check your district’s level of excellence.
- Challenged to think about an impossible dream as a board member.
-
