Examples of Excellence
Excellence in the Cañon City School District is being exhibited by McKinley School custodian Cindy Sturch. As a member of the district safety committee Cindy is going above and beyond the call of duty to promote safety and wellness in her building and to keep parents informed. She is doing so by creating a safety corner in the school hallway for public viewing. We have been told Cindy's personal push this year is to inform McKinley parents, staff members, and guests about all the school is doing to ensure their safety as well as that of the children. Thank you Cindy! I know this is not necessarily part of your job. Thanks for taking extra steps to communicate these important initiatives!
Speaking of excellence, on Monday I once again had the opportunity to meet with our partners from Pueblo Community College. This time our topic was Gateway to College program. Gateway to College is a successful initiative that allows many of our challenging students the opportunity to gear required school work directly toward acquiring college credits so they can get a head start on their postsecondary careers. I believe roughly fifty CCSD students will be participating in the program this fall. During the meeting I learned a lot about the intent of the program, the way it operates, and how students enter it. I must say to this point in time all of my interactions with PCC staff have been simply tremendous. I am quite impressed with the professionalism and positive organizational culture displayed by their staff members on a continual basis.
Finally, on Friday our dedicated summer school staff held a school's out celebration for all participants! There was food to eat, games to play, and individual students participants were honored for the growth they showed in reading and math as a result of their participation. It is my hope that all our children and our hard working staff members get a little time to kick up their feet and celebrate what's left of the summer before we get back to regular school.
Speaking of excellence, on Monday I once again had the opportunity to meet with our partners from Pueblo Community College. This time our topic was Gateway to College program. Gateway to College is a successful initiative that allows many of our challenging students the opportunity to gear required school work directly toward acquiring college credits so they can get a head start on their postsecondary careers. I believe roughly fifty CCSD students will be participating in the program this fall. During the meeting I learned a lot about the intent of the program, the way it operates, and how students enter it. I must say to this point in time all of my interactions with PCC staff have been simply tremendous. I am quite impressed with the professionalism and positive organizational culture displayed by their staff members on a continual basis.
Finally, on Friday our dedicated summer school staff held a school's out celebration for all participants! There was food to eat, games to play, and individual students participants were honored for the growth they showed in reading and math as a result of their participation. It is my hope that all our children and our hard working staff members get a little time to kick up their feet and celebrate what's left of the summer before we get back to regular school.
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The Focus of Our Work
Last Monday I spent office time extending the work the board of education and I have begun on an updated superintendent of schools evaluation process. We have already agreed on the following roles and duties of the superintendent of schools:
The board and I will continue our work on this evaluation revision Monday evening during a 45 minute work session where we will begin to validate indicators of success already identified for the first 6 job expectations, and we will being to create such indicators for the last 6.
On Wednesday I held my first CCSD leadership team meeting. These gatherings traditionally take place twice per month and include department directors, building leaders, coordinators, and managers. At the meeting we all gained information regarding instructional services, student services, personnel, and technology updates. The role I played included asking everyone to do a quick personal asssessment of Canon City Schools. My purpose surrounded communicating my value for, and measuring our attainment of, a clear teacher friendly curriculum, expert teacher lesson planning, quality administrator support of instruction, and gaining an indication as to whether our district leaders feel we are fully living up to our potential as an educational institution. Based on the results our leaders feel we are doing many things quite well, but feel there is still room for improvement.
On Thursday director of student services Dominick Carochi and I met with director of personnel Misty Manchester about our requirement to include student performance outcomes in teacher and principal evaluations by the end of this year. Each brought me up to date on where the district is with the process, and we decided to call the district teacher evaluation committee back together with the goal of explaining the requirement, revisiting work that has already been done, and drawing a line on the calendar by which we will make a final decision as to how we’ll actually do this for 2015-16 evaluations.
- The superintendent should fully support the Board of Education in its governance of the school district.
- The superintendent should establish and operate a district level collaborative leadership system to guide the district’s vision and academic improvement processes.
