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Compass PD Podcast with Dr. Carrie Hepburn
Compass PD Podcast with Dr. Carrie Hepburn
Compass PD Episode 29: Mastering District Leadership-Budget Planning to Effective Communication
Have you ever thought about how your school calendar could embody your values? Imagine a shared understanding of priorities that fosters deep relationships and maintains balance within your school community. I'm your host, Dr. Carrie Hepburn, inviting you on a compelling journey of school district leadership. Together, we'll uncover the power of Professional Learning Network meetings, build robust communication plans, and navigate hurdles of time management and staying motivated amidst the chaos.
But that's just the tip of the iceberg. We'll also delve into the often daunting world of budget planning and data analysis. Picture an ideal budget, a financial roadmap that reflects your educational goals and realities. We'll discuss how to use data to make tough decisions and the significance of immediate intervention when your classroom structures, routines, and pacing derail. Also, discover how shadowing students can enhance your understanding of their everyday experiences. As we close out, we highlight the importance of resource sharing, goal prioritization, and budgeting for ambitious dreams. And in the spirit of reaching the stars, let's share this episode with fellow leaders. After all, our collective impact could transform the learning journey of a million students!
Hello, dr Carrie Hepburn here from the Compass PD podcast and today you're going to just be with me. If you've been listening to the podcast the last couple of months, you'll notice that we think about school districts as a system and we work really hard to create a podcast that delivers information that's important for each stakeholder within that system. Our goal is to help those different stakeholders within the system align so that they are competing if we're headed toward the same goal. We want to prepare you so that you can be proactive versus reactive. At different times within the school year and lately I've been asking my colleagues about something that is happening in their life lately and I thought people are really resonating and connecting with the team as they hear about what's happening in our lives.
Speaker 1:And, to be honest with you, the last couple of weeks for me have been a whirlwind. I've been in places like New Jersey and in Illinois and Iowa and Missouri working with district leaders and with teachers on all things around curriculum and instruction and assessment. So I've done things like teaching in classrooms and mentoring new teachers, working with district leaders to create curriculum cycles and professional development cycles and proficiency scales. It's been really wild but it's also been super challenging for me the last couple of weeks as I lost my sweet dog Millie, who was a seven and a half year old Neapolitan mastiff, and I'm sure many of you can understand how challenging and difficult it is going into work each day when you've got like just this sadness in your heart and we knew it was coming, and so the stress that goes on with having an aging pet. So it's been really sad and people have been super kind and my colleagues sent me flowers the other day, but it still doesn't like when I come home and I don't have that sweet little girl like greeting me at the door. It's been a little sad, but I know it's part of it and I'm doing everything I can. My husband and I are determined we're not getting another dog for at least two years. But right now in my heart I'm like maybe we could just make it till Christmas, so praying for us that we were on the road a lot. We don't need a puppy right now and in my heart I'm like maybe, maybe just one by Christmas or January Terrible idea, remind me of that. It's a terrible idea to get a dog in the winter when you live in the Midwest. It's never fun potty training. Okay, so I digress.
Speaker 1:Let's get on to the podcast. The focus of the podcast today is that I'm going to be sharing with district leaders who are in the curriculum, instruction, assessment, professional development department Information for the beginning of the school year so by now you're a couple of months into the school year and the last two podcast episodes that I've led. We are talking about four big topics that kind of rule your world when you're in that department Calendar, communication, budget and data. And I'm sticking with that theme throughout this school year. So I want you to know that each month I'm adding a little bit more to that, and so you're kind of like Dr Needringhouse talked about in her last podcast, like juggling these plates, keeping them all in the air, and we're just going to add a little bit more and a little bit more.
Speaker 1:I want to first start with your calendar, the last episode and episode 20, leading the organization, the essential skills for curriculum and professional learning leaders. I talked about utilizing your calendar to highlight what you value Relationships, balance in your life, staying connected to those that you serve. With that in mind, here's your opportunity for reflection this month. I'm going to ask you to take just a moment to reflect what is working and what's not working. Think about am I in schools? Am I in classrooms? Am I attending PLN meetings to collaborate and connect with job likes? If you're like, what is a PLN, a professional learning network, typically in your area that are doing the same type of work that you're doing, people that you can talk to, you can problem solve with, you can navigate what the state is asking of you. And another thing I want you to consider is do I have time to work during my work day in the week, or am I having to do that all after hours, on nights and weekends? I'm asking you to take a hard look at your calendar and do some reflection right now.
