Standard 6: An education leader promotes the success of every student by understanding, responding to, and influencing the political, social, economic, legal, and cultural context.
Artifact 6
Issue Analysis
The Failing Performance Rate on Standardized Based Assessments
Artifact 6
Issue Analysis
The Failing Performance Rate on Standardized Based Assessments
Rationale:Standard 6 of the ISLLC Educational Leadership Policy Standards requires that educational leaders advocate for children, families and caregivers and assess, analyze and anticipate emerging trends and initiatives in order to adapt leadership strategies. The artifact selected for Standard 6 is a school wide Issue Analysis plan I created for EDU 715 Organizational Theory and Strategic Planning. The assignment required that I identify and analyze a school systems problem and consider multiple perspectives of the issue and then use that to create a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) in order to create SMART goals (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely). I analyzed my school's failing performance rates on the state's standardized based assessments through the lens of three different disciplines: Mental Models, Team Learning and Systems Thinking (Senge, 2012). Considering Mental Models allowed me to advocate for the children and families as I perceived common teacher assumptions and unpacked certain beliefs to restructure and modify viewpoints about students and parents. Considering Team Learning allowed me to analyze the structure and norms of our school's overall culture of collaboration. Systems Thinking addressed how crises management from administration puts each event in isolation where as systems thinking provides a way of looking at problems as components of larger structures that affect each other (Senge, 2012). I used all these components to analyze school, local and district strengths and weaknesses to set in place initiatives for leadership strategies and goals for the school to become more successful.
|
Reflection:Thanks to my coursework and completion of this Issue Analysis in Organizational Theory and Strategic Planning I learned two very important ideas that relate to Standard 6. First is the idea that "schools can learn" when the organization involves everyone advocating for children, parents/caregivers then assessing and analyzing current and needed leadership strategies. This assignment allowed me to understand and apply Senge's Five Learning Discipline Models of: Personal Mastery, Shared Vision, Mental Models, Team Learning, and Systems Thinking. These disciplines gave me a framework to strategically organize my thinking to proactively assess and analyze school issues in a solution-based manner. Systems Thinking relates the most to Standard 6 as it addresses school, local, district, state, and national level decisions that affect student learning. The second idea I learned when creating this plan was the importance of creating SWOT analysis and SMART goals. These plans help set a school up for success by getting ideas put into action. One aspect I would change about this plan or implement into another school's Issue Analysis plan would be increasing school involvement with the local and state school board in order to take more action with the political decisions that affect student learning. Standard 6 involves responding to and taking action on a more political level-something I need to get better at and something that I haven't seen a lot of schools strive for until I got to Roots Elementary. During my first of week of orientation at Roots the director explained how all school level decisions were based on state level and community level concerns for students and families. I believe that my position at Roots Elementary is going to allow me to expand on my educational leadership skills of Standard 6.
|