Standard+7


 * Micro-political Leadership **


 * // School executives will build systems and relationships that utilize the staff’s diversity, encourage constructive ideological conflict in order to leverage staff expertise, power and influence in order to realize the school’s vision for success. The executive will also creatively employ an awareness of staff’s professional needs, issues, and interests to build cohesion and to facilitate distributed governance and shared decision-making //**.




 * 7a. Micro-political Leadership ** : The school executive develops systems and relationships to leverage staff expertise and influence in order to affect the school’s identity, culture, and performance.

Internship Activities
 * Attended PLCs
 * Conducted regular classroom walk-through observations
 * Led small group instruction in classrooms
 * Meeting with public relations officer; superintendent
 * Meeting with //Roanoke Rapids Daily Herald// reporter about NELA
 * Analysis of Teacher Working Conditions survey results

Coursework, Trainings, and Readings
 * NELA Assessment Day – reporter scenario
 * Participation in "Witch and Watch" Experiential Learning Activity to better understand communication in organizations with hierarchical structures
 * Participation in "Innovation Maze" Experiential Learning Activity to explore group work, problem solving, innovation, risk-taking and reactions to mistakes

Selected Artifacts

Standard 7

Self Assessment 2010 // Standard 6: External Development Leadership // The success of children in schools is no longer strictly the sole concern of the teacher. Parent and community involvement is critical to the success of students. The external development leader understands the importance of community engagement in schools. This leader empowers parents to have a voice and to be active participants in school. As a **systems thinker**, the external development leader understands how relationships impact the advancement of school achievement. Developing relationships between the community, parents, and schools should be a goal of this leader. Living in a small community has its benefits. Moving here from a large city was a bit of a culture shock. The biggest difference I noticed immediately was that everyone knows everyone. When I needed to have meetings with parents, for the most part, it was with someone I knew. Communication with these parents has always been easy for me. Empowering parents to be advocates for their children is something that I do everyday. I am passionate about having parents actively involved and participating in their child’s education. It does not bother me to have parents disagree with me. I value their perspective and want very much for them to be heard. While having conversation with parents is easy for me, representing my school to the community is outside my comfort zone. I need to learn what support from businesses looks like and how to implement their support in my school. Building rapport with business and finding common ground (Marzano, Waters and McNulty, 2005) is a good first step. It is important that I understand what our district policies are regarding sharing information with the media. I need to be bold as I advocate for my staff in meetings with the central office personnel. During this next year, my goal is to increase my confidence as an effective external development leader. My goals are as follows:
 * 1) I will complete the course entitled “School & Community Engagement” through the NELA during the summer of 2011.
 * 2) I will read leadership journals, keeping a file of articles related to school and community engagement.
 * 3) I will work with the staff at CHECC to develop a plan to increase community involvement at our school.
 * 4) I will participate in community outreach events sponsored by my school district.
 * 5) I will interview our media outreach coordinator to learn what the policies are regarding sharing information with the media.