Turn the Page

"A strong working relationship requires every participant to be on the same page."
-Dinsh Paliwal

One of the things I love the most about working here are the relationships that exist among the faculty and staff. Many of you have been working together for most, if not all, of your careers, and those relationships extend beyond the work day. When I am interviewing candidates for positions here, and they ask about the culture among the staff, it is easy for me to gush about how much you all enjoy working together, and I truly believe that you do. 

That isn't to say there aren't areas where we still need to focus on getting more aligned, especially with the number of new-- or new to us-- faculty members we have added this year and will continue to add next year. With all of the newness, I have failed as a leader to ensure this same pagedness has taken place, and I intend to improve that as we move into next year. I am going to need your help. As we make our way through these final weeks, I want all of you to help me identify the "little things" where you see us being inconsistent with student expectations. This could be tardies, cell phones, running in the hallway, etc. I have no doubt that we are all on the same page in terms of major behaviors, but I think we have started to get some gaps in the way we are monitoring and addressing some of the little things, which is contributing to some of our bigger things.

It bares repeating, that I blame myself for this. As the instructional leader of the building, I should have been more diligent in banging the drum on these matters, but truth be told, I worried that with all of the changes this year and the stress that has come with them, that pouding away on the little things would only add to the stress I know you have all been feeling. However, I do feel like I am seeing us getting our legs under us in a lot of areas that were still shaky back in the fall, so as we look ahead to next year, I want to have a clear vision for the areas in which we can really get in lock-step in terms of enforcing student behaviors.

When we are on the same page in these areas, it allows to be on the same page with students as well, and that is where a strong working relationship pays the biggest dividends for us. 


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