What I Wish...

In my previous blog entry, I shared some specifics of an email correspondence between myself and a staff member. We had discussed what important things needed to be fixed at Union Middle School. I shared with them a list but I didn't feel complete in my response.

To be blunt, the "fixit list" didn't feel like an all-inclusive vision of what I wanted to truly share and what I hoped to build as the principal of Union Middle School.

And as I ended my email to this staff member, I quickly sent a second follow up communication. It wasn't about fixing everything... instead it had a list of things that I, as a the site principal, wished our students, our parents, our staff, and our school community knew.

It was about what I wished for.

I shared that...

I wished everyone knew how much work our front office staff and administrative team put into helping make the school day at Union Middle run as smoothly as possible.

I wished everyone knew how much I appreciated the hard efforts of our staff and the work they do on a daily basis with our kids.

I wished our students knew how all of the adults at Union Middle are on their side and working to best support them during their middle school years.

I wished our teaching staff knew how much I value their positive interactions with our students.

I wished our teaching staff knew how relentlessly I support, highlight, and brag to our parents, our district office, and our school community about the work I see that they put into their lesson design and classroom experience, all with the focus on their students.

I wished that our students would trust the adults on our campus a bit more, that they would trust that we are here to help them, to listen, and to best support them grow into the amazing young adults they're destined to be.

I wished that our parents knew how much we treasured having their students during the school day, how much joy they brought us, and how much we recognized even the smallest bits of their academic and social progress.

I wished that everyone knew how much I enjoyed coming to work each and every day. (Disclaimer: I have four kids.)

I wished that our staff could see our administrative team as an ally, no matter the situation.

And I wished that our parent community, our students, our staff, and our school community knew that just because I disagreed with something they believed in and spoke up for, it didn't mean that my decision to go in a different direction was personal. It never is. It just means that I, as principal, have a different vision on how to best support our students and school community.

At the end of the day, I'm the principal and I have to make some really hard decisions. It may anger a few community members, but I make every decision with the "what's best for our kids? what's best for our school community" in mind.

I wish everyone understood that we put kids first, no matter what.

I wish everyone trusted in the work we're doing.

And I wish the best for everyone over the upcoming holiday breaks and sprints of school days in-between.

If you're a student, be nice to your parents and don't forget to thank your teachers.

If you're a parent, be certain to give a bit of grace to your student and consider sending a nice message to a staff member who has helped make the middle school journey a bit less hectic.

If you're an educator, don't forget to give your students a second chance and to lead with trust and best intentions in your interactions with your peers and parent community.

If you're an administrator, don't forget to realize how blessed you are to work with your silly students, talented teachers, and supportive parents -- you can't fix everything but you can recognize how wonderful so many things truly are.

That's all I wish.

Fixing Everything is Impossible

It's the Friday night on the cusp of 9 days of Thanksgiving vacation.

As my wife and I start a new show on Netflix (she nixed Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Luke Cage -- we compromised on the Blacklist), I begin to fiddle through my daily emails that I haven't had a chance yet to answer.

As a site principal, I am constantly communicating with various teachers via email, Google chat, and text threads throughout the day. I think my staff knows that they can contact me and receive a high level of responsiveness, no matter the time of day or holiday break. It's something I actually enjoy: checking in with our teaching staff and seeing what I can do to help. Their insight has actually provided some of the more reflective moments of my educational practice.

Tonight, in one of my dialogues with a staff member, my blog was brought up in the conversation. We were kidding around, discussing various topics for future blog entries. They had just emailed some kind words my way and I responded with: "thanks for the nice words. I just wish I could fix everything."

In their response, they suggested the following shift of perspective in my journey as a middle school principal: "Fixing everything is impossible, my journey to find balance in middle school."

Wow. I was floored.

With just a few words, I had my inspiration for tonight's blog topic: Fixing everything is impossible.

And just for the record, this teacher, as usual, is absolutely correct.

We administrators cannot fix everything.

