Faculty Formation: Yes, This Is For All Types of Schools!

One of the great joys of my day-job is running the first and second year faculty/staff formation program.  The good people at Merriam-Webster define formation as “the art of giving shape to something.”   So we meet as a cohort once a month to read, reflect, discuss, articulate, and shape ourselves according to our Jesuit heritage and our Brebeuf mission.

Yes, friends, it’s going to get a little Catholic Jesuit deep here… but the big ideas are still valid in ANY educational setting.  I would even go as far as saying critical to all settings – and quite noticeable when missing.

Claim Your School’s Mission

“Brebeuf Jesuit, a Catholic and Jesuit School, provides an excellent college preparatory education for a lifetime of service by forming leaders who are intellectually competent, open to growth, loving, religious, and committed to promoting justice.” (full mission and core values are here… it’s worth a look).

As my debate teaching husband would say:  Name It (a Catholic and Jesuit school); Claim It (provides an excellent college preparatory education for); Prove It (a lifetime of service by forming leaders); Conclude It (who are intellectually competent, open to growth, loving, religious and committed to promoting justice). 

It Starts With Orientation

I start with our two-day orientation program.  Day One is what I call “The Nitty Gritty” day… how to print stuff, online gradebooks, location of bathrooms, get keys… all that day to day stuff.  Day Two is “Mission and Identity” day.  I start with a brief introduction to the Society of Jesus and Jesuit education.  We then explore and catch new educators up to some of our of cura personalis initiatives (student stress lately) and then send the new faculty and staff off to the Freshman Day of Service activities with our Community Service Director.  Immediately claiming who we are… and how we are operate in our Catholic Jesuit learning environment.  

Formation Cohorts

For two years, all new faculty and staff are required by contract to participate in what we call the Magis Program.  Yes, you heard me… required by contract.  Everyone but Buildings and Grounds (who are welcome but schedules are hard to coordinate).  These cohorts serve two main purposes: they create groups of supportive colleagues in new setting and they act as personal learning cohorts on topics of mission and identity.  The structure of the program starts with information (Context), moves to practical application (Experience), then to Reflection (Retreat), one to deeper dive (Use) and finally to a capstone project (Evaluation).  Whhaaaaa… the Ignatian Pedagogical Paradigm is the structure of the formation program.  Craziness J

Structure Your Program Based on Your Mission, Teaching Paradigm, or Educational Foundation

Shape the mission of the school through its teachers and staff.  Make the mission alive in all aspects of the workings of the school and watch the awe and wonder begin.  Seriously… and it might even increase test scores!  

Here’s our program at Brebeuf as example.

Context:   

First semester focuses on larger issues of Jesuit education and history.

• Introduction to St. Ignatius and the Society of Jesus
• Pre-election – Read “A Pocket Guide to Jesuit Education” by Boston College found at https://www.bc.edu/offices/mission/publications/guide.html
• Watch “The Olive” by Fairfield Prep http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSvOPtq30Xw
• Discussion – table conversations w/report back

• School Life
• JSEA Profile of and Ignatian Educator
• Culturally Responsive Teaching - http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/sept95/vol53/num01/A-Framework-for-Culturally-Responsive-Teaching.aspx
• Use Chapter 7 “Transcendence” from The Soul of Education by Rachael Kessler.  Amazon.com link http://www.amazon.com/The-Soul-Education-Connection-Compassion/dp/0871203731/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345568253&sr=8-1&keywords=the+soul+of+education
• Panel discussion with veteran faculty on school life at Brebeuf – Instruction, Grading, Communication, Discipline

• Our Way of Proceeding
• JSEA Graduate at Graduation  http://www.jesuitsmissouri.org/files/edu/TheGraduateatGraduation.pdf
• Jesuit School Standards and Benchmarks Introduction (DRAFT)
• Brebeuf Jesuit Mission and Core Values https://brebeuf.org/mission-state-and-core-values/
• Discussion topics: Relationship b/t Church, the Society, the Archdiocese and the school; Jesuit education as counter-cultural; structure and purpose of education as apostolate.

