Leadership Opportunity #2: Instructional Leadership Team
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Until this year, I was considered
the “newbie” at my school. I was
the youngest, the least experienced, the one who was guaranteed a pink slip at
the end of every year. Being the
“newbie”, I battled with isolation, frustration, and contemplation of finding a
new job. Very few could identify
with what I was going through. As
each year ended and each pink slip arrived, I felt like I had less and less say
in staff meetings and grade level collaborations. Why should anyone listen to me if I wasn’t even going to be
there the next year? I knew I
needed to make a decision: either I was all in or I was all out. I couldn’t play the in between any
longer. I couldn’t quietly hide
behind my classroom door hoping for a chance to vocalize my ideas, concerns,
strategies, hopes, and dreams.
With the help of the Teacher Leadership Program, I finally made a
decision. I was all in.
With my decision made, I set my sights on a lofty goal. I was going to become a member of our school’s Instructional Leadership Team, otherwise known as ILT. ILT is second in command, after the school principal. It helps make instructional decisions for the school and is able to help select professional development opportunities for the rest of the school staff. As an ILT member, your obligations include bi-weekly meetings with the principal and quarterly meetings at the district offices with other schools’ ILT members. Traditionally, ILT is comprised of veteran members of the school, one representative from each grade level. ILT members are rarely, if ever, “newbies”. If I wanted to step out of my own shadows and make sure the voice was heard at a school-wide level, this is what I needed to be a part of.
With the start of the new school year and another pink slip avoided, I quickly seized the opportunity to discuss my new goal with my grade level partner. She has been teaching at my school for over ten years and has been the obvious choice for our grade level’s ILT representative every year. I nervously explained to her that I was really trying to broaden my leadership capabilities and wanted a chance to represent our grade level as the ILT member. I asked her if she was ok with stepping down and allowing me to step up. I felt a rush of relief as she happily agreed to let me take the reign. We have been working together for the past three years and she has really become a supportive pillar for me. She encourages me to stand up and speak up and is more than willing to make changes in her own teaching if it means better educational experiences for the students. I’m quite lucky to have her as my grade level colleague.
The hard part was over, or so I thought, and I was ready to make a difference. I let my principal know about our grade level’s ILT representative change and how I was extremely excited to take on the new responsibility. She appeared to be pleased but also intrigued as to how I managed to finagle this change. Either way, my leadership journey was about to begin. As quickly as I signed up, I was informed that our first district ILT meeting was in two weeks. I was eager to see what ILT was all about as an insider. However, when the district meeting came, my excitement was swiftly squashed. I had imagined a day full of inspirational dialogue amongst our school’s members as well as amongst the members of other schools. Instead, the first three hours consisted of us sitting and listening to a speaker list off the district’s instructional initiatives and stress the importance of raising the test scores of our English language learners. Not to say the either of these aren’t important, but the presentation was far from what I had envisioned. I felt myself checking out and drifting into random thoughts. After the presentation, we were asked to reflect on what we had heard with our school colleagues. As each member presented at our table, other teachers carried on side conversations, a few worked on other activities, and only one or two were actually actively listening to the speaking member. Admittedly, I was one of the members not giving my full attention. Instead I was thinking about how I had gotten myself into this mess. Was this what ILT was all about?
Thankfully, an ILT member from my school confronted us all on our disrespectful behavior. “You’re all being very rude. Someone is trying to speak and you all could care less about what she has to say. How are we going to make any change at our school if we can’t even listen to one person reflect on what they’ve learned,” he stated. We all became defensive. How dare he say we were being rude, especially when he hadn’t said anything or contributed anything to our table’s discussions all day? I was angry…. upset… annoyed… I was wrong. He was right. He hadn’t contributed to today’s discussions because no one was really listening anyways. He had brought up a valid point. This wasn’t why I had signed up to be a part of ILT. Leadership was not carrying on side conversations.
I quickly changed my attitude and rechecked my mind into the day’s pre-planned agenda. I needed to make the most of the time I had to dialogue with my colleagues. After the tension subsided, we revisited some of our long forgotten norms and we started working together on the next task at hand: developing a new curricular school focus. It was a heated and loving conversation that continually went back to the needs of our students. We decided as a school that the district’s curricular initiatives weren’t exactly what our students needed. I felt so proud to be a part of this discussion. My thoughts and ideas were being heard and taken into account. I was a part of a school decision, a giver, as opposed to being a receiver of passed down information. Quite honestly, I don’t think our conversation would have been so beneficial had we not been called out on our inappropriate behavior.
