Teamwork and Shared Responsibility

Coming off of the excitement of Summer Institute last week, it was great to witness entire teams coming back together in preparation for Open Houses and the return of our students.
Part of our leadership is to make sure that we are all clear on how we can contribute to our organization and our core values. I have attached our values so that you can ask yourself that same question, what can I do to make a difference in these areas? I am highlighting teamwork and shared responsibility as those are two of our core values that were resoundingly evident as I traveled across our schools this week.

Each of you, in your school teams and individually, are committed to a set of shared SAIL goals this school year. Many of you have expressed to me, your deep compassion for the students that will enter your classrooms on Friday. We have the passion and the responsibility to "change the world" for each one of them. Thank you for your contribution to their learning...to their life. In your pursuit of self-actualization, as Maslow framed it, what core values are you committing to the ardor of pursuing with excellence?

Work together...be the tortoise and change the world!

Celebrating Leaders

As I walk up and down the hallways of West High School this week, as a listener and an attendee in all of the customized learning sessions, I am simply amazed at the talent in our district!
A special THANK YOU to all of our presenters this week! Your dedication and sharing of expertise was amazing! I felt such a sense of collaboration and positive energy at Summer Institute that I again feel deeply proud to have the privilege to serve within our wonderful school district community.

Using Instructional Feedback as a High Leverage Practice

As we end the week on such a positive high, I wonder how we can maintain this spirit of teamwork, coherence and grit once the school year gets going? We all did well at bringing our "A-game" this week on the first week back, but how do we operate in January and February when the grind hits us?

I challenge each of us to be very conscious of our unconsciousness. We have all been there, on auto-pilot with our words and actions. What if we could maintain and sustain a better balanced pace of consciousness throughout the school year, relying on our colleagues during times of frustration and fatigue? Think about ways in which you can "be the tortoise" for yourself and for others.

I am deeply committed to helping you in this endeavor, to be great...and change the world...every learner, every day!

Announcement that SummitView is one of the first 55 Nationally Certified Magnet Schools in the world!

Academic and Career Planning

I want to thank Amanda Wagner and Mollie Heilberger for leading the secondary schools through a facilitators training around Academic and Career Planning (ACP) on August 10th. They modeled for Principals, Teachers, and Counselors how Academic and Career Planning can be launched this year in schools utilizing different instructional strategies, and share what outcomes are needed to ensure students have similar experiences across our different school communities. As Amanda and Mollie shared, "the impact of ACP is to produce responsible graduates who will begin their adult life with the knowledge, skills, motivation and a self-directed plan for career and lifelong success."

I also want to thank Melanie Foreman who joined Amanda and Mollie to lead this group through Career Cruising, our tool to hold students' digital portfolios as they work on their plans. School teams entered into Career Cruising as students and played around which lead to lively and engaging conversations for all.

On August 22, every secondary school will have the opportunity to experience what these school teams did on August 10th. Again thank you to Amanda, Mollie, and Melanie for your hard work in planning and leading yesterday. Thank you to the school teams for your engagement and questions. Schools have the opportunity, and should, make Academic and Career Planning their own while hold to the essential outcomes so students can learn about their strengths and build a plan for life-long success.

Dan Keyser
Director of Secondary Teaching and Learning

AVID Update

I want to thank our District AVID Coordinator, Amanda Wagner, for helping to facilitate and organize learning for over 50 School District of Waukesha teachers and administrators this week as we attended the AVID Summer Institute. As I think about this year's theme-Discover, Engage, Succeed, it makes me reflect on my appreciation for Amanda and her leadership with South High School to start on this trajectory several years ago. Through their engagement, we have discovered that AVID helps each student succeed in an intentional, caring way.

With board support, our district will be engaging in AVID school-wide implementation at many of our schools over the next few years. By giving our students the academic and social support they need, we allow our students to decide their own path in life, without barriers.

A shout-out to our teachers, who engage in research-based teaching and learning strategies that can be used in any classroom to increase the level of success for our students, especially those traditionally underrepresented in higher education.