- The superintendent should guide the establishment of a district vision, mission and set of core beliefs, then communicate and promote these purposes to the entire educational community.
- The superintendent should ensure every teacher in every subject area at every grade level has access to, and has the resources needed to teach to a quality district prescribed curriculum aligned to current state standards.
- The superintendent should ensure student learning of the curriculum is measured both formatively and summatively on a periodic, but not overly burdensome, basis and that these learning results are used to drive future instructional improvement.
- The superintendent should ensure all teachers are guided by a building administrator who supports their professional growth and instructional improvement.
- The superintendent should support building administrators in their efforts to lead school improvement processes through the provision of quality building leadership development and effective evaluative feedback.
- The superintendent should support building administrators in requiring teachers to teach the curriculum in a way that continually measures student learning of key concepts and engages all students.
- The superintendent should establish processes to effectively allocate district resources and align their use to support the district’s academic and facilities improvement processes.
- The Superintendent should ensure there is effective supervision and operation of the instruction, human resource, business, facilities, transportation, nutrition, and technology departments.
- The superintendent should advocate for the greater financial and political interests of the school district at the county, state, and national levels.
- The superintendent should develop a trusting and collaborative relationship with local, state and national employee associations.
The board and I will continue our work on this evaluation revision Monday evening during a 45 minute work session where we will begin to validate indicators of success already identified for the first 6 job expectations, and we will being to create such indicators for the last 6.
On Wednesday I held my first CCSD leadership team meeting. These gatherings traditionally take place twice per month and include department directors, building leaders, coordinators, and managers. At the meeting we all gained information regarding instructional services, student services, personnel, and technology updates. The role I played included asking everyone to do a quick personal asssessment of Canon City Schools. My purpose surrounded communicating my value for, and measuring our attainment of, a clear teacher friendly curriculum, expert teacher lesson planning, quality administrator support of instruction, and gaining an indication as to whether our district leaders feel we are fully living up to our potential as an educational institution. Based on the results our leaders feel we are doing many things quite well, but feel there is still room for improvement.
On Thursday director of student services Dominick Carochi and I met with director of personnel Misty Manchester about our requirement to include student performance outcomes in teacher and principal evaluations by the end of this year. Each brought me up to date on where the district is with the process, and we decided to call the district teacher evaluation committee back together with the goal of explaining the requirement, revisiting work that has already been done, and drawing a line on the calendar by which we will make a final decision as to how we’ll actually do this for 2015-16 evaluations.
Last Week
For the week of August 3rd through 7th I met on Monday about the district’s Gateway to College program. On Tuesday I participated in the monthly KRLN radio interview of RE-1 and RE-2 superintendents. My part pretty much consisted of talking about me, and about registering for school. Rhonda Roberts had to answer a few tougher questions as she was asked to explain the religion in schools issue settlement Florence recently executed. I learned a lot from my first experience and will be sure to come armed in the future with information I want to share with the community about the district. At mid-day on Tuesday I made a quick trip to Denver and back to attend and chair the quarterly Colorado Safe Schools Resource Center Advisory Board meeting. I also attended the Cañon City Police Department “Night Out Against Crime" event being held on Tuesday evening at Rudd Park. Wednesday brought admin team, Rotary, and leadership team meetings, and a new administrator meet and greet gathering with our board of education.
On Thursday morning I met with director of instructional services Dominic Carochi to divvy up the principal evaluation workload. We agreed that he would guide the work for Lincoln, Washington, and Canon Online schools and I would guide the work for CCMS, Harrison, and McKinley. We will also work in tandem evaluating CCHS and CES. We discussed processes for evaluating and supporting principals and buildings, and I must say we are both excited about engaging in this work as I suspect we'll learn a lot from one-another.
Finally, I met with director of facilities and transportation Jeff Peterson over lunch on Thursday to discuss how we'll go about making decisions on potential snow days or delayed starts.