As I shared with this staff member, I actually don't want to fix everything. After all, I can't change how unhappy some students, teachers, or parents are with the hard work we all put into making Union Middle the amazing place it has become. That's not on my to-do list. Some people are just unhappy people.  

However, even if i can't fix everything, I do want to fix the important things. Specifically, I want our students to have the best school experience possible. I want for our students what I want for my own children: to have a safe, learning environment with the constant, relentless support of a teaching staff who work tirelessly to best support our kids each and every day.

I shared these thoughts with this staff member.

A bit brief, they responded: what are the important things you think need fixing?

Wow. Another good question.

Here's the thing about Union Middle School: we have fantastic kids who are in classrooms with top notch educators and supported by an amazing parent community. It is an amazing place to spend our days. Easily the best place I've ever worked.

So what are the important things that I, as the site principal, think need fixing?

In typical Friday night fashion, I responded with a rather lengthy reply.

Here are some of my main points from the email correspondence:

-I would like to fix how members of our school community interact with one another.

-I expect our adults to always lead with kindness and understanding in all scenarios, even if it is difficult.

-I hope to inspire our staff members to give our students extra opportunities to demonstrate their learning.

-I'd like to expect our students to be a bit more inclusive (even though I am constantly impressed with how kind and considerate they are -- there is always room for improvement here).

-I'd like to have clear agreements on how we, as a school staff, agree to work together with our administrative team to support kids, each other, parents, and the school community in general. I don't mind if students, teachers, parents, or whomever are upset with a decision we administrators have made. I don't expect that everyone agrees with the millions of decisions we administrators have to make each and every day. However, some acknowledgement that our administrative team is extremely (and intentionally) fair and thoughtful when it comes to supporting our students, staff, and communities would be appreciated at times. I'm ok if you want to disagree with the decision; just don't disagree with the love and thoughtful care we put into making it.

When we do make a decision, the focal point is quite simple: It's all about what's best for kids.

Always.

Without question.

Some may disagree with the decision we've made on a random topic but when you're putting kids first, I don't hesitate to defend my position. We administrators may make mistakes, but we always put kids and our school first. Every single day.

We work hard to build a school where students are encouraged to develop their learning, teachers want to come to work, and where parents are proud to send their kids.

So no... I can't fix everything... but I think it is my job as a site principal (and the job of every member of our school community) to help fix the most important things: how can we do our best for the kids.

In working together to best support our students and each other, I believe that we can find a certain level of balance in middle school.

They Don't Usually Get Invited

"We understand. Our son never does."

These six little words were said to me as my daughters and I were leaving a birthday party this past Friday night.

We had just attended a birthday celebration for a student at my daughters' school. This student spends most of his school day in a "Learning Center" classroom, code for "Special Day Classroom" (SDC) in my daughters' school district, with other learning disabled students. One student in the class has down's syndrome. Another student does not speak and is performing grade levels below their current age.

My daughters, each with their own significant needs, get academic support in this classroom as we try to fill in very basic content gaps whose absence is preventing them from accessing the general education curriculum.

Being a student in a SDC classroom can be difficult. For most elementary students, they know that they are different but they haven't exactly figured out why everyone else is in a classroom with 20-30 other students and one adult... while their classroom often has more adults than kids.

When you get to middle school, it gets significantly harder for all involved parties. Kids in middle school SDC classes long to be "normal" and in the "regular" classes. The students in these "regular" classes can sometimes be a bit exclusive toward students in need of extra support. Being different is hard. For others, being friends with someone who's different is even more challenging. Middle school can be a rough time.

The birthday celebration itself was a lot of fun. The majority of the students invited were from the SDC classroom. All of the kids had at least one parent present, a distinct difference from the other birthday parties I've attended with my daughters where kids can just be dropped off for the duration of the activity. There were balloon animals, painting activities, silly YouTube videos to sing along to, lots of snacks and birthday cakes, and everything in between. Most of the students did not interact with one another; social skills are a work in process for most elementary students, especially those with special needs. The SDC teacher even showed up for most of the evening. The kids treated her like a celebrity; it was pretty neat to see.

