Standard 4: Human Resource Leadership
Principals will ensure that the school is a professional learning community. Principals will ensure that process and systems are in place which results in recruitment, induction, support, evaluation, development and retention of high performing staff. The principal must engage and empower accomplished teachers in a distributive manner, including support of teachers in day-to-day decisions such as discipline, communication with parents/guardians, and protecting teachers from duties that interfere with teaching, and must practice fair and consistent evaluations of teachers. The principal must engage teachers and other professional staff in conversations to plan their career paths and support district succession planning.
Element 4a. Professional Development/Learning Communities: The principal ensures that the school is a professional learning community.
I co-facilitated several planning periods with the administrative team on the district's instructional framework. The first step in our meeting was brainstorming activities that fit into each section of the framework. Our next step was creating the same language of the framework parts-learning purpose, anticipatory set, instructional delivery, review, and closure. During our annual school review, it was brought to the school's attention that teachers were not using the same language. By the end of the year, there will be a common language established that will be used in each class room next year.
Element 4b. Recruiting, Hiring, Placing and Mentoring of Staff: The school executive establishes processes and systems in order to ensure a high-quality, high-performing staff.
As a member of the interview team, I co-facilitated the interview process and conducted reference checks for candidates applying for positions at the school. We interviewed for the following positions: ESL Teacher Assistant, CTE Nursing Fundamentals Teacher, and an Exceptional Children's Teacher Assistant position. As a result of my participation on this team, I suggested that in future interviews, we should ask more character questions and have the applicant create and present a short mock lesson for the interview team.
Element 4c: Teacher and Staff Evaluation:
The principal/assistant principal evaluates teachers and other staff in a fair and equitable manner with the focus on improving performance and, thus, student achievement.
As the executive leader of a school, school improvement is always at the forefront and is done intentionally. During my principal residency, I had the opportunity to conduct formal teacher evaluations. During the evaluations, I was able to evaluate teachers fairly and use the experience as a learning tool. After the observations, I would generally provide a copy of the completed observation and have a post-conference to provide feedback on the things I saw while in the classroom. The teachers appreciated the feedback and talked about what they could do differently if they taught that lesson again. They shared what went well and what didn't go well.