Personal Statement On Educational Leadership

In chapter 8, Becoming a Trustworthy Leader, of the Jossey-Bass Reader on Educational Leadership, Megan Tschannen-Moran states, “the principal sets the tone for a school” (100). This statement, in my opinion, accurately sums up the true goal of any administration which is to be the guide and inspiration for the rest of the building. Therefore, I felt Moran and her chapter on trustworthy leadership were the most compelling components of the readings and lectures. Throughout the chapter Moran discusses the vital need for administrators to be trustworthy individuals. This resonated with me because I agree that trust is the glue that can hold a school together. I have been around administrators that make promises that are impossible to keep and almost seem to string along the staff with ideas but never fulfill them. Eventually the staff realizes that the administration is not reliable and cannot be trusted at its word. This immediately puts a barrier between the staff and administrator so that very little is ever accomplished and people feel ostracized. Without trust, as Moran reiterated, relationships are destroyed and the culture of the building suffers. If, however, one is a trustworthy leader then trust can ensure follow through from a leader which is essential when running a school. If students, parents, and staff feel like a leader will follow through on his/her word then this thinking will trickle down and others will do the same. Thus trust allows for things

The first three chapters of the book describe why trust in schools is important, define trust, and give ideas for cultivating trust. Then there are chapters on betrayal, revenge, teachers trusting one another, fostering trust with students and parents, and restoring trust. The final chapter outlines ideas for becoming a trustworthy leader. Appendix A has several surveys on trust. Each survey includes scoring directions and information about reliability and validity.

 To promote a positive ethos in the school through encouraging a shared understanding of the values which underpin our school ethos

This will continue to support my organizations goal of supporting every learner into being college and workforce thriving members of their communities. I would also like to develop myself as an effective leader to have the knowledge and skills available when professional growth opportunities arrive within my organization. Positioning myself as a leader will allow me to develop and implement policies and practices that would support the mission and vision of

I am not sure this is a good one?! Or I have to reconsider my decision.

As an educational leader, I must have a vision and mission statement for the school that is known by the staff, students, and parents. The vision will address the needs of the students academically, emotionally, and socially. According to DuFour (1998), “ Those who seek to transform their school into a professional learning community as characterized by an environment fostering mutual cooperation, emotional support, personal growth, and a synergy of efforts.” The leader must implement a plan that will cultivate the success of all students. The mission will speak to the direction of the school community stating what the desire goals are. The building leader will lead by example. High expectations will be communicated and encourage by staff and students. The educational leader of a school must develop a culture of team work to create a climate that is student friendly. The vision mission and goals of the leader should be transparent. The establishment of common goals is the first step. Without common goals, sustainable progress will be impossible and thus everyone will have lower expectations. The students, parents, and staff should be commented to the goals of every child reaching their full academic potential. The school environment should speak to goal setting and high expectations for all students and staff.

Prior to the course, my leadership style could be defined as a combination of elements of both the servant and situational and styles. From the outset of my career in education, the idea that leadership is about trying to make sure that other people’s highest priority needs are being served (Spears, 1996) has been important. I have also been cognizant of the effect that this process has on the least privileged in our society, to ensure they will benefit or at least not be further deprived (Greenleaf, 1970). One of my guiding questions has always been, “Am I doing harm?” At the heart of my philosophy has been the desire to identify and meet the needs of students, players, colleagues, and learning communities where they are at (not where I think they or anyone else should

My overarching goal is to complete the educational leadership program successfully and publish my dissertation. Additionally, I plan to publish a few conceptual articles before I complete the program and I hope to be involved in at least two collaborative studies during my time at Penn State University.

Whether you are a school principal, superintendent or area superintendent, there is a great deal of issues that you face as an educational leader. Some issues may be poverty, the lack of qualified teachers or teacher morale, finances, lack of organizational structure, parental and community involvement, technology, or simply time. I was provided with the gratifying opportunity of interviewing a prior Principal of mine, Dr. Angela Murphy-Osborne (Dr. O). In this interview, Dr. O shared her top three issues that she faced as an educational leader today. Selecting only the top three issues was a major challenge for her! As a result, she provided her top three, while also voicing other concerns. After in-depth consideration, Dr. O decided that the top three issues she faces on daily basis as an educational leader were testing, lack of time, and budget. She explained to me that each of these issues is significant because they not only impact her directly, but they also play a major role to the success of the school!

I have developed my philosophy of education and the principalship over the past twelve years. These years have given me a healthy and balanced perspective from which to construct effective programs to improve and support student learning. In keeping with my recent experience, some of my beliefs have evolved. Many other ideas, developed during my years as an educator in Grand Rapids Public School and Davenport University, have been affirmed. This blending of ideas and approaches, gives me much to offer students, staff and community stakeholders in any school under my leadership.

My past personal and professional experiences have taught me to be open minded, flexible, and passionate towards individuals and education, which I hope to be able to instill onto

“I believe that educational leadership should be based on the principles of trust. Honesty is expected from me and my superiors; above all, we are worthy of trust. When principles of trust require amendments, I will defend my beliefs and will not forfeit my belief standards for convenience (Hudson, 2013, p. 1)”.

School improvement is transformation. It is one of the most important actions of a school. It is a process that schools must use with fidelity to ensure that at all students are given the opportunity to perform and achieve at exemplary levels. School improvement is vital to schools and it is a process that cannot be done in isolation. It requires team work, collaboration, and constant analysis of data and setting of goals. School improvement goals focus on how to meet the needs of students. Addressing the educational needs, funding, and achievement gaps between subgroups is collaborative effort involves everyone that has a vested interest in the schools. These basic measures set the foundation for improvement. And so, if it is the

My goals or aims in developing myself as teacher leader is first of all to make through my first year of teaching special education. My goal for myself is to balance the many responsibilities that I will taking on such as instruction, managing IEPs for my assigned caseload, parent communication, my research/teacher leadership project that I will be taking on in the next 18 months for Bellarmine, and my other graduate coursework. My goals specific to my leadership project include finding the best method for collecting data for my project, completing the project, for my students to reach the benchmark goal of 20 percent improvement in their reading comprehension over the course of the school year as measured by the scholastic reading inventory (SRI) and to communicate my research to stakeholders in my building (Knutson, 2011).

Developing, working towards and sharing a vision of learning has been a large focus of my internship and school year. At the beginning of the year, we set our focus as a school around social-emotional learning and ensuring that each student felt connected to a trusted adult in the school. We looked at our school climate data from last year and as a leadership team, we developed school wide and classroom specific activities focused on making connections with students. in addition, the leadership team and I set our school wide goal tied to teacher evaluations around increasing the percentage of students who felt connected to teachers. “School Climate Score for Student Connectedness will increase from 66% to 76%.” The school climate survey took place in the Social Studies classrooms on Thursday, November, 16. I also worked with the school administrators to help facilitate some activities, such as creating school wide behavior expectations with both the students and the staff. This directly correlated with the development of our school improvement plan which we worked on as a leadership team throughout the year.