Experience: 

Second Semester focuses on practical life in a Jesuit school.  The main objective being taking the theory/history into daily practice.

• The Classroom/Workplace as Holy Ground
• “The Classroom as Holy Ground” by Kevin O’Brien, SJ. From America  May 26, 2003.
• “Unfinished Houses” by John McLoughlin from America July 21, 2014 http://www.americamagazine.org/issue/unfinished-houses
• Discussion topics: Church;  Prayer (Individual, Communal, Spiritual Exercises) ; What is Holy Ground

• Care of the Person
• “Cura Personalis” by Peter-Hans Kolvenback, SJ.  From Review of Ignatian Spirituality, Number 114.
• “Care and Concern for Each Individual Person” Excerpt from Characteristics of Jesuit Education (JSEA) page 9 Original found at http://community.jsea.org/mod/resource/view.php?id=162
• “Choosing to Care” by Katy Ridnouer.  From the book Managing Your Classroom with Heart 2006 pg 9-18.
• Discussion topics with Student Panel: Cura Personalis – what it is and isn’t; how care is lived in action

•  Professional Growth
• Component 4: Growing and Developing Professionally” by Charlotte Danielson from Enhancing Professional Practice: A Framework for Teaching 2007.  Amazon.com link http://www.amazon.com/Enhancing-Professional-Practice-Framework-Teaching/dp/1416605177/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345568755&sr=8-1&keywords=enhancing+professional+practice+a+framework+for+teaching3
• JSEA Profile of an Ignatian Educator
• GC 35 Decree 2 “The Fire that Kindles Other Fires”
•  “Professional Training and On-going Formation” from Excerpts from Characteristics of Jesuit Education (JSEA) found here.
• Discussion topics: Tie into Diversity work in Cultural Competency;  Growth opportunities.

Reflection : 

All faculty and staff are required to participate in the Midwest Province retreat “Ignatian Themes” the summer after the first year of employment.  This is a 2 day retreat.  All funding for travel and registration is covered by the school.

Use: 

Year Two is a deeper dive into the theory and practice of Jesuit education and the formational documents of the Jesuit Schools Network (formerly Jesuit Secondary Education Association).

• Context and Reflection on Ignatian Themes Retreat Overview
• “Four Hallmarks of Jesuit Pedagogy:  Prelection, Reflection, Active Learning, Repetition” by Ralph Metts, SJ.  From JSEA.
• All of the IPP readings are on the JSN website .
• Veteran Faculty Speaker

• Experience
• JSEA Foundations “The Preamble"
• Key Questions:
• What techniques do  you use to install a sense of awe and wonder in your students/interactions?
• What techniques have you seen another use?
• What tensions/balance do your students/constituents struggle with?  How do you offer experiences to guide them to an Ignatian response? (see paragraph 11)
• Veteran Faculty Speaker

• Reflection
• “Foundations: Reflections on the Educational Principles of the Spiritual Exercises” by Robert R. Newton.
• Look at various forms of reflection (Examen, journaling, prayer)
• Key Questions:
• Review of Spiritual Exercise and relationship between Retreatant – Director – Creation and how it related to Teacher – Student – Knowledge
• The purpose of Jesuit Education “the knowledge, the love and service of God.”
• Why is reflection so key to learning?
• How do we engage the affect elements of learning?
• Veteran Faculty Speaker

• Action/Evaluation
• Read “A Fire the Kindles Other Fires” from GC 35
• Culturally Responsive Teaching (see handout from St. Ignatius San Francisco).
• Key Questions:
• How do we live this mission in action in our school?
• How do we live a compassionate response to the world, community, students, families?
• What frontiers are you called to?
• Review Ignatian Identity Review and how used to move school to Action/Evaluation
• Review the Five Steps of IPP Handout
• Intro the application project for the next 2 months

  

Evaluation:  

Participants are then charged to work with a mentor on intentional use of the IPP in their classroom or workspace.  This is the reflection they turn in to “graduate” from the program.

