Education Consultant

So many people wonder what school and district educational leaders do during the summer.  Most people don’t understand the amount of work it takes to begin a school year with little to no incident. Effective school principals spend the first week after the staff and students go home for the summer, working on a summer schedule for their twelve month staff: secretaries, bookkeepers, custodians, counselors, and any other twelve month staff. The principal should work with the custodians to develop a summer schedule for cleaning the building, repairing equipment, painting, moving furniture around if applicable, opening and disbursing new furniture, maintaining the lawn, washing tables and chairs, cleaning carpets if applicable, washing windows, and any other building needs. They should also discuss the custodian’s summer vacation. Principals should have someone on the maintenance team available everyday during the summer.   If there is more than one front of...

Empathy – empathy is sympathy with a little more effort.  Effective leaders exhibit great empathy for the people they work with.   These are the leaders who are in the trenches with their people.. When problems arise, effective leaders take responsibility for the final decision and the outcome. After all leaders make the decision to do or not do something. If the leader is not making the decision overtly, they are making it covertly.  I have often heard leaders say, “I didn’t know that was going on in my school or organization. The problem with that statement is, “it is your job to know what is going on”. Not knowing does not absorb the leader from their responsibility to know. It is the leaders job to know what is going on in his/her school/organization.  Understanding empathy, helps the leader better protect their people from unforeseen issues that might rise. Empathetic leaders understand that when things go well, the leader gets credit; and when thin...

We would all love to have all of our ideas garner the results we want, but that simply does not happen. So, when things go wrong, how do you deal with the setback, the disappointment, and the adversity? One thing effective leaders do is give him/herself permission to fail. Be ready for the fall because you know it is coming, you just don’t know when.  Any person who has accomplished anything in life has failed multiple times. Dr. Seuss failed twenty seven times before his hit book; “The Cat in the Hat” was accepted. What would have happened if he had stopped at the tenth, twentieth, or twenty- fifth failures? It is always those things that we cannot anticipate that knock us down the hardest.  When leaders fall, the greatest mistake they make is to hurry and try to get up again, to try to get back on top, to get back to where hey were. When you fall down, stay there a minute, catch your breath, and think.  Ask yourself some important questions: What could I have...

1983, President Ronald Reagan commissioned a study of education called, “A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform”. This report cited dismal effects for future growth in closing the gap of student achievement between poor and middle-class Americans.  The authors of this study began from the assumption that public schools were failing and since education is function of the state and not the federal government, who are we to offer suggestions on how to fix the failing schools.  Due to the lack of improvement in education, President Regan cut many of the funds previously allocated to schools. His belief was if the money is not helpful, there is no need to spend so much money. Even though there was a substantial cut in funds, President Reagan did keep all the programs in place, simply cutting back on staff to implement the programs. There was no difference in the achievement levels after Reagan cut the funding than it was before. Why continue to spend ta...

In 1966, James Coleman, a professor at Johns Hopkins University was commissioned by the US Commissioner of Education to study the choice between compensatory education and racial integration, which strategy was more likely to equalize educational opportunities for poor minority students?  This report wrote that racial integration alone did little to boost academic achievement in urban schools. With the conclusion of all of these programs, a substantial amount of money was added to Public Education with little effect.   All the money sent to school districts across America is not making a difference in the education of all students. What is the real problem?

The true purpose of effective leadership is to unlock the potential in others. Leaders build leaders. TRUST: Trust is must for effective leaders. When people work with you it is important for leaders to deposit in their own trust worthy account. Trust is the foundation of any relationship: personal or professional. Remember, leadership is about relationships and relationships are built on trust. The only way leaders can build trust is to make your words and your actions match. You must do what you say you will do every time. You must be willing to do the things you ask others to do. When you align your words with your actions, people begin to trust you. Trust is build through consistency over time. When people trust you, you have more influence in their lives. When you can influence the people you work with, you are in a better position to add value to their lives and their work product. Trust is the foundation of effective leadership. DESIRE: Desire is the only character...

In the early 1960’s, President Kennedy read Michael Harrington’s publication, The Other America, which revealed that poverty in America was far more prevalent than middle-class people had assumed, and explained the impact that poverty had on education. This formulated another movement from Washington called the anti poverty agenda. The Civil Rights Movement brought to the forefront equal rights issues and school segregation. The separate but equal law was questioned.  This movement created programs like: The Food Stamp Act, The Social Security Amendments which created Medicare and Medicaid, The Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, which established the Job Corps, VISTA, and federal work-study programs, The Elementary and Secondary Education Act was also implemented. The more money added to schools, the less progress students made in improving the education for all students. What is the real problem with educating poor and minority children?