AVID will help give our teachers the tools necessary to equip our students with the writing, inquiry, collaboration, organization and reading skills they need to achieve at their highest levels. The School District of Waukesha continues to be stronger-together!

Jody Landish

Assistant Superintendent of Teaching & Learning

Follow up Center for Applied Linguistics Dr. Jose Medina

Did you know that in the School District of Waukesha there are many ways to continue and grow your servant leaders for Academic Language Learners and Emergent Bilinguals?

Throughout the school year there are several opportunities to engage in ongoing learning to support your service:

August 21: Teaching for Biliteracy 1 and 2

A full day session intended for those who SERVE teachers who SERVE Dual Language Learners 

Audience: Leaders (Administrators, Coaches, Teachers, Coordinators)

This session addresses deeper levels of Dual Language implementation in our District and introduces participants to the significant shifts in thinking and practice that is essential to success with learners.

Two books are required and provided, along with pre-reading preparation.

Any Time, Self Paced, Online: Dual Language Essentials

13 online modules with readings and discussion posts. Individuals, individuals leading small groups or collective/collaborative participation are all possible.

Audience: Leaders (Administrators, Coaches, Teachers, Coordinators, Aides)

These sessions introduce and deepen our knowledge around leading in mutilingual environments (ie. every school in Waukesha).  Each discussion post prepares the participants for the actual work of leading, rather than theorizing.

The online course can be facilitated by a leader bring a team through the modules, or my partners or individuals.

TDP: Success with Academic Language Learners and Emergent Bilinguals

3 TDP sessions offered in January

Audience: Leaders (Administrators, Coaches, Teachers, Coordinators, Aides)

These sessions help leaders to understand the affective and linguistic considerations they need to be present to when ensuring learning for those who are multilingual.  Special emphasis on the multilingual student population who is also learning English as their partner language.

Leading and/or Serving ALL

"A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don't necessarily want to go, but ought to go"

-Rosalyn Carter, former first lady

This week we were blessed with the opportunity to learn together with Dr. Jose Medina from the Center for Applied Linguistics (More photos in the Connect).  His powerful work and messaging with us, has inspired our robust participation from Bethesda, South, North, Heyer, Banting, Butler, Horning, Les Paul, Student Services and Teaching and Learning and coordinators to view our leadership from the perspective of serving our community: teachers who serve learners, bringing a special and focused lens to serving out Hispanic and Dual Language Learners.

Servant leadership is not management leadership but a mission to create a more just world. The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.

The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. 

Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. 

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world.  Indeed, it is the only think that ever has"

-Margaret Mead, cultural anthropologist

That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive....

The servant-first leader ensures the growth of the people and communities in which they belong FIRST: they become more skilled, more confident, wiser, freer, more autonomous, and are more likely to become servants themselves. Servant leaders impact the least privileged in society, or at least do not create further deprivation.

Are you or do you work with a servant leader?  The servant-leader shares power, puts the needs of others first and helps people develop and perform as highly as possible to ensure that the least privileged learners becomes to most likely to succeed.

When we lead to serve for ALL (Academic Language Learners and Emergent Bilingual), we ensure the structures of our schools and programs truly serve our learners.  We ensure those charged with being the difference (teachers) in serving learners are fully served themselves in their effort to do so.  Supported Instruction and Curriculum development, collectively keeping, discarding and creating that which will ensure service to rigorous learning.  Adequate professional processing time to place student impact at the center, and the autonomy and trust in teachers to ensure that curriculum and instruction always responds to learners. 

When we lead to serve, we recognize and embrace our leadership responsibility for ALL.

Impactful Coaching

This week, I had the pleasure to learn alongside several of our administrators during an Effective Math Instruction workshop and an Impactful Coaching workshop. What I admire and value so much about the School District of Waukesha, is the learner and leadership mindset each of us models as part of our collaborative culture.

We have a strong administrative team dedicated to professional growth and learning. Reciprocal accountability and collaboration is so critical to our systematic growth as a district.

Thank you to our dedicated administrators who support one another. Collectively, there is power in multiplying our leadership capacity so that our levels of self-efficacy and skill can broaden our teacher leadership capacity, ultimately changing the positive trajectory of student lives.