Rethinking Faculty Evaluation and Professional Growth

Full disclosure.... using this post to process an idea.  So if you are inclined to discuss - feel free to comment.  If you work with me  - don't panic.  My ruminations below are all in the idea stage!

Here we go :-)

Our current faculty evaluation system here in Indianapolis is about 10 years old.  In true Ignatian Pedagogical Paradigm (IPP) fashion, the time has arrived to move into the evaluation stage. Is the process serving faculty needs?  Is the process encouraging the kind of growth we anticipated?   To give you content, our current evaluation program looks like this:

This model is built on the foundations of Marzano, Downey, Wiggins and McTighe.  Through a series of standards and indicators, evaluating administrators and faculty discuss successes and failures in the classroom... culminating in a year end meeting.  Evaluating the process, we find a weakness in meeting needs of new and experienced faculty - both who are lumped in same process.  We find that formal observations and informal walkthroughs work well for early career teachers who are new to our methods and expectations.  The indicators and focused discussion builds a foundation for them.  However, we are not seeing the growth process with mid-career faculty.  Veteran faculty quite frankly know the elements of day-to-day teaching but do not feel challenged to really innovate. In an nutshell, our challenge has become less one of evaluation (Are you doing your job?) and more one of professional growth (How can you better develop your craft?).

As Jesuit educators we a challenged by the 1^st Principle and Foundation “…we show reverence for all the gifts of creation and collaborate with God in using them so that by being good stewards we develop as loving persons in our care of God’s world and its development…”  As a public school educator I might have translated this to say “My gifts and interests are meant to be shared and I choose to share with my students so they can grow and care for the world.”  However you interpret – a challenge as an educator is to recognize and articulate professional gifts and limitations.  Once gifts and limitations are articulated, then a professional begins to desire opportunities for growth.  

Great, Jen… but what does this have to do with faculty evaluations in schools??

What if we separate evaluation from growth in our processes?  This is not all my idea… The IndependentSchool Management firm thinks the idea of separating is possible and even preferred. Taking a page from higher education tenure processes - what if we ask the deeper questions regarding life as a scholar?  Can I as faculty articulate my identity as a scholar?  What do I offer to my department/university that is unique to my gifts?  I strongly feel we should be having this conversation in K-12 to focus on growth rather than simple evaluation.

Taking this idea into my school context,  we create an evaluation around the Profile of an Education Educator plus some basic professional expectations to create an evaluation to quickly communicate “meets/does not meet” expectations for employment in our schools.  (For those wondering, Brebeuf Jesuit operates with year-to-year at-will employment agreements).  Maybe it could look like this:

Meeting expectations communicates that a faculty member has a job next year
(barring anything unexpected with enrollment and finances).  With evaluation out of the way, then faculty and supporting administrators could focus on the real work necessary for improving our learning experiences – professional growth.  Setting goals that stretch teaching methods, innovate assessment and just plain energize the classroom away from the fear of “will I have a job if this fails?” So, instead of checking the "do you lesson plan effectively" indicator, I am asking:

• What is your personal identity and mission as an educator?
• Why do you hold these values?
• How do you values support the mission of Brebeuf Jesuit as we develop students God-given talents as a responsibility and act of worship?
• How do you express your mission within your department?
• What do you need to bring these desires into the classroom?

Diving into the questions above through a process of self-reflection, dialogue and action might lead to deeper professional growth.  Growth that would encourage my desire that all our faculty discover the classroom as a place of awe and wonder and not just a paycheck. 

The Power of Daydreaming

My son was in 1^st grade when he came home from school full of excitement.  “MOM!  Today I learned how to dream with my eyes open!!!” To William, the ability to dream anytime/anywhere was the educational highlight of his short life.  He started middle school two weeks ago and so far – he’s still daydreaming and growing in his imagination.

