[Ous-lp-rp13] EDAD 6020, Response to Answer for Question #2

[Taylor, Dakota]

Molly, I enjoyed reading your response about Green High School. I can vouch for all of your statements because I was able to witness most of this during my student teaching year at Green. I specifically liked revisiting the school environment through your precise language and details. Administration at Green High School truly seems to be human focused, and I have a ton of respect for your building principal. I am glad I was able to witness him, “Our [your] building principal take time to speak to each teacher on a regular basis about our personal and professional goals, helping us move forward to reach our highest potential. Each of these examples show how our administration is made of competent managers and leaders, focused on maintaining orderly day to day operations while developing leaders within our buildings, which allows us to maintain a professional, not a chaotic system.” I strongly believe that supporting and developing teachers into effective leaders within the school building will create and maintain a positive professional environment that will stimulate human motivation and professional success.


EDAD 6020, Response to Answer for Question #2

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"The structure at Green High School most clearly resembles a professional structure. It's my opinion that this decentralized structure has been created over time by our current administration who places a lot of authority and faith in its specialized staff members. Of course, our system does have necessary bureaucratic characteristics, such as hierarcy, rules and regulations, policies and a normed social process. However, our administration places a strong emphasis on the human resource perceptual lense which allows for the professional structure to prevail. For example, our principal recently placed it in the teacher's hands to create our own OTES walkthrough tool. The system he was using was clunky and expensive. As a district, we are becoming more comfortable with Google, so it was suggested in a BLT meeting that a walkthrough tool be created on a Google form. Around this same time, our district had been deeply exploring DOK levels. Our TBTs and BLT felt like the walkthrough tool could be personalized by department so that our principal could have specific "look-fors" that could help him easily identify what DOK level is being taught no matter what classroom he is evaluating. Our principal simply put it in our hands to create our own walkthrough tool. Within a few weeks, our staff had developed one that satisfied the needs of OTES and our high school staff. This dispersion of power is no exception. Our administration was active, as they set deadlines and checked in with us informally to make sure there was proper completion of this task, however it was up to us to create the tool in our own way and by our own means. Additionally, our administration looks to their employees to maintain their own classrooms by their own authority and to make decisions about student discipline, scheduling, rules, policies, and even state required safety drills. As a result, our staff feels a strong sense of control, self-worth, morale, and professionalism which in turn enables us to follow our administrators when they cast vision or when they do take on an authoritative voice, as is sometimes needed.


The structure at Green High School least resembles a chaotic structure. In my years at Green, there have been very few times that staff have expressed dissatisfaction due to a lack of structure, a sense of disorder, or even lasting dissension between employees. Again, our administration are strong, effective managers who maintain a healthy sense of bureaucratic structure which is necessary to prevent a chaotic structure from penetrating. We have typical procedures, rules, and deadlines to follow as a staff for leave requests, fundraisers, submission of SLO's, and time sheets. Staff knows what is expected of them and we know what to expect from management, as expectations are communicated regularly throughout the building. Administration keeps communication strong by holding quarterly staff meetings and sending weekly blogs and updates from the superintendent's office. Additionally, our building principal takes time to speak to each teacher on a regular basis about our personal and professional goals, helping us move forward to reach our highest potential. Each of these examples show how our administration is made of competent managers and leaders, focused on maintaining orderly day to day operations while developing leaders within our buildings, which allows us to maintain a professional, not a chaotic system."


Molly Sylvia




Dakota Taylor

Teacher/Coach

(304) 208-0198



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