We were walking out the door at the end of the evening. The birthday boy's parents graciously walked us to the front door and all the way to the sidewalk. I thanked them profusely for inviting our daughters and said, "It's hard sometimes... They don't get invited to a lot of birthday parties..." The mom made eye contact and said very clearly, "I understand. Our son never does."

I went home and shared this moment with my wife. She nodded and said, in an understanding way that only a parent of a special needs student can, "I know. It's hard."

It's something that many parents never have to address as their child will at least have acquaintances and classmate friends that they can text, have sleep overs, go to their birthday parties, and sit next to during snack. A parent of a special needs child worries about what will happen when they can't take care of their child any longer. What if something happens to us; who will take care of our daughters? The layers of unpredicted stress that arrive when your child enters the realm of special needs is a challenge for the involved adult and their marriage. Everything about it is difficult.

And one of the hardest things to endure is when your child isn't included in basic age-appropriate activities.... like the birthday parties.

Looking back at my own childhood, my mom made the rules very clear when it came to my birthday parties. I could invite everyone from my class or I could invite no-one. I wasn't aware of these policies at the time (I was 10), but I remember how I would hand out invitations to everyone in my class and then post a list with their names to record their RSVPs when they called over the next week. Yes, this took place in the pre-Evite days.

It's different today.

Out of the 20-25 students in our daughters' general education classroom, I'm anticipating invitations to no more than 5 parties for my girls.

This year is actually better than last year as there are a few more "uniquely normal" kids in this year's kindergarten class with a few more inclusive parents.

I profusely thank every parent for inviting my daughters' to their child's birthday party. Most of the parents say "no problem, glad to have them join us" but very few truly know what it's like to have a child (or two) who's excluded from these birthday parties because their kids are a bit different.

Until...... you find someone who understands.

Odds are they have a special education student too.

Teenagers and Their Tentative Truths

I'll start with a story.

There's a high school student working at their ice cream job. This ice cream employee is not only known for the best peanut butter and chocolate milkshakes in town, but they're a pretty good student and rule follower as well.

This teenager has an hour break between shifts. They know ahead of time about a house party that they want to stop by. Somehow, their mother finds out about the party and says, in no uncertain terms, they are not to attend this party. The teenager agrees that they won't "attend" the party.

However, even though the teenager decides that they're not going to attend the party, they instead choose to just stop by. To the teenager, this is okay... they're not attending the party; they're just stopping by for ten, maybe twenty minutes.

In between their shifts, this teenager gets a ride from a co-worker/friend to the party. They're at the party less than twenty minutes. They don't drink anything they shouldn't. They just say hi to a few friends and then return back to their job for their next shift. It was a brief visit and barely worth a mention.

The next day, the high school student's mother asks the student if they attended the party. He says "no". The parent follows up with a slightly more linear question: "Are you sure you didn't step foot into that house? That you didn't go to the party?" The teenager pauses and thinks to themselves: What exactly am I being asked right now? How can I not lie but still not tell the full truth? No matter the response the teenager gave, unless it was the full truth, the parent already had their answer. It turns out this mom had connected with a family friend who lived across the street from the party and had offered to keep an eye out for the car this responsible student drove.

Eventually, the teenager had to admit that they stopped by the party. The parent grounded the student for not following the parental expectation and also for lying.

The teenager, himself a rather decent honors student and solid son, tried to find a loophole in their parent's mandate and got caught in the web. It's what kids do. It's also something I remember to this day.

Much like the teenager from the above story, let me be blunt and share: your kid will lie to you.

They will lie a little bit about big things.

They will lie a lot about little things.

They will lie for seemingly no reason.

They will lie with intention and purpose.

Your perfect little angel will lie to you.

This is absolutely normal.

In your student's mind, they're not lying. They're just not telling you the full truth. Often, in my conversations with parents, I share that there is a huge bubble of information that we call the "full truth". I'll make a huge circle with my hands to show how large this "truth bubble" truly is. If a child was to tell you everything in the truth bubble, they'd start at the beginning, not leave anything out, have a perfect memory about what transpired, and took full ownership of their decisions. This rarely happens.