Today on #CatholicEdChat, a thread began on daydreaming.  Admittedly, I overslept (is there such a thing after the first week of school??) and missed most of the thread. But it got me thinking about the power of daydreaming.  Then this happened:

Thus inspired (and renewed by 11 straight hours of sleep) the tweet encouraged me put fingers to keyboard for a quick, rainy day blog post.

St. Ignatius believed in the power of daydreaming.  He used words like imagination, reflection and contemplation.  In his development of The Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius challenges the retreatant to imagine “the labors of the journey to Bethlehem, the struggles of finding a shelter, the poverty, the thirst, the hunger, the cold, the insults that meet the arrival of God-with-us.” (a great post on this topic can be found at IgnatianSpirituality.com here). He knew that daydreaming gave us time to change, grow and identify our desires.  More modern educational theorists such as Dewey, Piaget, Egan and Montessori write on cognitive and social growth in imaginative play/study/work.  Our imagination is where learning turns into understanding.  

For me as a Jesuit educator, reflection is where I take all my experiences of the day, allowing them to swirl around my understanding of the world and either fall into place or be discarded.  My daydreams are where I stop inputting new information and begin to play, reflect, mix and match the sounds, images, feelings and actions of the day.  It’s where the pieces fall together.

So why do we criticize students for daydreaming?  Why do we block windows so students will focus on learning?  Why do we cram our teaching with words and more words?  Why must every moment of the school day be scheduled and planned?  Over 20 years ago, Brebeuf Jesuit took the still radical approach of creating Personal Responsibility Time (PRTs) into the school day.  These are 15-40 minute blocks of time for students to take responsibility for their learning.  Some study, some meet with teachers, some play intramural sports, meet as a club or throw a Frisbee around... some sit and stare out the window.  And officially, the earth still spins on its axis.  Students can and should have moments all their own during the school day.

As the new school year begins, I challenge us all to offer times for daydreaming to our students.  And while you are at it, find a little time for yourself to take a breath and let your mind wander.  Albert Einstein is quoted as saying, “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.”  Words to dream by.

Cura Personlis in Unexpected Places

It’s state reporting season in Indiana these days.  As a private school offering the Indiana State diploma and accepting voucher funding, we are responsible to collect, format and report various data points regarding students, faculty and course offerings.  I have written before of my feelings about big data… my feelings haven’t changed.  The lesson in frustration of state data reports is still strongly in favor of “data is only as good as the human inputting it” … but this week, I have to admit, something rather remarkable occurred.

You all can read ad nauseam about the woes of the ISTEP exams in Indiana.  Last week, I was working on the TL report (or Testing Label report for those of you not in the know).  Data requested includes students with testing accommodations/special needs.  None of this is particularly interesting… but the data collection method turned a corner of cura personalis I did not expect or anticipate.  I called a meeting of Academic Counselors and Learning Center Faculty to fill out the spreadsheet.  We ended up talking about each individual student needing accommodations, updating one another with recent evaluations, checking in on student who may need additional care and generally enjoying one another as professional educators.  This process took all of 25 minutes – but the outcome was way beyond another spreadsheet. The conversation, dare I say colloquy, created in the group a companionship for the benefit of the young people in our care.  The conversation created a companionship for students as individuals, in light of care and consideration for their lived potential. 

In 2007, Fr. General Kolvenbach gave a speech on cura personalis (care of the person) where he calls the listener to “that which leads us ‘more’ to the end for which we are created”.   If as educators, we truly answer the call to develop men and women for and with others, shouldn’t we too find those moments for others in our daily roles in the trenches?  Times where we are surprisingly present for another – even in state data reporting.  The awe and wonder for once directed at moments of connection and not the spreadsheet on the screen.

The Information Commons: Our Mess is DONE (sort of...)

