The following blog post comes from ideas that are in my forthcoming book, School Leadership: Learner-Centered Leadership in Times of Crisis which will be published in December. Becoming a learner-centered school leader is easy in concept and difficult in practice. believe me, I have experienced the difficulties involved in making this transition. I believe there are three key mantras you…
Freedom versus obligation. I was in a discussion on Friday with my friend Duff Rearick when the topic of freedom came up. Now, there have been books, dissertations, and entire careers in academia dedicated to defining freedom. This short blog post is not going to try to answer the question, “What is freedom”. What I am going to do (hopefully)…
The following are my thoughts on the effects of COVID-19 on our education system. This comes from my experience in Pennsylvania working with school leaders throughout the Commonwealth. #1 Educators are now frontline workers in the fight against COVID-19 In the Spring when COVID first impacted us, the frontline workers were our health care professionals who treated us, the workers…
There sure is a lot to get stressed about these days…and I’m not just talking about what is happening in the education world! The bottom line is that there is so much change, uncertainty, and chaos in the world right now that it is easy to “just get by”. Worse yet, we may find ourselves sleepwalking through the day doing…
Is Busy a Badge of Honor? Let’s face it, the last six months have been “busy” for educators. Our schools and communities have undergone changes and challenges that 12 months ago would have been unheard of. While adapting to these changes, students, teachers, administrators, and parents are forming new habits and mindsets to deal with the changes. The result of…
“Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness.” -Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I have listened to Dr. Martin Luther King’s “Mountaintop” speech dozens of times over the years. The concepts that he talks about in the speech resonate as well today as they did in 1968 when he gave the speech. Recently, I was listening to the speech again…