Instead, a student will tell you little pockets of truths within this larger bubble. Here is an example:

What you are asking "did you complete your homework?"
What they say: "yes, I did my homework"
What the truth is: "I only did my math homework and not my ELA homework"

To them, they're not lying. They did do their homework. Their math homework is done. You asked if they completed their homework and they have completed their math homework. You didn't ask about the ELA homework though, even though you think you did.

If you asked specifically about their ELA homework, they'd probably counter with another not-a-lie-but-not-the-truth response like "oh, we actually did most of it in class" (not false) or "I only have a few more sentences to write; it's pretty much done" (not false either). Unless you ask directly about the completion of their ELA assignment, you're not going to get the answer to the question you're asking.

The challenge as a parent, as an administrator, is asking the exact simplified question you want an answer to, even if you have to repeat the question over and over again. Instead of asking a broad "is your homework done?" type question, you need to break the request into smaller, much more defined inquiries.

Don't ask "is your homework done?"
Instead, "please show me your math homework"

Don't say "did you talk with your math teacher like we said you would?"
Instead, "tell me about the conversation you had with your math teacher. tell me every word. I'm about to email them, so I want to make sure I have the full story."

Don't say "everything go well today at school?"
Instead, "let's share our favorite part from today and one thing that didn't go as well as we hoped"

As a school administrator, I know that a student's first reaction when they're in our office is to lie. It's just what always happens. Sometimes, I start the conversation with "I know you're not going to tell me the truth when I ask these questions..." followed by "let's restart this conversation again now that we've agreed that we weren't truthful in the beginning."

Personally, I wish that everyone just started with the truth. I wish our students were truthful with their parents about not completing their work. I wish our parents would trust our staff a bit more on certain occasions. I wish every conversation I had with a student started with an agreement of truth.

I understand why our students aren't truthful. They're a little bit scared. They're worried about the truth. Some students are trying to figure out what I know so they can only share that small segment of information. Other students will just continue to lie, even when confronted with an avalanche of facts. A loophole is the friend of every teenager I know.

About 98% of the time, we administrators and parents get to the truth eventually. Odd thing is... any conversation we have with the student often doesn't even involve a consequence. Our students just don't share the full truth because they don't know how to tell the full truth, even if they're told ahead of time that there isn't a consequence attached.

This is actually ok. They're kids. I don't expect the truth right off the bat and neither should our parents. Instead, let's work on asking the questions that can give us the answers we want from our teenagers. Let's understand that our kids won't always tell the truth... and that they need us to provide the structure and possible consequences when they don't live up to our reasonable expectations.

Much like the story shared above, even a responsible honors student can rationalize ways where they feel like they're not lying to their parents. Every student makes a few mistakes. The secret for their growth is to reestablish our adult expectations and make sure a lesson is learned for the next time.

Because there's going to be another party... there's going to be another next time.

Part 1: Principal of 1030 students

I have always had a soft spot in my heart for kids who don't fit the mold of your typical middle school student expectation.

My first teaching assignment was a self-contained classroom with students of varying diagnoses. A few students were school-phobic. Other students exhibited oppositional defiance disorder tendencies. I distinctly remember students who were emotionally disturbed, dyslexic, borderline intellectually impaired, or simply uninterested in doing school. My classroom was where expelled students would land.

That said, I think it was the best four and a half years of my professional life. I felt like we were working hard as a team to make middle school for our shared students the best experience possible. Looking back, there are more than a few students from our classroom who continued on to high school and higher education with much success. We truly tried to give our students everything we could to make them feel cared for and to know that we would all be there to support them.

Fast forward to today. Parts 1 and 2.

This morning, I focused on a variety of school issues. My inbox was full with questions, concerns, and action items. As I sifted through, I saw an email with a calendar item to contact a parent this morning via a phone call. This parent had some concerns about the progress of their student thus far this school year.

