EDLD 5399 SISE Reflection

I had a very good conference with my site supervisor this past week.  As always when I visit with her, I walk away with new knowledge and become more comfortable in my decision making as a leader.  After reviewing the intern plan and all the activities I completed, we discussed that while doing the activities was a good concept, it is still not the same as actually being in the hot seat of the superintendent.  We each reflected on our experiences in our individual superintendent courses and came to the consensus that one possibility for future superintendent candidates to get more out of the activities, is to reduce the number of activities but to require more in depth processes with each.  Just as we are pushing our students to “think deeper” with the rigors of state testing, why are college prep courses only skimming the top of experiences?

The other concept I walked away with is that building a network of reliable professionals both within and outside of the district can help extend the life of a leader tremendously.  Without this network, the superintendent can easily find him/herself on an island all alone.  This is not good for the person or the district as a whole. 

Finally, it was very comforting to leave the meeting knowing that she would fully support and recommend me for an entry level position at the district level if I chose to do so.  This arena would allow for me to continue gaining knowledge and in turn becoming a better leader for the future. 

EDLD 5399 Lessons learned from PDP

In developing my PDP, I was able to review assessments, course work, and read other people’s blogs.  By reviewing these items and reflecting, I was able to see the areas where I had a definite weakness or just wanted to sharpen my knowledge and skills. I utilized the information I gathered to then tailor the plan to fit my needs.  After developing and reflecting on it, I realized that some of my goals can be easily met by working with personnel already within the district.  This is comforting due to the fact that as resources become more and more limited, it will be nice to lean on the strengths of others in order to strengthen my skill set and ultimately become a better leader.

EDLD 5399 Three Year PDP

 Year One

Goal Implement data teams as a strategy in the continuous improvement cycle.	TExES Competency and Domain Domain III, Competency 10	Objective (What do you want to improve?) Our method of reviewing and analyzing data in order to implement plans for improvement.	Course Work/Book/ Workshops (How do you want to improve?) Data Teams Workshop presented by Region service center. “Leaders Make It Happen”, An Administrator’s Guide to Data Teams by Brian A. McNulty and Laura Besser	Mentor Professional Support (Who will help you improve?) Assistant Superintendent of C&I Region service center specialist	Date of Completion May 2013	Evaluations (How will you know you have improved?) Improved scores on both formative and summative assessments. Feedback from personnel involved in the data teams.
Goal Become more familiar with Superintendent and Board Relations	TExES Competency and Domain Domain I, Competency 4	Objective (What do you want to improve?) Working relationship between the superintendent and school board	Course Work/Book/ Workshops (How do you want to improve?) New Superintendent Academy ·               Team of 8 Training presented by Region Service Center	Mentor Professional Support (Who will help you improve?) Cohort members of the superintendent academy Region Service Center facilitator	Date of Completion October 2013	Evaluations (How will you know you have improved?) Positive working relationship with board.

Year Two

Goal Increase my knowledge in developing a district level budget.	TExES Competency and Domain Domain III, Competency 8	Objective (What do you want to improve?) My understanding and comfort in developing and maintaining a district level budget.	Course Work/Book/ Workshops (How do you want to improve?) Working relationship with CFO. Workshop presented by Region Service Center.	Mentor Professional Support (Who will help you improve?) Chief Financial Officer Region service center facilitator	Date of Completion May 2014	Evaluations (How will you know you have improved?) Develop a district level budget and have it approved by the board of trustees.
Goal Increase my knowledge of curriculum within the district.	TExES Competency and Domain Competency II, Domain 5	Objective (What do you want to improve?) My knowledge of a vertically aligned curriculum where there is consistency between the written, taught, and tested curriculum.	Course Work/Book/ Workshops (How do you want to improve?) CSCOPE State Conference Conversations with Assistant Superintendent of C&I	Mentor Professional Support (Who will help you improve?) Assistant Superintendent of C&I Region XIII	Date of Completion May 2014	Evaluations (How will you know you have improved?) Have a better understanding of the district adopted curriculum. Understand the alignment between the written, taught, and tested curriculum.

Year Three

Goal Lead  Strategic Planning in a designated area for the district.	TExES Competency and Domain Domain I, Competency 2	Objective (What do you want to improve?) My comfort and knowledge of the strategic planning process and to understand the benefits of it.	Course Work/Book/ Workshops (How do you want to improve?) Region service center workshop of strategic planning basics. Work closely with experienced leader who has experience in this area.	Mentor Professional Support (Who will help you improve?) Region Service Center facilitator Experienced leader with expertise in strategic planning.	Date of Completion May 2015	Evaluations (How will you know you have improved?) Successfully lead and complete a strategic planning team.
Goal Revise staff evaluation process.	TExES Competency and Domain Domain II, Competency 7	Objective (What do you want to improve?) The evaluation process by which teachers are evaluated to make it more of a collaborated effort between administrator, teacher, instructional coach, and central office administration.	Course Work/Book/ Workshops (How do you want to improve?) Region service center workshop Work with Assistant Superintendent of C&I Book study on topic	Mentor Professional Support (Who will help you improve?) Region service center facilitator Assistant Superintendent of C&I	Date of Completion May 2015	Evaluations (How will you know you have improved?) Observation of improved instruction and learning throughout the district.

EDLD 5399 Reflections of a Leader

In this fast paced, ever changing world of education a leader must have vision, communication skills, and be able to plan, do, study, and act on on-going improvement processes.  In order to become effective in the P-D-S-A cycle a leader must become a master of reflection.  Reflection is the key to further learning and without reflection a leader cannot celebrate successes, make change where it is needed, or challenge areas that are already successful.  Throughout this entire year, I have had the opportunity to reflect on a variety of topics. This reflection process has helped me further understand concepts and ideas from different points of view throughout the courses.

Course assignment activities

By reflecting on the course assignment activities I was able to see not only how to apply the knowledge I was gaining, but it furthered my understanding of why things are the way they are in education. For example, by looking at the financial records of both a wealthy and poor district I came to understand how the state was trying to create equity in what seemed to be an unfair system. Now knowing the importance of understanding the state funding, it will be critical for me to continue reflecting on decisions that will affect the budgetary process.

Blogs  

At first I was not a fan of the blog portion of the requirements, but as time passed I came to learn how powerful blogs can be. In reading other cohort members posts and providing feedback to them, I learned new ideas that I have now started to utilize to strengthen my leadership skills. Reflecting on blog discussions has also allowed me to provide valuable advice in areas that I’ve perceived to be of strength of mine.

Course and campus supervised logs

Keeping track of intern activities and documenting them on the logs was very beneficial to solidifying my knowledge base. While I do not think that choosing thirty eight activities to complete in a year gave me the type of experience I was hoping for, it did give me a sample of what to expect. I believe that completing fewer, but more in depth activities would be much more beneficial to future cohorts that go through this program.

Assessments

The assessments in the courses allowed me to gauge my growth in different competencies. These assessments are a crucial step in the continuous improvement cycle. Without being able to study the results, we will not know what direction our next actions need to take. Without these directions, our studies would be like a ship that is lost at sea. 

Other intern reflection experiences

I really liked the discussion boards because it was very convenient to have discussions on a variety of topics in a centralized location. This, along with blogs and wikis, open up different avenues for communicating with others. The collaboration amongst this group of professionals has not only been rewarding, but enlightening as well. We are the leaders of tomorrow and are now a network of educated professionals.