Speaker 1:If you aren't able to use your calendar to highlight what you value relationships, balance, serving your stakeholders what is getting in the way? Is it things that are unexpected? If so, are you noticing trends? Are you avoiding situations like PLNs because of your workload? And personally, I will tell you from experience, I would become overwhelmed and then say I don't have time to go to my professional learning network because I have to get all of this work done. However, what I noticed was when I went to those meetings. Those times that we got together, that's where my cup was refilled, that's where I was energized. Talking with people who did the same kind of work as I did could be therapeutic sometimes, and there would be times where people would be venting. But if you have the right leaders and if you structure it correctly, you can really get some work done in those professional learning networks, solving some of the tough problems that you and your district are facing. So I want to encourage you to think about your calendar and think about how your time is being spent and reflect and see what you're noticing and then make some decisions based on that.
Speaker 1:Let's move from the calendar to communication. I'm never going to stop saying this, but it's going to take at least five to seven times for something that you're communicating to be fully understood or heard, even maybe not even understood I should change that to heard. In education, you cannot over communicate. Your stakeholders are receiving tons of information from all kinds of people. You need to develop a communication plan that's setting everyone up for success. By now I expect you, or hope, that you've sent out at least one email, one newsletter, one communication regarding first quarter, my preferred mode is a newsletter If you want to learn more about that, you can go to episode 26, where you're going to learn about some ways to get started. Not everything that you need to communicate, but some really nice list of places to get started. By now, this time of year, I am pretty confident that you've heard your fair share of rumors. I say rumors because in schools we have tons of stakeholders and there's a lot of emotion around the work that we're doing, because it's important. This is another reason why transparency is vital.
Speaker 1:Be as upfront as you can and talk about as much as you can when you can. There are going to be topics that you're not allowed to discuss. When those kinds of things come up, I say things like it's the beginning stages of the discussion. We're at a point where we're able to talk about that yet. Or I can say things like there has been some discussion, but it's early and there's no decisions. Once I hear more, I can share it with you. Then guess what I do? I actually do follow through with that. Follow through with what you say you'll do. This is another way that you're going to build that trust with your people. If you can say it, say it. If you can't, tell them. I can't right now. I will as soon as I can. I'm going to share that with you Before I wrap up this communication section.
Speaker 1:I want to remind you that as you are in meetings and receive questions, you're going to notice trends in those questions. You're going to start noticing trends in those rumors. This is feedback for you. There's misunderstanding somewhere. Whenever you can address those questions or those rumors in your newsletter by delivering information, not saying I heard a rumor, just deliver the information and then, every time you get a question in a PLC or in a principal meeting or you receive an email, say that's a great question, check out my newsletter and send them to your newsletters and let them know where it's at in your newsletter. This is going to help train your people that your newsletter is a great place for them to go first before they reach out to you. In the end, what that's going to do is that's going to free up some of your time and it will reduce some of the things that you're seeing in your email, which is always a good day.
Speaker 1:Now we've talked about this time of year already. We've discussed calendar, we've discussed communication and this month I'm really going to spend time on budget and depending on the size of your district. This is crazy talk, I know, but some of you are already discussing budget. It's not even October and we're talking about budget for next year. Well, keeping this in mind, I want to let you know a trend that I'm noticing as of September of 2023, when I'm recording this.
Speaker 1:A lot of trends that I'm seeing is that we don't have strong visions or strategic plans in place. We don't have something that's guiding the work of our district. First of all, this is concerning because it leaves planning and budgeting opening to like willy-nilly, all over the place kind of ideas. It doesn't create a safe space for our stakeholders and it certainly isn't a wise use of taxpayer money. I'm going to kind of leave it at that and I'm going to say if you don't have a long range vision or strategic plan that's guiding what your curriculum, instruction, assessment and professional learning looks like, that's something that you need to put in your budget now as a priority. Secondly, I've I'm asking you to collect data so you can make good decisions regarding your budget.