It’s been a busy time of remodeling, curriculum development and faculty formation!  And in all the kerfuffle of life, I never got around to following up on our Mess and Progress in creating our Information Commons.  So here goes…  

As of Friday, November 6^th, the last piece of lighting was installed and the Information Commons is officially complete.  Students, faculty, alumni and families have been enjoying the space since we opened in late August.  Rather than bore you readers with the details of incomplete cabinetry, back-ordered furniture and misspelled wall art… I thought I would frame this post in light of the happy surprises this project has created.

Zoning works!  We planned our space in light of retail design theory which calls for loud spaces up front with spaces becoming quieter and more personal as the user moves deeper into the space.  So our collaborative tables are near the door, small group tables are nestled within the shelving and personal seating is furthest back near the windows.  Adult presence is most dense in the front of the space – IT Helpdesk and 360 degree reference desk included.  Our surprise lies in the student understanding of zoning.  Our librarians were very intentional in explaining (during class visits, opening tours and continued supervision) the rationale for the zones, purposes and expectations.  Students immediate react with “Oh, that makes sense!” and use the zones appropriately.  Now our physical space reflects our academic learning objective that “students will assess their learning need – evaluate resources available – use the resources appropriately”. 

Sound proof glass to create the quiet study room works!  We chose to glass off the quietest section of the Information Commons.  This created a physical and mental transition from the chattier areas of the space.  Our surveys indicated 48% of the students still required a classic, quiet study space.  The happy surprise has been that students completely own this space.  No adult has yet to need to monitor the space… the students monitor and respect the purpose.  Personal ownership is key to our success. 

Students like to create their own spaces… and will move furniture around appropriately to create great spaces.  We put almost every piece of furniture on wheels.  As students live in the space, we all recognize what works and what doesn’t.  Students have great ideas on how to better create THEIR learning environment.  Having flexible furniture allows for the space to grow, meeting student needs.

Existing features are highlighted.  I can’t tell you how many times people ask me when we put in the skylights.  I have to answer “Ummmm 1986."  The windows and skylights have been in the space for over 30 years… yet prior physical layout, dark paint and walls obscured these features.  By opening the space and brightening the paint and carpet the existing features really pop.  As we enter the dark days of winter, the Information Commons is now the most popular space in the building in part because of its wonderful lighting.

So 2015 has been a great experience in terms of space… and the next step is really looking at the work flow.  Part of our Ignatian process is to reflect on experience.  We have experienced the Information Commons as a physical space for three months.  Now it is time to reflect on how we use the space, how work flow is impacted and how instruction can be modified.  In some ways, a new mess for new progress.  I am looking at Work Flow Analysis research and structures to help facilitate conversation and reflection.   I'll keep you all posted...

Oh - and recently JD and I presented at the Treasure Mountain Research Retreat at The Ohio State University. We talked a lot about allowing for student voice in design. If you are interested in seeing those slides just follow the hyperlink.

The Material and the Symbolic: Designing Libraries in 2014

During this arctic week in the Midwest, I am working on a keynote for the JSEA Librarians conference.   My husband lent a helping hand to the process by pointing me in the direction of communication theory of "discourse of space"… we’re a lively pair ya know.  This led to more topics, which eventually led me to the urban planning scholarship of socio-spatial transformation and the research of Ole Jensen in Denmark. 

Jensen argues any planning process (in my case redesigning a 1980's library) as a consideration of the “relationship between the material practices and the symbolic meaning that social agents attach to their spatial environments…”  For me, this means that the tension between material practices (the day to day doings of librarianship) and the symbolism we attach (the sacred cows of librarianship) effects how we arrange our physical environments.  The catch in bringing library services (particularly K-12 school media services) into the 21^st century can partially be attributed to how many of us still attach our own experiences to the school library – sitting and reading a book in a quiet, safe place. The library was a repository for books and other print (or at least tangibly physical) items where one went to sit quietly and absorb knowledge.

