Fostering A Positive School Culture Through Collaborative Administrative Practices

1. Fostering A Positive School Culture Through Collaborative Administrative Practices A Framework for Excellence: The Role of Administration

2. Session Goal • To outline ways in which Central Office personnel can foster school-level collaborative administrative practices and support the district mission and goals

3. Key Terms… • Collaborative • Distributed • “Loose-Tight” Structures & Processes

4. District Importance “Excellent schools in poor districts implode over time, whereas, poor schools in excellent districts get better.” -Linda Lambert

5. A Leadership Framework THOUGHTS Collaboration Vision What Why How Trust EMOTIONS ACTIONS

6. Shared Knowledge Through Strategic Focus THOUGHTS

7. Strategic Focus These… Should Align With… Ensuring that all students learn Results-Orientation Collaborative Culture • Policies • Practices • Procedures

8. Structural Changes • An academic program supportive of all students’ learning • A system for monitoring student progress • Job-embedded professional learning

9. An Academic Program • How are all students placed in academic classes? • How do collaborative teams refine and consistently follow the agreed upon pacing of a guaranteed and viable curriculum? • How are all students provided necessary interventions?

10. “Loose-Tight” • The Central Office should be “tight” on supporting school sites in making these structural changes and “loose” in providing school, sites the autonomy to make the accompanying cultural changes

11. Monitoring Student Progress • What systems and processes are used to frequently provide collaborative teams with timely data on student learning? • How are results used to provide support and feedback to collaborative teams?

12. “Loose-Tight” • The Central Office is “tight” on the need for schools to support each overarching central office goal • Yet “loose” on each school’s action steps and respective SMART goals • Then monitoring, support, and feedback occur continuously

13. Professional Learning • How is collaboration time embedded during the school day? • How are support and coaching services provided to collaborative teams for their professional learning? • How is professional development, job-embedded and guided by students learning results? • How do tools and routines guide the work of collaborative teams?

14. “Loose-Tight” • Again it is critical that the Central Office shift its focus and resources to be “tight” on ensuring school sites make structural changes to allow for job-embedded professional learning • And “loose” in providing school sites with the autonomy needed to make necessary cultural changes

15. Common Beliefs Through Distributive Leadership EMOTIONS

16. Common Beliefs Through Distributive Leadership • Establish common beliefs • Indentify and articulate the fundamental purpose of the district and the big ideas to achieving that purpose • Trust- encourage organizational autonomy within defined parameters

17. “Loose-Tight” • Loose leadership practices promote collegiality by providing a collaborative team with the autonomy to develop values and beliefs that drive their team and classroom practices • Tight leadership practices promote accountability by requiring a collaborative team to produce artifacts that articulate their focus on student learning

18. Collective Commitments Through Collective Efficacy ACTIONS

19. “Loose-Tight” • Tight leadership is exhibited by focusing the efforts of collaborative teams within the defined parameters • While loose leadership will simultaneously be exhibited by allowing the teams to design, implement, and refine tools and routines to collectively engage in the continuous improvement of student academic achievement

20. Conclusion Educators want solutions that are exotic and easy, but in reality the answers are simple and hard to do.