Speaker 1:The wisest use of funds you can use is increasing teacher knowledge and building capacity based on research and evidence based practices. It never fails in a district will spend 500,000 to a million dollars on a resource that lasts five years tops, and then less than $20,000 on professional development. I cannot stress to you enough that, regardless of the resource, without foundational knowledge of content and instructional practices instructional best practices before you buy a resource that resource is going to fail Ultimately. You're not going to see long term results. It'll be temporary, but continued investment in staff and their knowledge is always going to withstand the test of time and I think that there's a ton of research out there about that. But we're constantly looking for quick fixes and a bandaid approach to solving this problem. So right now, if you are a professional development leader, be thinking about the curriculum cycle or your PD cycle, your professional development cycle that you want to begin with and a particular content area, or if you want to try something district wide, then consider those costs.
Speaker 1:I wanted to invite you to read one of our articles and I'll have it linked in the show notes about the best practices of professional learning. It's called mastering the art of professional learning unlocking the five critical attributes for success. As you read this, I encourage you to dig into the research that's cited in the article. You don't just have to take our word for it. You can go into the research and draw your own conclusions. I also want to stress that I understand the need for resources, subscriptions, materials, and you need to ensure those are in your budget as well.
Speaker 1:When you're planning a budget this early in the game, it's challenging to receive accurate quotes, so you need to think about not planning for the bare minimum of money that you're going to need to pay for the things that you currently already have in place that are reoccurring subscriptions, reoccurring replenishment of materials and resources. Now, I'm not saying I want you to pad your budget. You have to be fair when you think about the budget overall, but understand current rates are going to change, especially right now during this time of inflation that we're seeing things cost rising in everything that we're doing. I was blessed to work with several leaders in curriculum and I learned all kinds of ways to navigate the stressful season of budgeting. One of my best tips is to create like an ideal budget, like where, if money was no object and have all of the things in that budget and then I had a list of all of those items in a hierarchical order that could be cuts, as those inevitable cuts happen throughout the year.
Speaker 1:As you're in the season of budgeting, keep in mind what your data is saying. I know you don't have a lot this early in the school year, but for some of you it's a start, and I want you to keep in mind a lesson I learned long ago when people are asking for more things, it often means that they're confused about something, and that can be alleviated with you guessed it increasing knowledge, content knowledge, understanding, investment in those that are doing the work, that are asking for the things. Then, lastly, I want to talk about data. Last month, I asked you to intervene if the data was telling you that there were issues with structures, routines and pacing. Right now, nipping those problems immediately can ensure optimal learning for the school year. If this is still an issue, you have no time to waste. Think about this. You only have 180 ish days in the school year to impact student learning, to impact instruction. So if, by now, we don't have structures, routines and pacing on pace in place, we've already missed six weeks of instruction, and it's not even October. Take care of it now. Couple things I want to tell you regarding data Typically second quarters, where you're going to see the most growth because structures and routines that are in place. Students have built relationships with their teachers and their peers and there are minimal disruptions, and so capitalize on the opportunity right now to notice those trends of structures, routines and pacing being in place and that it's happening regularly. Be sure to note that and then, as you see the data the end of quarter data in the semester data, your screening data coming in notice and highlight that these things were in place and so, as you're seeing growth, that could be a reason that that growth is happening. I want to encourage you to do this.
Speaker 1:Recently, I was in a school and this is another thing point of data. I think that could be really beautiful for you to collect. As I was in a school, I shadowed a high school student. I attended their eight different classes plus their lunch. So do this in elementary, middle and high school, shadow a student. As I shadowed the student, I went into all of their classes with them throughout that day and each class in the high school. So I'm talking high school today. How's their lecture, which was the PowerPoint? It housed their lecture materials and resources inside a Google classroom. What I think was good was that every single classroom was using the same learning management system, or LMS. They were all using Google classroom, but they all housed their lectures, their PowerPoint presentations inside there, along with the resources.