UC Riverside Library
http://newsroom.ucr.edu/1711

Diana Eidson recently published an article entitled “The Celsus Library at Ephesus: Spatial Rhetoric, Literacy and Hegemony in the Eastern Roman Empire.”  In the article, she looks at how the Celsus Library (probably one of the most famous images of a library out there) was not just a repository of material - it was a place where the walls told a story (allegorical carvings tell the stories of Greek and Roman convergence), people met to share experiences and hear stories, communal decision making took place.  It would have been a lively place.  In a population where only 10% were literate, the physical building spoke to patrons and passersby.  Sadly, the Dark Ages, a bit of plague and some circling of the wagons shifted the focus of libraries to silent repositories only for the elite.

2014 holds so many ways we can get back to the library as center of community where even the building can speak to passersby!

Libraries still have material practices in the 21^st century. Some look much like they have for centuries: books, magazines, maps, artwork and newspapers. Some are a little more recent: instruction on citation practices, research strategies and information retrieval. A quiet place of self-reflection in an over-stimulating school environment is needed… but do we adults let our own symbolism influence how the space functions for a young visitor?  Just because we had wood tables nestled in stacks of books, is that what our students need today? 

Face it, we need to let go of our symbolic meanings of what defines a library.  Embrace the innovations, which allow us to move beyond walls, continents and even time (have you seen the awesome collaboration between the Bodleian Libraries and the Biblioteca Apostolica Vatincana?).  Open spaces for story telling, collaborative assignments and communal discourse. 

Seattle Library Main Branch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_Central_Library

And what the heck, let the walls or floors tell stories again.

Story Surfer at Aarhus Library, Denmark
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aakb/3005626860/

Libraries can be vibrant spaces of experience.  In 2014, reflect on where your attachments to symbolic meaning are hampering progress.  Reflect on material practices that really can be let go (there is no need to keep a year’s worth of paper magazines these days).  And let’s move forward…

Update 2/5/2014... Here's the slideshow from the presentation.  The title is what happens when my husband and I get a little silly during snowstorms - but it's how we roll...

Click image to link to SlideShare Upload

Works Cited:
Eidson, Diana. “The Celsus Library at Ephasus: Spatial Rhetoric, Literacy and Hegemony in the Eastern Roman Empire.” Advances in the History of Rhetoric (2013) Vol 16, Issue 2.

 Jensen, Ole. Discourse Analysis and Sociospatial Transformation Processes. School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Global Urban Research Unity. Electronc Working Paper  28. http://www.ncl.ac.uk/guru/assets/documents/ewp28.pdf

, Diana. “The Celsus Librarys: Spatial Rhetoric, Literacy and Hegemony in the Eas

A Joyful Noise: An Examen for Teachers

In #catholicedchat yesterday morning, the topic of gifts was on the docket.  Gifts given and received.  Not an unusual or surprising topic given the season and the audience.  It just happens my personal Advent journey this year includes reading James Martin SJ's book Between Heaven and Mirth . Again, not terribly surprising given my day job and personality.  In Fr. Martin’s introduction “Excessive Levity”, he gives several reasons for the seriousness of religion.  He writes, “…the aim of religion is sometimes seen as one of overriding seriousness.” Basically, we don't laugh, dance or make a joyful noise to the Lord because... by goodness... Church is Serious!!  In light of recent news stories in Indiana (check out State Impact Indiana for dramatic details) and nationally (The Answer Sheet is always good for a depressing glimpse of the state of education reform), I think it’s safe to say the aim of education is sometimes seen as one of overriding seriousness. And heaven help those of us in both realms.

Lately, the seriousness has been bringing me down.

  Right now, if you are like me, the joy comes back after a day or two of 8+ hours of sleep and not obsessively checking email waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Joy is slowing down, spending time with friends and family and laughing.  I realize we don’t laugh enough in education.  We tell students to quiet down and we frown upon frivolity of Ugly Sweater Day as we busily read the state data reports to see if our school is on The Nice List or The Naughty List.  And we are unhappy. And those students we seek to serve are unhappy.  We create locked down atmosphere of serious study - every activity aligned to a standard and every classroom silent. We lose sight of the focus … children.  Broadening their horizons with messy experiences and time for reflection.  Children laugh… sometimes a lot… sometimes loudly, messily, obnoxiously and for no reason.  They are seldom full of overriding seriousness.