Now that I have experienced the potential power of ILT, I have created personal goals in regards to my membership. I want ILT to become a place of introducing new teaching strategies, such as project-based learning. I want district-scripted curriculum to become less of a focus. I want to find a way to include more staff members than one representative per grade level. I want to incorporate protocols to make the most of our conversations with each other. I want to address the pressing issues of our school – the issues that are rarely talked about. With all these wants, I need to be conscientious of the example I’m setting. I need to respect the idea, concerns, strategies, hopes, and dreams of ALL my colleagues. As Albert Schweitzer said, “Example is leadership.”
With my decision made, I set my sights on a lofty goal. I was going to become a member of our school’s Instructional Leadership Team, otherwise known as ILT. ILT is second in command, after the school principal. It helps make instructional decisions for the school and is able to help select professional development opportunities for the rest of the school staff. As an ILT member, your obligations include bi-weekly meetings with the principal and quarterly meetings at the district offices with other schools’ ILT members. Traditionally, ILT is comprised of veteran members of the school, one representative from each grade level. ILT members are rarely, if ever, “newbies”. If I wanted to step out of my own shadows and make sure the voice was heard at a school-wide level, this is what I needed to be a part of.
With the start of the new school year and another pink slip avoided, I quickly seized the opportunity to discuss my new goal with my grade level partner. She has been teaching at my school for over ten years and has been the obvious choice for our grade level’s ILT representative every year. I nervously explained to her that I was really trying to broaden my leadership capabilities and wanted a chance to represent our grade level as the ILT member. I asked her if she was ok with stepping down and allowing me to step up. I felt a rush of relief as she happily agreed to let me take the reign. We have been working together for the past three years and she has really become a supportive pillar for me. She encourages me to stand up and speak up and is more than willing to make changes in her own teaching if it means better educational experiences for the students. I’m quite lucky to have her as my grade level colleague.
The hard part was over, or so I thought, and I was ready to make a difference. I let my principal know about our grade level’s ILT representative change and how I was extremely excited to take on the new responsibility. She appeared to be pleased but also intrigued as to how I managed to finagle this change. Either way, my leadership journey was about to begin. As quickly as I signed up, I was informed that our first district ILT meeting was in two weeks. I was eager to see what ILT was all about as an insider. However, when the district meeting came, my excitement was swiftly squashed. I had imagined a day full of inspirational dialogue amongst our school’s members as well as amongst the members of other schools. Instead, the first three hours consisted of us sitting and listening to a speaker list off the district’s instructional initiatives and stress the importance of raising the test scores of our English language learners. Not to say the either of these aren’t important, but the presentation was far from what I had envisioned. I felt myself checking out and drifting into random thoughts. After the presentation, we were asked to reflect on what we had heard with our school colleagues. As each member presented at our table, other teachers carried on side conversations, a few worked on other activities, and only one or two were actually actively listening to the speaking member. Admittedly, I was one of the members not giving my full attention. Instead I was thinking about how I had gotten myself into this mess. Was this what ILT was all about?
Thankfully, an ILT member from my school confronted us all on our disrespectful behavior. “You’re all being very rude. Someone is trying to speak and you all could care less about what she has to say. How are we going to make any change at our school if we can’t even listen to one person reflect on what they’ve learned,” he stated. We all became defensive. How dare he say we were being rude, especially when he hadn’t said anything or contributed anything to our table’s discussions all day? I was angry…. upset… annoyed… I was wrong. He was right. He hadn’t contributed to today’s discussions because no one was really listening anyways. He had brought up a valid point. This wasn’t why I had signed up to be a part of ILT. Leadership was not carrying on side conversations.
I quickly changed my attitude and rechecked my mind into the day’s pre-planned agenda. I needed to make the most of the time I had to dialogue with my colleagues. After the tension subsided, we revisited some of our long forgotten norms and we started working together on the next task at hand: developing a new curricular school focus. It was a heated and loving conversation that continually went back to the needs of our students. We decided as a school that the district’s curricular initiatives weren’t exactly what our students needed. I felt so proud to be a part of this discussion. My thoughts and ideas were being heard and taken into account. I was a part of a school decision, a giver, as opposed to being a receiver of passed down information. Quite honestly, I don’t think our conversation would have been so beneficial had we not been called out on our inappropriate behavior.
Now that I have experienced the potential power of ILT, I have created personal goals in regards to my membership. I want ILT to become a place of introducing new teaching strategies, such as project-based learning. I want district-scripted curriculum to become less of a focus. I want to find a way to include more staff members than one representative per grade level. I want to incorporate protocols to make the most of our conversations with each other. I want to address the pressing issues of our school – the issues that are rarely talked about. With all these wants, I need to be conscientious of the example I’m setting. I need to respect the idea, concerns, strategies, hopes, and dreams of ALL my colleagues. As Albert Schweitzer said, “Example is leadership.”