Perfecting the Practice

By Tim Brooks, Rich Montgomery and Robert Miller
Posted on 2/26/2019 - 6 minute read

Think of your day as a school personnel administrator. Break it down. As a Human
Resources leader, where are you spending the majority of your minutes, hours and days?
Hopping from one meeting to the next; responding to a plethora of email requests; constantly navigating difficult conversations; investigating this; negotiating that… all the while, making literally a thousand decisions before 5:00pm.

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By Tim Brooks, Rich Montgomery and Robert Miller
Posted on 2/20/2019 - 4 minute read

There’s nothing like the excitement of Fight Night. “Camps” have prepared for this moment for months. Camps are the teams of people involved in training with a fighter. Specialists in kickboxing, jiu jitsu, wrestling and other disciplines train with a fighter to complete their skill set. The most difficult of physical and mental training was endured. Although the camp lasts months, years have gone into preparing to become capable of even having the option of training for a professional fight.

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By A.Y. “Fred” Ramirez, Ph.D.
Posted on 2/19/2019 - 6 minute read

The field of education goes through many changes, and if you stay in it long enough, you will see the recycling of theories. One thing that hasn’t changed:  the “Golden Rule” in life, which says to treat others as you wish to be treated.

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By Stuart Caldwell
Posted on 2/12/2019 - 3 minute read

As I recall it was my father who first used the phrase “heart moment” in my hearing.  He too spent many years (over four decades) teaching and leading our nation’s younger generations.  Many of his students rose from humble means to great heights of public and private service. One rose all the way to the office of President of the United States (no, not our current president).  When I heard my father speak of heart moments I took note and I started to see them all around in my daily work and out in my community (with my own children too, but that’s always going to be true for parents, right).  So what does a heart moment look like?

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By Stuart Caldwell
Posted on 2/12/2019 - 4 minute read

How do we know that school leaders are successful?  Improving test scores are the most obvious indicators of school leadership success.  However, test scores provide a limited snapshot of school improvement. They take time to improve and there are many, many factors that go into sustainable improvements that manifest in high stakes accountability (e.g., test scores) improvement.  

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By Stuart Caldwell
Posted on 2/12/2019 - 4 minute read

In our schools there are managers and there are leaders.  For our students in our most struggling schools we need leaders.  Moreover, we need leaders who are willing and able to take measured risks, as the status quo will not achieve the learning outcomes that we must get from our students if they are to compete and excel in our modern society.

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By Sofia Kind
Posted on 1/7/2019 - 4 minute read

After dedicating myself to middle school students for over two decades, I have found the power of a teacher’s smile.

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By Robert F. Cunard
Posted on 1/7/2019 - 3 minute read

The best research study I’ve read about principals’ actual use of time during the day was produced by Horng, Klasik, and Loeb in 2010. Their team of researchers from Stanford University shadowed 65 principals in Miami, coding what they were doing every five minutes for an entire day, constructing an accurate picture of how principals actually spent their time.

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By Dr. Rebecca Stanton
Posted on 9/17/2018 - 4 minute read

Being a parent is not always easy. When your child has special needs, the job becomes even more difficult. Add to that a Twice-Exceptional (2E) child, someone who not only has special needs such as Autism but also is academically or otherwise gifted, and you can imagine where the stress level reaches.

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By Thomas Cooper
Posted on 9/14/2018 - 4 minute read

A 2017 report from the National Council for Education Statistics (NCES) found one in nine school has a new school administrator each year. With the rash of so many newly certificated school administrator being placed in a position of responsibility it is apparent that there need to be pillars of support to guide these fledgling administrators during their formative years of growth and development.

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