I found myself journalling yesterday on this concept of joy and my vocation.  The path I found myself on looks similar to what I write below and I thought some others might be interested so I offer you this Examen for Teachers.  (What's an Examen you ask?) 

• Take a few moments to sit in silence – in a place that gives you comfort.

• In this silence, see in your mind those laughing faces that made you want to be a teacher.  Bring to mind faces of former teachers, colleagues, students and parents.  Anyone who walks with you on your journey as an educator.

• Fr. Martin writes that “Joy…. is what we’ll experience when we are welcomed into heaven.”  Recall the people and places where you were welcomed.  What did you see?  Hear?  Feel?

• Reflect on what stops you from being joyful - those barriers which hinder feelings of welcome, comfort or laughter.

• Overwhelm those barriers with earlier faces of joy.  If you are so inclined - pray for strength and patience overcoming these barriers.  

• Be grateful for the faces which overcome the barriers.  Enjoy the welcoming calm. 

And with that I wish you a joyful holiday break fully of wonder, peace and laughter! 

Feedback versus Evaluation

In my brief July hiatus from daily life at school, several topics have filtered through my less stressed brain.  Time for reflection, without a timeline, is to be treasured… even if treasure does not automatically appear in the form of a report or initiative (that’s another topic though)…

Today I am processing the idea of feedback versus evaluation through the lens of professional development.  I live in Indiana… a state at the “forefront” of the Ed Reform Movement.  2012-13 marked the beginning of an evaluation system and pay scale tied to big testing, Student Learning Objectives and growth models (the state model is called RISE but districts can write their own model).  Some issues have arisen, not the least of which is it’s mid-July and we still don’t have access to our state exam scores to base salaries on, but arguing the deficiencies of the system is not my goal here.  My goal is to reflect on the idea of feedback for professional growth and evaluation of professional effectiveness.  Because my friends, these are two different concepts…

I’ve written on this topic before, and today the folks at SmartBlog on Education picked it up too… “teaching” is not an end goal.  We didn’t take up our graduation gown and announce to the world “I am done!” If so, I wouldn’t be typing this on a laptop, on a wireless network, in MS Word, on a color monitor, hyperlinking articles found on the Internet… Because none of these things were commercially available when I graduated with my undergrad!  So teachers like to learn… okay… but what current discourse is trying to present is that evaluating that learning is the same as developing knowledge.  And THAT I will argue is a deficiency of the system.

This will look familiar to #Jesuit types

In education we refer to the feedback loop.  This is an idea that the learner engages content.  The learner then practices and plays with the content while the teacher/director/facilitator comments along the journey giving feedback while the learner adapts and modifies use of the content.  It is a loop – circular – in conversation and experimentation and commentary.  It’s formative… commentary given during the formation of a skill.  This is what is missing from many professional development programs - space for teachers to experiment with methods and content, within a safe feedback loop.   Evaluation, by contrast, is measuring the effectiveness or productivity of action.  And I do believe we should evaluate – this can be a powerful tool for ensuring the experiments are working.  BUT evaluations are summative and should not/cannot be done without a prior period of comment and feedback. 

Some questions to ask yourself as you shift from an evaluation model to a feedback model….

1. What is the end product of the current process?

The current system I work with attempts this feedback loop but is really more of an evaluation system.  How do I know that?  The end product is a form to put in an HR folder.  The end goal should be a supported faculty member and productive classroom environment... not a form in a folder.

2. Is the feedback given without judgment?

Feedback does not evaluate. One of the best ways to break the evaluation trap is to get rid of any ranking system (you know the one – scale of 1-5 from Atrocious to Proficient).  As soon as anything is ranked, rated or graded it’s an evaluation.

3. Do the administrator and teacher meet face-to-face?

Feedback is a very personal activity.  It requires trust and relationship…and I have yet to see a form or spreadsheet in relationship with a human. This is why many successful programs refer to coaching or mentoring programs.  