In the phone conversation with the parent, I spent the majority of the time listening to their concerns. I found myself agreeing with many of their points. Their student is someone I've worked with over the past two years and seen such incredible growth from. I enjoy interacting with this student. I feel like we have a secret, non-verbal language sometimes, one where we can communicate in silly glances and random facial expressions. I see a lot of myself in this student. I want him to be successful. I care.

At the end of the phone call, I informed the parent that I had an idea on how to address some of their concerns. I'm not going to pretend that I had an answer for every action item. I didn't. What I could do is spend my morning focusing on how to best support this student.

So I spoke with our assistant principal about a few of my ideas. She helped refine my out-of-the-box thoughts to something that could actually work for the student. I then reached out to our new mental health therapist; he was completely on board. I sensed that he too shared an instant connection with the student and would be able to greatly assist moving forward. I looped in the 8th grade resource teacher, our school counselor, and eventually the student as well. Everyone was on board with the plan. A short email later to the team (and yes, the team includes the parent) and we had a solid rebooting for the rest of the week to best support the student.

We know it might not be perfect. Everyone on the team agrees that we're going to try a lot of things... and if something doesn't work, we'll adjust and try something different.

The highlight of my morning is two-fold.

The first memorable moment was from the new mental health therapist. He commented (and I'm paraphrasing here): "I haven't seen a principal take the lead before on a student's support plan." My response was very simple: we are a team; everyone needs to support our students, including the principal. Secretly, I appreciated his comments. The work of a principal often goes unrecognized. We often get the emails when something is wrong, but rarely do we get feedback from our school community that recognizes the care we give to each and every student, teacher, and parent.

The second memorable moment was my conversation with the student. It actually wasn't much of a conversation. As stated earlier, we have a non-verbal understanding and high level of trust with one another. The sly smile the student provided when he recognized my efforts to help his school day be a bit better -- that's what I received from him after sharing our plan.

I'm excited to see how the plan works for the student. It may need some refining but we are committed as a team to work with the student, his teachers, and all of the supportive adults involved to keep trying. We don't give up on kids.

And a perfect day would stop there. Unfortunately, part 2 had not yet happened.

Don't Give Up On Kids

At Union Middle School, we try our best to give every student what they need to be successful.

Our teachers seek out students in need of a parent-teacher-student conference. Our mental health team challenges themselves to find students who may need supports that we're not yet providing. The administrative team repeatedly asks each other "what are we not doing for kids that we could try to do?" 

Essentially, we have built a school community where every individual is responsible for the growth and welfare of every student at our school. We don't have "those" kids or "not my problem" kids -- if you work at Union Middle, you have agreed to try your best to support all of our students, even the ones not necessarily asking for assistance.

This is not to say that we don't make mistakes. We do. We then try our best to fix the problem for the betterment of the student. 

This is not to say that we address every problem or student issue by the end of the day. We can't. Some problems we never find out about despite our best efforts. Some situations we don't find out if our suggested interventions have helped until the students visit us a few years down the road. Regardless, we are committed to try our best to support our kids and our UMS community.

This is not to say that we get it right the first time. No-one is perfect. It is to say that we don't give up on our students and will try to make the learning experience for every student a positive one. 

I realize it can be challenging for an educator to give a bit more when they feel pushed to their professional limit. This happens a lot in education, partly because educators are a noble lot and often over-extend themselves for their students. It doesn't mean that we won't try. 

Two of our new-to-UMS 6th grade teachers are starting a twice-a-week homework help club for 15-20 invite-only students in need of such supports. One of our 8th grade teachers, upon hearing about this 6th grade homework help club, has initiated a similar club but for 8-10 8th grade students in need of extra help. A simple check of #teamUMS on Twitter sees staff attending soccer games, preparing for wrestling practice, and inviting our school community into their classrooms.

Trying to best serve our students is the reason why we show up every single day. If an educator loses sight of their promise to put students first, they've officially lost their way and need to ask for help to rediscover how lucky they are to work with kids every single day. 

To paraphrase a parent from a recent IEP meeting after I asked how their students were adjusting to Union Middle...

