“One’s philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes…and the choices we make are ultimately our responsibility.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
I have written about the Illinois Vision 20/20 initiative over the past few years in an effort to share policy information and proposed legislation that will benefit Illinois public schools and Illinois public school children. What I like about the initiative is that it is “for” as opposed to “against”, and the issues are relevant, timely and meaningful. The vision involves support for highly effective educators, 21st Century learning, shared accountability, and equitable and adequate funding.
A hot topic is school finance and the Illinois Vision 20/20 team has produced a video about the funding model supported and proposed by the coalition.
It will take a great deal of action and effort to amend the Illinois School Funding Model. It’s essential for all of us to learn, listen, study, and get involved as appropriate to improve structures and systems in place.
“Willingness to change is a strength, even if it means plunging part of the company into total confusion for a while.”
– Jack Welch
Today the Honorable Bruce Rauner, Governor of the state of Illinois, visited Alan B. Shepard Middle School in our District! The Governor is on a tour of the state visiting schools, businesses and communities as part of his messaging and visioning in his first 90 days in office. In Deerfield we represent one of the Governor’s hometown school districts. He attended grade school and part of jr. high school in our district. It is an honor to host the state’s chief executive officer as we showcase the excellence of an award winning public school district. Illinois has been in
Governor Rauner addressing the sixth grade students at Shepard Middle School
business since 1818 and the Deerfield public schools have been educating students since 1847 – our histories are long and deep in terms of the American story. We have experienced ups, downs, and “in betweens”. Right now Illinois is at a critical point in history and public education is at the crossroads and often in the cross hairs. Our Governor supports strong education and strong economic growth. Just as DPS109 is in a period of transformational change and growth, so too is our state. The Governor’s staff was outstanding to work with – those with whom we interacted reflect the best and brightest and each member of the staff was highly professional, courteous, respectful and professional!
In DPS109, each day we aim to Engage, Inspire, Empowereach and every student each and every day. With the Governor’s visit we were able to share real life examples of outstanding local governance and local financial planning. The Board of Education’s stewardship of the public trust and public finances is leading to world class education transforming education for all of our children. Today we were able to share new science labs that reflect our recent world class facilities improvements. These major renovations to the learning spaces in science and STEM are a reality as a direct result of prudent fiscal management of the Board of Education through responsible and innovative use of general state aid. In addition, it is a source of great pride that we were also able to share amazing students and teachers with the highest office holder in our great state. The Governor was wonderful and quite personable in answering student questions, engaging in real and meaningful dialogue and for spending quality time seeing how his hometown school district has grown and changed in the years since he last attended. The sixth grade students were honored to have had the chance to shake the Governor’s hand and to take a group picture and more importantly, to have had their questions answered by a man who many years ago played in the band in the same space where we interacted today – in the Shepard gym!
We chose our new science/STEM labs for his visit as they showcase our Board’s look forward to the future. One of the reasons that last year’s Superintendent’s Task Force for Middle Level Education’s STEM subcommittee recommended upgrading all 12 middle school science classroom/labs was in support of our nation and state’s economic growth. The future for our students is in technology, software, engineering, collaboration, communication, critical thinking, collaboration, as well as a focus on excellence and competitiveness. As the home to major corporate headquarters for science and technology companies like Takeda, Siemens, Walgreens, and others, it’s incumbent upon us to provide world class educational opportunities in our public school district. This year we welcomed scientific expertise in science fair judging as well as in model lesson instruction from local experts from Takeda and Siemens. In addition, we have a focus on girls in STEM, also launched from our community engagement process, and we have leading female role models in our community leading girls in STEM clubs at our K-5 schools during the day! For these and other reasons we were proud and happy and motivated to welcome a visit from our state’s chief executive.
Showing the governor solar panels and wind turbines at Shepard
His visit to our district was a “big deal” to us and our school was shining like it was the opening day! Governor Rauner’s staff members were outstanding to work with and while at Shepard, he toured learning spaces, met with students and with district and community leaders. The learning spaces he toured were the new science/STEM classroom/labs, renewable energy modules, and learning spaces built last summer and serving as prototype labs for this summer’s construction of eight new science labs at Caruso and Shepard. In the picture at the right, Governor Rauner, Principal Filippi, Board President Schwartz, and I are discussing the solar panels and the electricity-producing wind turbines outside of the science labs.
In addition to visiting the world class science labs and addressing all sixth grade students, Governor Rauner also spent some time with the district executive leadership team, school principals and elected local officials including members of the Board of Education. The video clip below showing me, the Governor and the president of our school board provides a snapshot into our time together.
The Governor with our sixth grade students and teachers
The job/role of a superintendent is that of support and advocacy. Support for student education, support for teacher learning and growth, and support for Board governance. In addition, the role/job involves knowing the political landscape insofar as policy and legislation is concerned. This year a coalition of six major state organizations representing superintendents, board members, administrators, principals, business officials, and others joined forces in support of Vision 20/20:
Fulfilling the Promise of Public Education in Illinois. In December I posted on the blog about this Vision and on February 9, 2015, the DPS109 Board of Education joined hundreds of other Illinois School Districts and signed a proclamation in support of Vision 20/20. The Vision 20/20 premise is basically a group of professionals and leaders in the state joining together to state and advocate what we are FOR as opposed to stating what we are against. Some slides from their site are shared below as a graphic example of what this is all about: Highly Effective Teachers, 21st Century Learning, Shared Accountability and Adequate and Equitable Funding.
