Dr. Victoria Pettis

Summer Cohort 2006

EOCS 7450

July 15, 2006

 

EOCS 7450

Practicum in Leadership

Case Study 1

 

ISLLC Standard 1: A school administrator is an educational leader who promotes the success of all students by facilitating the development, articulation, implementation, and stewardship of a vision of learning that is shared and supported by the school community.

 

Case Study: School Goals Are Everybody’s Business[1]

 

Problem: Identifying a school’s instructional goals and communicating them to all the stakeholders involved

 

Questions:

1. How are the overall instructional goals of a school identified?
2. What are ways that a school’s goals can be communicated to students, parents, community members, and teachers?

 

The Situation:

            When Brian Wilcox accepted the principal position at Superior High School, he realized that one of his first objectives was the school’s instructional goals and how they were communicated to all the stakeholders involved. His mentor had last advised, “If you want to groom SHS into a winning school, you have to start with clearly defined instructional goals. Clearly defined goals provide everyone involved a sense of mission, and they are a means for measuring progress.” Wilcox had been mentored by Dr. Veronica Lawrence at Gateway High School, where he had been an assistant principal for five years. While there, he learned from Dr. Lawrence that establishing clearly defined goals is a long range process, which involves four steps: the planning process, the goal statement content and structure, goal monitoring and revision, and communicating philosophy and goals to students, faculty, parents, and the community.

            Using his experience and wisdom he gained from Dr. Lawrence, Wilcox was a man on a mission: He must involve groups from both SHS and the community to establish and communicate the school’s instructional goals. He spearheaded a planning committee, which was composed of his other administrators, parents, students, community members, and faculty. The committee’s purpose was to work together to write a statement of philosophy and formulate a list of the school’s academic goals. The data they used to start the discussion included parent questionnaires, student surveys, and teachers’ assessments of student needs. They finally drafted a statement of philosophy and four goal statements that directly corresponded to the groups that would be directly responsible for their accomplishment, including students, faculty, parents, and community.

            Once the statement of philosophy and goal statements were implemented that fall, Wilcox knew that the goal-setting process was not complete with simply setting goals. Progress had to be monitored; targets may need to be changed. With that thinking in mind, elected representatives from the planning committee met monthly to review school programs and monitor the school plan. During these meetings, parents, students, community members, and faculty were invited to offer their opinions about school programs and objectives. Once spring arrived, the planning committee reviewed the philosophy and goals in order to evaluate the school’s performance and measure accountability. They published an annual school profile of student performance to identify building level improvement and any progress made toward goals. This profile was sent to every home. During the summer, Wilcox organized a retreat where planning committee members were asked to reflect on what happened with the implementation of the school’s philosophy and goals and to plan for year two. Actually, by the end of the retreat, members had used interviews and conferences that had been conducted with students, parents, teachers, and administrators as basis for conceptualizing a five-year plan, which included a year-by-year timeline with a built-in monitoring process.

            Finally, Wilcox did not forget that communicating the school’s goals was central to his SHS’s mission. He used every method at his disposal to publicize the school’s philosophy and goals, including school pep rallies, assemblies, awards programs, agenda books, school posters, newspaper articles, personal contacts, orientations, workshops, open houses, school newsletters, course guides, organization and club meetings, signboards, radio, and TV.

 

Response to Questions: In the scenario described above, the administrator worked collaboratively with all of the stakeholders – from students to community members -- involved to plan and implement school goals. He did not shoulder this responsibility alone, but chose to use every means at his disposal to articulate the importance of each stakeholder molding, sharing, and supporting the school’s vision.

 

Evaluation: The situation described above includes so much clear, detailed evidence to support ISLLC standard 1 that it leads me to conclude that this leader exhibits proficient leadership skills in this area (perhaps one in the early stages of being an accomplished one) because the administrator’s decisions demonstrated his knowledge and understanding of developing and implementing strategic plans, effective use of communication, and effective consensus building. His actions shows that he values and is committed to a school vision of high standards of learning, continuous improvement, inclusion of all members of the school community, and doing the work required for high levels of personal and organizational performance. Finally, this administrator’s role as a facilitator in the school’s identification and implementation of goals ensured that the vision and mission of the school was developed, shaped, monitored, evaluated, and revised by all of the stakeholders involved.