"It's really weird for my kids at Union... I asked them, 'what's going on with those kids over there' and they said to me, 'mom, you don't have to worry; they're good kids. It's not like (our last school). Kids here are really good kids. It's not what we're used to... and it's sort of nice.'

No school staff is perfect... but I don't think you'll find a more caring, dedicated staff that our #teamUMS. 

Let's Talk Mission & Vision

For each of my five years as the principal of Union Middle School, I've tried to have a unique start to the school year for our teaching staff. During my first year, I did a three year road map for our school to give our staff a sense of where I envisioned we were headed. Last fall, we worked solely on team building exercises with an instructional leadership theme for the year. I tailor each beginning as not only a precursor for what the year will bring, but specifically selected based on where I believe the staff stands as educators and as a school community.

During my first year, as is the case for any new principal, a majority of the staff was waiting to see where I would help steer the school. Providing the road map on day one gave our teachers a chance to have the school wide action plan shared as a group and at the very beginning of the school year. Last year, the school culture was becoming an issue; we needed to learn how to work, play, and belong together again. Both school years had activities, committees, and events that encompassed the themes from the first day. 

This year was no different. 

This year we are revisiting our mission and vision as a school community. To begin on day one, I shared my own personal mission and vision with the staff. Truthfully, I was a bit nervous about speaking in front of the staff. Much like many educators I know, it's really easy to talk in front of our students, but speaking to our colleagues is significantly more challenging. I also spent a good part of the summer reworking my mission and vision in my head and in my slides. I wanted to find the right words for each part of the presentation. Perfectionism became a small issue along the wall. Eventually, as is the case with most projects, you just have to let go a bit and move on to the next part of the presentation. 

I chose to make our school mission and vision the focus point of our school year because I believe that we are ready to take the leap forward as @teamUMS educators. Finally, for the first time in my previous six years at Union Middle, we have the right people in the right places with the best intentions to best serve our students. Over the past five years, I've made a point of hiring a certain type of staff member: talented, nice-to-kids, good-for-our-school-community individuals. You can look at Margaret and Nora in the front office as perfect examples of these qualities. My goal is to create a staff that puts kids first, that gets along with one another, and enjoys working together. We work with 12 year olds - it's ok to be silly and have fun! Couple these educators with a hard working, talented group of veteran staff members and we're now at the point where common expectations and shared goals should be a part of our daily routine. 

My presentation began with a quick review about what a school mission and vision entails. Next, I shared some personal notes about the story of building my family and then various elements of our #teamUMS staff that correlate to my own values as an educator. After giving our staff a few moments to write down their own mission and vision, I shared mine. Here it is:

My Vision:

As the UMS Principal, I want to:

• Provide our students with a safe, nurturing learning environment with every opportunity to experience academic, social and emotional growth; a place where they are treated with compassion, and are given opportunities to develop tolerance and respect for our individual, unique differences. I want our students to grow, to learn kindness, and to be cared for.
• Ensure our #teamUMS staff feels supported by their administrative team and their colleagues, beloved by the school community for their dedication to their craft, and have opportunities for their professional growth in their own academic journey; I want our staff to grow, to practice kindness, and to know they’re cared for.
• Hire the very best staff members to join our talented #teamUMS family; individuals who believe in kids and who want to be a part of a positive learning community. I want our new and future colleagues to be individuals who practice kindness, who want to grow as an educator, and who can add positivity to our school community.
• Communicate with our parent and school community, to be open to feedback and to work together to best support Union Middle; I want the adults in our community to be involved in the growth of our students, to treat our staff with kindness, and to know we work extremely hard for their children.

My Mission:

As the UMS Principal, I want to:

• Ensure that Union Middle School is devoted to doing what’s best for our students, giving teachers the time, tools, and resources they need to grow in their respective disciplines, and work with our school communities toward maintaining a safe, nurturing environment where all #teamUMS members have the opportunity to create, learn, explore, build, rebuild, and grow.

And now, as a staff, our next steps will be to create a mission and vision for our staff, our students, and our school community. We've set aside time to work on this lofty yet essential goal during the school year. I'm excited to see our next steps.