4. How much time is taken/offered?

A true feedback process takes time.  The teacher must have time to gather and consume new content and have time to practice/experiment with it.  The administrator gives feedback in dialogue and the process continues.  Time is also needed to reflect and review – this may mean release time from the classroom, flexible scheduling and broadening participation of mentor teachers to provide feedback for newer teachers.

5. Are teachers rewarded for participating in the feedback process?

There should be no negative consequences for failure in experimentation.  This is why it’s a loop – failure is to be expected.  We grow by learning from our mistakes and moving through them.  Researchers are just beginning to understand the value of failure … if teachers are not free to fail, no growth will take place.

My reflections looking at our current evaluation system is just that – it’s an evaluation system.  Not a bad one necessarily, but not one that allows for a lot of time or process of feedback.  Walk-throughs were a great step forward for formative visioning of the classroom, but there is no regular follow up conversation other than a written summary by the evaluator.  What I am sketching out is a process of goal setting, practice, feedback with an administrator and time for reflection of success/failure (or in Ignatian Pedagogy speak: Context – Experience - Reflection) as process… meaning every faculty would have the opportunity to meet regularly, every year, with a support person who would offer feedback on experimentation.  Logistically there are some issues – but to meet the strategic goal of excellence in teaching and fully support our amazing faculty it’s a logistic we need to overcome. 

(*** not to be assumed a new initiative for next year – but something I will be bringing up throughout the year, O’ Readers who may work at the same school as I J)

Feel free to leave ideas, processes or plans for developing feedback loops for professional growth in the comments section.  I know I’d love to read them and I am sure others will too!

The Value of Shared Experiences

As I tried to write this post originally, I was interrupted by an 8 year old screaming “There’s a RAT in the bean bag!”  Apparently our cat had killed a mouse and hid his trophy in the kid’s bean bag…an offering of affection as it were.  End writing process and begin mom process of community dialogue on a shared experience... 

• What is the difference between a mouse and a rat? 
• Why would the cat put a dead mouse in the bean bag? 
• Why can't we touch dead animals?
• What are you going to do with the body?

Humans do not live in a community of one.  We live in relationship with others: our families, our friends, our co-workers, and strangers on the street.   We create discourse communities based on shared experiences – like dead rodents in bean bags.  This dialogue helps all of us reflect on the experience, taking new knowledge forward into our lives.  Knowledge accessed via a void, with no dialogue or reflection, at best lives in short term memory, leaving us at a loss when faced with the need to access that knowledge later in life.

I have recently read about The School of One and the concept of personalized learning.  My concern with the focus on personalize learning to the extreme is the loss of dialogue in shared experiences.  Creating a discourse community is still relevant in education today.  Learners in a void do not have the opportunity to engage others in shared discourse.  This hinders the reflective elements of learning, which encourage new or innovative articulations of thought.   I would argue without this opportunity for reflection, for the creation of a discourse community, we are hobbling our students. 

In her book, “Reality is Broken”, author Jane McGonigal writes of the importance of social connection as element of satisfaction and experience of success.  We as humans build “intrinsic rewards, positive emotions, personal strengths by social connections that we build by engaging intensely with the world around us.” (45) Personalized learning privileges the one over the many.  While in some cases this may be temporarily successful, the danger of isolation is very real… holding the learner from others with whom valuable reflection and collaboration could enrich the learning experience.

Practically applied, this means creating opportunities in our classrooms for learning as community.  As educators we can encourage dialogue based on the shared experience of new content (Mitosis to Shakespeare), events (Prom is on the horizon) or skills (Ultimate Frisbee anyone?).  Offering our students time to engage each other, working through experiences together, creating communities of discourse is what we do as professional educators.  

Because that cat is only a year old... and there will be more mice in house thanks to our large wooded lot... retaining this new knowledge is going to be critical.

Toast the Rodent Hunter