On Thursday morning I met with director of instructional services Dominic Carochi to divvy up the principal evaluation workload. We agreed that he would guide the work for Lincoln, Washington, and Canon Online schools and I would guide the work for CCMS, Harrison, and McKinley. We will also work in tandem evaluating CCHS and CES. We discussed processes for evaluating and supporting principals and buildings, and I must say we are both excited about engaging in this work as I suspect we'll learn a lot from one-another.
Finally, I met with director of facilities and transportation Jeff Peterson over lunch on Thursday to discuss how we'll go about making decisions on potential snow days or delayed starts.
This Week
On Monday morning I will plan out my entire week board-superintendent secretary Colleen Carroll. So far I have meetings with representatives from Goal Academy, a board work session and regular meeting, a meeting with the chief of police, superintendent council of advisors, leadership team, and truancy committee meetings on my calendar for the week as well.
The Way I See Things
All day Friday I attended a staff development session in Pueblo with several other CCSD leaders about the implementation of Colorado's new teacher and principal evaluation systems. I know transitioning to this process has caused a lot of anguish and concern for teachers and administrators all over the state, and perhaps even a bit in the Cañon City School District.
In my former place of employment we had been implementing the new evaluation processes faithfully for the past three years as part of a pilot project with the Colorado Department of Education, and I believe the end result was better classroom instruction by teachers, increased student achievement, and a feeling by all staff members that they finally clearly understand what their job expectations are and that they were actually being supported to conduct them.
This experience may have been a bit of a rarity in rural Colorado, as starting the process certainly was not an easy lift. In successfully implementing SB 191 style evaluation in the past I have found certain things need to be in place in order to make it work. They are as follows: 1. Teachers need clear guidance through a well written district adopted curriculum to guide what it is they are supposed to be teaching. 2. Teachers need to have a voice in the process by which it is determined the extent to which student achievement and learning growth factor in to their evaluation. 3. Teachers need to effectively plan to teach the curriculum on a weekly basis, and they need Principals who have the skills necessary to review these plans and to offer helpful feedback for improvement. 4. Principals need to visit classrooms to offer effective specific guidance and instructional support many more times than they have likely been doing in the past. 5. Full blown, face to face, intense mid-year reviews need to take place so teachers and principals know exactly where they stand as far as the conduct of their job performance requirements by no later than February 1st (while there is still time to improve).
Of course there is a lot more to SB 191 than this, but to me the actions I have listed above are key to making it all work effectively. I believe any evaluation process that leads to a better learning experience and increased achievement for our children is worth doing, and doing well. Because of this I will put a lot of my focus into making sure everyone has the support they need to make this work.
George S. Welsh
In my former place of employment we had been implementing the new evaluation processes faithfully for the past three years as part of a pilot project with the Colorado Department of Education, and I believe the end result was better classroom instruction by teachers, increased student achievement, and a feeling by all staff members that they finally clearly understand what their job expectations are and that they were actually being supported to conduct them.
This experience may have been a bit of a rarity in rural Colorado, as starting the process certainly was not an easy lift. In successfully implementing SB 191 style evaluation in the past I have found certain things need to be in place in order to make it work. They are as follows: 1. Teachers need clear guidance through a well written district adopted curriculum to guide what it is they are supposed to be teaching. 2. Teachers need to have a voice in the process by which it is determined the extent to which student achievement and learning growth factor in to their evaluation. 3. Teachers need to effectively plan to teach the curriculum on a weekly basis, and they need Principals who have the skills necessary to review these plans and to offer helpful feedback for improvement. 4. Principals need to visit classrooms to offer effective specific guidance and instructional support many more times than they have likely been doing in the past. 5. Full blown, face to face, intense mid-year reviews need to take place so teachers and principals know exactly where they stand as far as the conduct of their job performance requirements by no later than February 1st (while there is still time to improve).
Of course there is a lot more to SB 191 than this, but to me the actions I have listed above are key to making it all work effectively. I believe any evaluation process that leads to a better learning experience and increased achievement for our children is worth doing, and doing well. Because of this I will put a lot of my focus into making sure everyone has the support they need to make this work.
George S. Welsh