Speaker 1:I don't know about you guys, but one of the first things that happens when I go to a professional development or when I go to learn, I don't think the first thing that I say is, oh yay, I get to watch another PowerPoint or Google slides presentation, no matter like how cute it is or how Pinterest did it up. It is so. That's the first thing that I want to know. Another thing that I noticed was that in each of those eight classrooms, a different expectation for things like phones turning in, assignments, discussions and the routines within the classroom. They all started differently, they all flow differently, they all diff, they were all different, and just trying to navigate eight different sets of expectations, eight different places, locations for resources, eight different ways of turning things in was absolutely mind numbing, and I hadn't even gotten to the learning yet.
Speaker 1:I was super pleased that everyone was using the same LMS, google classroom, but what I noticed was is in each of those classes I had to access multiple resources, so I had to access the presentation, I had to access different materials, and that resulted in five or six new tabs per class, not to mention trying to stay on pace on which tab I was supposed to be on, based on where the teacher was within the lecture. Every time I changed tabs, I lost focus. Every time I had to change or figure out where I was at, I lost the learning or what was happening before, and so I found myself oftentimes confused and not for there to be a flow, that things were connected, I was like my brain was having to reset, reset, reset, reset again and again and again, and imagine that in eight different classrooms. So imagine resetting at minimum six different times just to stay on track. Stay on pace, not in learning times. Eight different classes. So, as I collected data on things just like this, what the students were experiencing, which was absolutely exhausting Before we even started learning, I collected data on what were students doing and what were they learning.
Speaker 1:I noted things like who was doing the work, because one of the things that we talk about at Compass PD is whoever is doing the work is the one who is doing the learning. Later, I took these findings and shared them with our district leaders, and I highly recommend that you do this, that you experience what your students are going through in a school day as a district leader, as a principal, as a teacher. Notice what students are doing, then think about how can we solve this problem. I truly believe that this data is going to be the data that changes the way that you're doing school. Let's switch now to question two.
Speaker 1:So if you listen to our podcast, we talk about trends at the beginning things to have in mind so that you can be proactive versus reactive, and now I'm going into what predictable problems are you going to be facing right now? First of all, a predictable problem you're always going to be facing is pop up expectations and pop up meetings. It's going to happen, don't stress. Know that you need buffer time in your schedule, which is why I've been focusing the last several months on you getting a grip on your calendar. Second, your stakeholders are going to feel overwhelmed. So they've just finished giving lots of data. Many of them are probably sitting in data team meetings and trying to figure out what are they going to do for the students who need extra support. This can be super overwhelming. Listen, ask questions and and think those people for sharing their, for believing in you and for sharing their emotion with you, like their, their concerns with you, and that you're all on the same page and you're going to support them as best as you can.
Speaker 1:And then, right now, everything's just too much. When we don't have a strong vision or strategic plan, with leaders in place to keep all eyes toward the goal, we start grasping for everything. I'm currently seeing this when I'm meeting with district leaders that I serve. We keep adding more and more, hoping something's going to stick and it's going to work. I want to encourage you to pause and to breathe. There are so many wonderful ideas and best practices out there, but doing all of them isn't the answer, and continuing to add and add without getting solid tier one instruction in place is not the solution. My advice is always to go slow, to go fast. Build a solid foundation, teach stakeholders how to locate current and reliable information, have a strong belief system of what good instruction looks like, and invest in learning deeply about content before adding on things like MTSS technology, blended learning, personalized learning and more.
Speaker 1:My final thing is attempt for district leaders, as you think about this time of the school year, know your why and you have a clear vision of what you want for students and how you're going to get there. Breathe. Don't make decisions quickly. Give yourself time to consider the pros and the cons and the impact the decision is going to make on all stakeholders. If you're adding something, you need to take something away. That's something that requires the same amount of investment and mental energy needs to be taken away. Changing things after the school year starts is extremely dysregulating for your people. It's up to you to steer the ship and stay calm in the midst of this storm.
Speaker 1:I just want to say thank you for joining me today. I hope this information was helpful for current and new leaders, and I would love your feedback. If there's something you want to hear from us, just like, let us know. If you didn't know, compass PD has a big goal of impacting the learning of 1 million students. One way you can help us meet that goal is by sharing this podcast with a fellow educator, and if you find this learning helpful, our team works with leaders and teachers in school districts every day. Reach out to us and we would be happy to talk with you about how we can help you reach your ambitious goals. Have a great day.