Standard 5 - Managerial Leadership
School executives will ensure that the school has processes and systems in place for budgeting, staffing, problem solving, communicating expectations and scheduling that result in organizing the work routines in the building. The school executive must be responsible for the monitoring of the school budget and the inclusion of all teachers in the budget decisions so as to meet the 21st century needs of every classroom. Effectively and efficiently managing the complexity of everyday life is critical for staff to be able to focus its energy on improvement.
Element Va. School Resources and Budget: The school executive establishes budget processes and systems which are focused on, and result in, improved student achievement.
Element Va. School Resources and Budget: The school executive establishes budget processes and systems which are focused on, and result in, improved student achievement.
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The following video is my final strategic budgeting presentation for the graduate course: Organizational Management: Resource Support and Sustainability. This project required me to analyze a particular school's budget and performance data, and from that analysis, prepare recommendations for a comprehensive and detailed budget proposal. This proposal must abide by local, state, and federal spending policies, which were all topics we covered throughout the class.
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In our Organizational Management: Resource Support and Sustainability class, we discussed the importance of decision analysis. As school leaders, we are going to be faced with decisions that are complex, difficult, and require a lot of information. The sheet below details a decision making protocol assignment. In small groups, we analyzed a school's low performance and had to apply this model to choose what action we would take moving forward. We assigned weights to each of our criterion and its expected direct and indirect impact on our school. After analyzing each option's weight in our model along with its potential for impact, we were able to arrive at a consensus.
Duplin County Schools holds Principals' meetings once every month. My principal has given me the pleasure of accompanying her to those meetings. They have provided me opportunities to be a part of county-wide strategic conversations and speak on behalf of Warsaw Elementary when sharing best practices. My principal was unable to attend the April Principals' meeting, so I was asked to attend in her place. It was a meeting in which 2018-2019 budget allocations were dispersed, which allowed me the chance to directly view our teacher allotments and student enrollment projections. With the North Carolina state budget cuts, along with House Bill 13 (K-3 Class Size Reduction), I met with the other K-8 principals to discuss the various ways our schools would be affected as well as brainstormed options for responding to the changes. Below is the agenda for the April Principals' Meeting.
Element Vb. Conflict management and Resolution: The school executive effectively and efficiently manages the complexity of human interaction so that the focus of the school can be on improved student achievement.
Every Thursday, myself and our school Curriculum Specialist meet with every grade level in our data room inside our media center. Our PLC conversations are to be transparent, focused, and geared towards solutions. We may present "issues" but when we present them, it is with the intent to solve them. It was the beginning of February when I had the idea of having our grade levels participate in consensus mapping. I wanted to generate a conversation around how our administrative team could best support our teachers while they worked hard to help our students. These consensus maps contained some leadership struggles, and revealed some of the gaps we, as a Leadership Team, needed to fill for our staff to feel fully supported. Fruitful and productive conversations occurred that were solution focused and I believe that through this activity, trust was built.
Element Vc. Systematic Communication: The school executive designs and utilizes various forms of formal and informal communication so that the focus of the school can be on improved student achievement.
We have several means of communicating with our community, staff, students, and stakeholders at Warsaw Elementary. Once such way is through our monthly newsletter. Although our goal has been to create a newsletter for each month that highlights all we are accomplishing, it has been difficult to achieve that goal with fidelity.
As the Fall semester was coming to a close, Warsaw Elementary had much to celebrate and I wanted to ensure that all of our stakeholders, parents, guardians, staff, and students knew about it! I created our "Warsaw Winter Newsletter" (displayed below) that highlighted all we were doing.
As the Fall semester was coming to a close, Warsaw Elementary had much to celebrate and I wanted to ensure that all of our stakeholders, parents, guardians, staff, and students knew about it! I created our "Warsaw Winter Newsletter" (displayed below) that highlighted all we were doing.
Element Vd. School Expectations for Students and Staff: The school executive develops and enforces expectations, structures, rules and procedures for students and staff.
We have several buses with double routes. Due to our first group of students arriving each morning at 7:10 am and our second at 7:30 am, we were experiencing hall way and classroom supervision gaps throughout our morning. Similarly, in the afternoons, adjusting to dismissing nine grade levels at once (due to our first year as a K-8 school) was a challenge. Several unfortunate incidences were consistently occurring either in the morning or afternoon. I created this duty assignment master sheet that placed at least one staff member at every "blind spot" in our building. This sheet listed the expectations, but it has taken consistent visibility to keep our teachers and staff accountable to these expectations.
We have several buses with double routes. Due to our first group of students arriving each morning at 7:10 am and our second at 7:30 am, we were experiencing hall way and classroom supervision gaps throughout our morning. Similarly, in the afternoons, adjusting to dismissing nine grade levels at once (due to our first year as a K-8 school) was a challenge. Several unfortunate incidences were consistently occurring either in the morning or afternoon. I created this duty assignment master sheet that placed at least one staff member at every "blind spot" in our building. This sheet listed the expectations, but it has taken consistent visibility to keep our teachers and staff accountable to these expectations.