In addition to the serious tour, talks about renewable energy and policy, the Governor showed his personal side in taking a “selfie” with one of our all star teachers Christian Ball, who asked the Governor if he would take a picture of the “science fist” for his science students!
Governor Rauner and science teacher Christian Ball doing the “science fist”
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. “
– Maya Angelou
As I reflect on leadership, administration, public service, endings, and beginnings, I find the same connections between successful people and relationships. As social beings, we seek the benefits of friendship, mentorship, collegiality – in work, personally, in civic clubs, sports, and hobbies. The people are who/what “matter” insofar as leadership and change, and growth and progress are concerned.
On a personal level, I have the good fortune to serve in four school districts over the past 22 years. Each change allowed me to channel the excitement and possibility about the new beginnings I was about to “encounter”. It is always bittersweet to leave the many relationships I have had the privilege of building over the years in one place. I am confident that many of the relationships will sustain the transition and my departure. What is most exciting about leadership transition and change is that it allows for contributing in another community that has a rich history, strong continuity, and strong community ties.
It is an honor to have been selected to join learning organizations with the wonderful people with whom I have worked and led. My hope is always to meet/greet/start to build relationships with the people and then find out their needs and wants; and my hope is to be able to work together and lead in as collaborative manner as practical in the best interests of the students, faculty & staff, parents, members of the board, and the community in general. It is fantastic to have this opportunity for new beginnings!! Each new opportunity has provided a series of true leadership experiences and opportunities for learning and growth
“There are as many ways to recognize people as there are people to recognize.” -Eric Harvey
When we do employee survey work, “Recognition” is often the most neglected dimension by managers. For recognition to be appreciated, it must be timely and perceived as an earnest expression from a caring colleague. Get to know your coworkers as humans beings and understand how they prefer to be acknowledged, recognized and rewarded. Then catch them “doing things right” and do the needful with enthusiasm. Taking time for oneself, one’s family and one’s faith. Leadership involves balancing the many “pulls” in one’s life and enjoying all of the gifts that life has to offer. Each day is a gift – take care to not take for granted!! Here in DPS we have sustained a focus on The Leadership Challenge (Kouzes & Posner) and Encourage The Heart (recognition is part of this) is one of the five practices of exemplary leadership about which they write.
Essentially my whole focus is on EXCELLENCE – I have lived my life by this focus, I conduct my work by this focus. As a public school superintendent – a proud superintendent – my charge is to support student growth and learning every day – I am held to high standards by my school board, my staff, the students, the community – everyone. And I should be held accountable to very high standards, and my performance is measured – as it should be – according to established best practices and internationally accepted standards for leadership.
I also have had the honor of working for several years as a Sr. Educational Consultant for HUMANeX Ventures (Ventures for Excellence) as a practitioner scientist, researcher, trainer, and developer of leaders. In my roles (private and public) I work on helping others reach heights higher than they thought they could reach through scientifically validated highly predictive instruments and research and analyses used in selection and development of staff.
During my more than two decades of public educational leadership, teaching, and service, I value the coaching I have received through mentors and coaches powerfully dedicated to supporting my impact as a leader.As I read the news about “reforms” and legislation and philanthropic efforts toward impacting education, I state emphatically and publicly that selection of staff AND the development of staff will lead to excellence in our schools. Personal and professional connections lead to supportive relationships and culture.
As we approach the end of one calendar year and the beginning of another, I appreciate the opportunity to serve, reflect, and lead!
“In order to be a leader, a man must have followers. And to have followers, a man must have their confidence. Hence the supreme quality for a leader is, unquestionably, integrity. Without it, no real success is possible.”
– Dwight D. Eisenhower
In Illinois, as well as across the nation and world, there is much written about education and reform movements and efforts. In Illinois there have been sweeping reforms over the past few years with legislation around administrator and teacher evaluation, curriculum standards, and recently regarding school funding (SB16). So much is at stake when policy makers consider changes to public schools when they consider societal effects on the public schools and the shared responsibility of all to support growth of our local, county, state, regional, and national endeavors.
In DPS109 we have a lot of work to do in terms of educational reform and instructional transformation! This year has been particularly stressful on our system and staff and parents with multiple initiatives launched at once. One of the main reasons for our rush is the sense of urgency we feel in support of innovative and forward thinking education so that each and every child may succeed and flourish in an educational environment with high expectations and modern evidence based instructional strategies. We are grateful to our stakeholders for communicating with us – pro, con, support, concern – this helps guide and govern our work.
As part of the communications campaign of the groups sponsoring Vision 20/20 I am sharing the informational video below as well as links for more information if you wish to get involved in this “reform,” “transform,” and professional approach to take charge of public education in Illinois. The Illinois Vision 20/20 resources page has links to evidence based finance information as well as current curricular mandates in effect for Illinois public schools.
For more information and an overview of Illinois Vision 20/20, please take a few minutes and watch the following Vision 20/20 video: Fulfilling the Promise of Public Education:
