I’ve embedded an interview with the Commissioner of Education, Dr. Diane DeBacker. Deb Haneke does an outstanding job of asking really important questions of Diane. I would urge all Kansas educators, and even educators outside the state of Kansas, to listen to the entire interview. Diane touches on some very important topics.
I’m especially interested, and encouraged by the things that Diane has to say. I hope that what she believe should happen in education can be made to happen. She’s a good thinker and has a clear vision of what our schools should look like. I hope she doesn’t get buried by the bureaucracy, and the special interest groups who are only interested in protecting their own turf. With her leadership I have faith that we can experience real school change.
You can also view some very interesting interviews with state Board of Education members, And Cheryl Semmel, executive director of United School Administrators of Kansas by going to the Crisis In The Classroom website. – Steve Wyckoff
For many years I have spoken to perspective building administrators as an adjunct professor and as a visiting lecturer. This week I had the pleasure of visiting with a class of prospective school administrators at the University of Kansas.
I’ve always enjoyed these visits mainly because I enjoy listening to myself speak, but the students have always been polite and somewhat engaged. My topic is always centered around school change, which for the most part is of little relevance to school administrators.
Typically the students are much like well-behaved students in a driver’s ed class. They already know how to drive a car and they are simply suffering through the class to lower their insurance rates. In this case, the master’s degree students in educational administration are pretty sure, no very sure, that they already no what a principle does and how to do it. They’re just putting in their time to earn the certificate that allows them to be principals.
This class was different. In fact, at one point I even asked them if deep in their hearts’ they already knew how to be a principal. They responded “yes.” But in spite of that there seemed to be authentic emotional engagement in the conversation. They seem to truly believe, as Prof. Neil stated, that we may be nearing the tipping point in education.
Perhaps they were just sucking up but I got the sense that they were truly concerned about what we’re doing in education and that we are headed the wrong direction. I hope so. If we don’t engage in real school change soon, we may be in real trouble as a society. – Steve Wyckoff
I just saw a tweet about the book The School Principal Visionary Leadership and Competent Management. In part of the summary there is a quote, “Today, school-level administrators are expected to be both visionary leaders and competent managers.” I haven’t read the book but my first impression was, “I don’t think so.” This is not [...]
The whole question of leadership versus management has been on my mind for some time. Years is in fact. I’ve watched as we were told that principals and superintendents needed to be leaders not managers. And magically, even though they were doing exactly the same things on their job, they became leaders rather than managers. [...]
In the innovative educator’s dilemma part 1, I talked about how your best customers can drive you out of business if you’re not careful. That your best students with the most influential parents will keep you in the old paradigm of education, traditional schooling, right up to the point that they leave for private schools, [...]
Why can’t schools change? It’s an interesting question. If you ask many educators they would say that schools have changed dramatically. I disagree. I think what goes on inside some classrooms has changed dramatically, but not schools. We do use more technology in classrooms; projectors, computers, smart boards, etc. But what we’re doing inside those [...]
Erie school district has been blessed. By Mike Carson, Rose Frey, Ted Hill, and many many others who were involved in the transformation of their school. Erie high school is unique. What makes them unique is that their focus is on their students, and their student’s futures. Erie high school has changed what the students [...]
