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Reforms and changes in the education system
Importance of public administration
Role of public administration in society
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Public school systems are constantly undergoing change, as they continue to face numerous reform movements and society-driven value fluctuations. Whether the arguments center on the idea of the Common Core State Standards or to teacher evaluation reform efforts or perhaps even to the validity of school vouchers, there has been an increasing amount of pressure placed on district administrators to provide leadership, vision, support, and action within the scope of their job’s roles and responsibilities. Ultimately, school districts operate with the intention of increasing student learning and academic achievement. District-level administrators facilitate this process by providing the overseeing and overarching leadership needed to take on such a tall challenge. First, district-level administrators use their leadership to cultivate collaborative leadership at both the district and the building level. While all teachers and building-level administrators need a certain level of autonomy and authority to respectfully do their jobs, a district-level administrator can streamline this in order to ensure that the district’s mission and …show more content…
Articulating a personal commitment and providing evidence of need – most often in the form of district and national data, create the sense of urgency they are trying to convey. Often, the district’s mission and vision communicate the need for effective teaching and learning. Therefore, district-level administrators participate in curriculum development and evaluation. Furthermore, they recruit and train principals, teachers, and learning coaches who are also instructional leaders and are willing to work together in order to improve student learning and academic
Ms. Hall has had many years of public education experience and higher education training in which to hone her leadership style and framework. She started her career as a teacher in the Kirkwood School District. She then served as an assistant elementary principal at both Ritenour and Pattonville School Districts before being selected to serve as the assistant superintendent of the Maplewood Richmond Heights School District in 2008. Throughout her career she continued to pursue her education as a means o...
The major concepts of this article relate to the ineffectiveness of school leadership programs. Arthur Levine found that a majority of the programs were inadequate. He noted four areas in which these programs lacked efficiency. These areas of concern were the rise in off-campus low quality programs, weak research-intensive universities that are working towards awarding doctoral degrees in administration, competition for students is causing lowered program quality and admission criteria, and the fact that state and local school districts are adding to the problem by salary incentives for advanced degrees. Levine noted several major issues that affect school administration programs. First, he revealed that many people who had finished these programs agreed that the curriculum was irrelevant; they said that it did prepare them to deal with "on-the-job issues." Second, the issues of low admission and graduation standards were addressed. The study illustrated how many schools lower their standards to increase admission and create tuition "cash cows." Third, he discussed the issue of these schools having weak faculties.
Leading organizations of school administrators offer educators various opportunities to encourage educators to become leaders. No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) has mandated that leaders be better prepared for the task of providing quality education to all. NCLB “… is forcing all educational stakeholders to face the weakness of contemporary school leadership and is making it impossible to ignore the need for higher quality principals” (Hale & Moorman, 2003, p.1). It is believed that all educators can be and are leaders in their own right. A leader is a visionary and has the ability to inspire others to aspire to greatness. Of the numerous opportunities that are offered, those that are most beneficial include but are not limited to leadership training programs, professional development, and creating shared leadership opportunities for teachers to become leaders. The systems “…that produce our nation’s principals are complex and interrelated – and governed by the states. Each state establishes licensing, certification and re-certification” (Hale & Moorman, 2003, p.1). States use the ISLLC standards “…as the framework for preparation programs and in service professional development of school superintendents, principals, and other leaders” (Hale & Moorman, 2003, p.3).
According to standard two of the Professional Standards for Educational Leaders (2015), educational leaders should act with integrity, fairness, and in an ethical manner to promote the success of every student. In the scenario, a new assistant superintendent in a school district is head of curriculum and instruction. The school district services 15 schools, 12 elementary schools and 3 junior high schools. The assistant superintendent has prior experience in a previous school district with curriculum and instruction, but seemed much happier in the new district’s atmosphere. The district seems to be more goal-oriented and focused on the upholding the vision and mission of the district. There is also a strong value on self-evaluation
An educator must have the ability to notice the value of extending planning and subject matter. In addition, educators need to be flexible enough to change the curriculum based upon state standards and the student’s ability to absorb information.
