The Education Of Michelle Rhee

“Don’t ever underestimate the importance you can have because history has shown us that courage can be contagious and hope can take a life of it’s own.” Michelle Obama

Ms. Avery, the principal instituted specific curriculum goals and objectives that aligned with the school district. She organized a team of parents and teachers who was in charge of developing new

Achieving a school district’s mission and vision requires the commitment of its stakeholders. In order to involve them in the process, it is necessary for educational leaders to “motivate staff, parents, students, board and community members” (Educational Leadership Constituencies Council, 2002, p. 4). The transformational leadership theory emphasizes the importance of educational leaders acting as role-models in order to motivate and inspire the school community. This approach has the potential to involve all stakeholders, leading to increased student success (Bush, 2007). The Assistant Director of Special Education in Northwest ISD directly supervised the school district’s assessment staff. Her education, experience, and passion set an example for her subordinates, stimulating them to achieve more, leading to her promotion to Executive Director of Student Services.

“Who am I?” is the question Maxine Greene asked, as she looked around the room, before she answered herself: “I am who I am not yet.” This bold statement sums up Maxine Greene’s philosophical concept of education that stems from her self- proclaimed ideas of existentialism. In this article, Greene discusses how combining curriculum and consciousness in education can evolve into continuous growth and rediscovery for us as educators.

Our political leaders struggle to understand the impact they have on the policies they put into place to improve public education. We see mandates that are unfunded and have a significant impact on a school district’s budget. Special education continues to be an area rich with policy and yet additional dollars are not included in the decisions made for implementation. Title one funding is an area that falls into a blurry area of policy for school districts. In our district, we have policies for fiscal responsibility in our spending procedures and yearly audits to be sure we are spending our money in a proper way.

Systematic reform can be defined as specific elements or components in an educational system. Reform is used to aspire change within a specific district or state, that is designed to achieve common objectives. After reading Chapter Six of Author Lisa Delpit (2012) book, “Multiplication is for White People”, I wonder if systematic reform can ever be achieved. Delpit provided an overview of how Brown vs. Board of Education set the tone for the achievement gap back in the 1960’s. Immediately following the desegregation of schools, black professionals were being replaced with white professionals. In certain circumstances, most of the white teachers and administrators were being hired to replace black teachers or administrators. Delpit provided an example that

According to former Indiana state superintendent of schools Dr. Suellen Reed, “We know from our research that there’s no turnaround school without a turnaround principal” (as cited in Gammil, 2007, para. 2), further supporting the fact that “school leaders have an essential role in cultivating a positive school culture in public schools” (Peterson and Deal, 2002, p.30). However, it is imperative to improve our understanding as to how principal leadership impacts the school culture in high poverty schools to ensure that all children receive a quality education, regardless of zip code, in an environment conducive to learning. The six measured factors are as follows:

school system in 1959 she was head of the city's Board of Education, and was central to the

Identifies skills, theories of change, program designs, partnerships, and ways of building schools where students achieve.

The plan outlines five goals that we have found for our school district. These goals show our commitment to provide the highest possible standards of education for all students in our district and to ensure the fair and equitable treatment of all members of our community. We consider understanding individual differences in each student and teacher so that we can adopt the appropriate programs of study for them of the utmost importance.

Closing the achievement gap is not an easy task. However, education leaders have a moral obligation to create a system of student supports and a belief system in which all students achieve beyond the standards. A superintendent's belief system and passion need to extend outward. As you move your institution toward the goal of everyone passionately believing, as a district leader, you only hire teachers, administrators, secretaries, bus drivers, custodians and all staff members who believe this as deeply as you do. By doing this, you begin to change the culture of your institution be it a school or an entire district.

“We are heading headlong into a new century, and thus,” DeVos’ memo states, “we are going to be heading into a new era in the Department of Education. We will be returning to the Three R’s, except with what I like to call the ‘DeVos Twist.'”

ISLLC 2008 Standard 1: An education leader promotes the success of every student by facilitating the development, articulation, implementation, and stewardship of a vision of learning that is shared and supported by all stakeholders.

Grew up on the Southside of Chicago, earned degrees from Princeton and Harvard Law School, married the man she loved, became the first black woman to be the First Lady of the United States, improved civil rights for people of color, and changed the face of feminism; these are some, but most certainly not all, of the accomplishments of the same woman, Michelle Obama. She is overall an inspiring woman to so many people that have had to struggle in life. She has done everything in her power to help those people lead a life of justice and equality that they otherwise, had been prevented from doing. Michelle Obama has achieved things most others with her upbringing could only dream of. She used her achievements to give those people a better chance. Michelle Obama has become an extremely important figure in America because of her inspiring advocacy for women, girls, and people of color, and she was doing this far before she became the first lady of the United States.

Professional development principles Ben embraces are Rigor, Relationships, Relevance and Realness. Mr. Rhodes continually emphasizes that work needs to have relevance and rigor in assignments and that the relationships teachers build with students is essential for success. Specific content used for staff development goals are Glenn Singleton’s work (Equity), National Achievement Gap, High Performing Schools, 90/90/90 Studies, 21st Century Skills, Marzano’s Instructional Strategies, and Heidi Hayes Jacobs’ literacy work. A variety of activities for teaching new skills to teachers occurs throughout the year. These include study groups, guest speakers, ERO (staff development classes), open classroom visits, master teachers sharing best practices in literacy, differentiated instruction, , math, and culturally responsive teaching, conference opportunities, mentors, district content area inservices, building inservice days, monthly district content area meetings, partnerships with universities, Collaborative Action Research for Equity (C.A.R.E.) cadre, and monthly building equity meetings. Mr. Rhodes uses the district Teaching Learning Cycle (Plan-Teach-Monitor- Adjust) to evaluate and assess the learning goals and make improvements. Ben also meets with Ben and the leadership team about the goals and creates the timeline to provide training and analyze progress. Evaluation of the learning goals using the SIP (as a living document) and individual goals are important