The School Leadership Team (STT) has a huge responsibility to lead, including instructional coaching duties, and mentoring the new teachers. Parameters were set in place by the principal, offering a clear vision, including clearly-defined values and teachers are becoming empowered through leadership opportunities, which have been devoid in the past. Therefore, I think the leadership style is effective, because the administrator is willing to share the leadership, and I have witnessed firsthand the impact an instructional coach is having on the school, and the individual growth of that coach is becoming immeasurable. 2. The principals current practice is to have her “office” on the go. At the practicum site, there is a spot in the school, which is centrally located at four corners of the building, and this is where the principal can be found during the day, most of the time. She is setup with a cart, her laptop, cell phone and a daily planner, and likes to be out in the building, rubbing shoulders with teachers and kids. I believe the leadership style is effective because the principals mobile cart has created a transparent environment where teachers and scholars can easily interact with the building administrator and the leader is able to accomplish essential tasks while keeping close contact with stakeholders, which contributes to a
Standard 1 of the Florida Principal Leadership Standards (2011) describe the priority of the school leader as, “effective school leaders demonstrate that the student learning is their top priority through leadership actions that build and support a learning organization focus on student success”. Our number one priority and focus is and always should be our students. They are the reason behind our professions. It is the faculty the ones who should be supported by the administrators. The leaders should celebrate their success, encourage them, support their assertive instructional decisions, and motivate them each day to create the right conditions for learning. The principals must plan to project growth the most accurate possible, employing all the help that they could get for this challenging task. Students should not be affected because qualified teachers are not available. Strategic schools use the resources at had to relocate, and alleviate the human resources problems.
As a school administrator it is important to be a motivator for the teachers that
Rayan admitted the presence of resistance among teachers throughout the process of curriculum development and design. She perceived the situation to be normal and emphasized the significance of creating a positive working environment structured on strong professional relationships as means to overcome resistance (R. Katerji, personal communication, February 10, 2017). Ms. Rayan was mostly challenged by experienced teachers, since novice teachers are more flexible and open to change knowing that they require more time and effort from her (personal communication, February 10, 2017). To reduce this resistance, Ms. Rayan includes teachers in the decision making process and determines their needs through discussing the state of the curriculum in LIS and conducting needs assessment (R. Katerji, personal communication, February 10,
With the passage of NCLB, many school reform efforts have been initiated using top-down model in which each school leaders have been charged with initiating bold administrative changes to address the legislation. With the number of leadership theories and models, researchers have become interested in studying those to determine which might bring forth the most significant results for leading such change. Due to the lack of highly qualified administrators and the increasing demands for administrators, Bush, O’Brien & Spangler (2005) studied a program, the Southern Tier Leadership Academy, a collaborative of the New York Education Department. The study included three separate cohorts who completed an eight month program. Whereas, Somech (2005) chose to investigate directive and participative leadership approaches, and which would more significantly impact school effectiveness. Perhaps Somech’s reflect Scherer’s (2009, p.7) understandings as described in Educational Leadership, ‘broom-wielding leadership can indeed be beneficial’ as is putting advocates into positions of power and influence and building teams, both of which are seemingly contrasting opposites.
The role of teacher leader has been defined as “teachers who aspire to stretch beyond their classrooms to engage in leadership roles that take many shapes and forms, both “informal and formal”. (ECS, 2010). Teacher leadership has also been described as “the process by which teachers, individually and collectively, influence their colleagues, principals, and other members of the school community to improve learning practices with the aim of increased student learning and achievement.” (ECS, 2010). In years past, a majority of teacher leadership roles took the form of department chair, committee chair, grade level chair, etc. It was more of a representative role versus a leadership role. Their responsibility primarily involved dispersing information from administration to their counterparts and taking information back to administration from the group. Their position lacked decision-making power and true leadership that brings about “real” change. These tasks are still viewed as opportunities for teacher leadership; however, recently, the
When it comes to implementing a curriculum everyone has an opinion. Whether it is the organization of the curriculum or the evaluation of the curriculum, everyone from administers, teachers, and parents will have their opinions on the new curriculum. The curriculum development group has many difficult decisions to make. They have to decide when and how to implement, who will be in charge, what data will be collected, and how will the curriculum be evaluated.
Administrative principles look more at the organization, or department as a whole and not focus on individual employees or functions of the organization. Fayol, Gulick, and Urwick, among others, started creating principles for “organizing different tasks into jobs, jobs into work units, and work units into departments” (Liebler & McConnell, 2012). Fayol broke away from Gulick and Urwick and created his own fourteen management principles, which were pertinent to all types of organizations and consisted of “Division and specialization of work, Authority, Discipline, Unity of command, Unity of direction, Placing group interests above individual interests, Pay, Centralization, Line of authority or scalar chain, Order, Equity, Stability
Teachers and leaders work and communicate together to initiate changes that’s needed to build new ways of learning, sharing and accessing knowledge, then putting it to work in the lives of all students. At my school we have learned education, science, technology and hardworking devoted staff members are the key to preparing our students for a great global education and future.
Education is a very important aspect in the life of a child. The level of success a student has in the classroom is greatly influenced by their teachers. Students, as well as their parents, depend on the teachers to guide them through their education. But who guides a teacher to perform successfully in the classroom? Principals and teachers play an important role in schools. A good relationship among school leaders and teachers is necessary and play an important role in making improvements in the school. Leadership refers to the “process in which one person successfully exerts influence over others to reach desired objectives”. (Okoji, 2015) Good leadership involves honesty, vision, confidence and commitment. It is the ability to inspire a