The Hudson Chronicles

As I reflect the successes and challenges of the previous school year and work with my team to plan for the upcoming school year, the concept of reclaiming the joy in schools is a theme that I can't get out of my head. We know all too well that the past several years in public education have been exhausting.  Schools have focused on the increasing behavioral and social emotional needs of students.  And, while these needs have intensified, adults have experienced their fair share of struggles as well.  No one appears exempt.  A significant number of employees and community members report feeling overwhelmed, and this dynamic often results in stressed relationships. For simplicity's sake, I am suggesting that too many people have lost their sense of joy in school.  One way this has manifested itself is the student attendance crisis across the country.  Another is increased absenteeism among school employees nationwide.  In Arlington, we see it in our dat...

I have recently been afforded the opportunity to teach a graduate course for Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY, entitled Designing Curriculum and Instruction. I have taught graduate courses for Aurora University, Northern Illinois University, and Western Illinois University, going back to approximately 2004, and I have enjoyed every single course and every single student.  However, this was the first time I have taught a course in four or so years.  What a joy!  What a privilege!  Thanks to Marist for giving me the opportunity. I have always enjoyed teaching graduate courses.  I guess it brings me back to my salad days--my undergraduate days at the University of Wisconsin, my time at Eastern Kentucky University, my cohort pals at Northern Illinois, or my very special days as a college baseball coach and athletic director at Lakeland College, during which I taught several undergraduate courses.  Though I miss those days and wonder what my life would have be...

Few, if any, public schools have managed to provide quality experiences for children without high levels of community support.  If you click on Jamie Vollmer's website , the first thing you see is the quote, "No expenditure of our tax dollars yields as high a return as our investment in public schools."  Vollmer didn't used to believe this.  In 1988 he was asked by Dr. William Lepley, Iowa's Secretary of Education, to join the Iowa Business and Education Roundtable.  Before becoming an advocate for public education, he was a harsh critic. In his first two years as Director of the Roundtable, he visited dozens of schools, met with hundreds of educators, and interacted with advocates from every point on the political spectrum.  One of the first "aha moments" for Vollmer was a realization of the increasing number of things that have become the responsibility of public schools.  In what has come to be known as Vollmer's List, he names these responsibilit...

The Arlington Central School District, located in LaGrangeville, NY, is a member of the American Association of School Administrator's Learning 2025 Network  along with approximately 125 other school districts from across the country.  Learning 2025 is a student-centered, equity-focused, future-driven collaborative.  Its central premise is that leaders, teachers and students must play an active role in redesigning systems, reengineering instruction, and co-authoring the learning journey. Last year the District began working with Eric Sheninger to deepen its understanding of how to leverage technology to personalize learning for all students.  Sheninger's concept of personalized learning emphasizes the importance of student voice and choice and path, pace, and place in the learning process.   Throughout the school year, administrators and teachers worked together to identify how the Learning 2025 Core Redesign Components could support Arlington's efforts to ...

Schools often make the mistake of focusing so intently on improvement strategies that they fail to take the time to mark the occasion and celebrate successes.  One of the most important principles in change theory is that organizations should celebrate small successes as a way to create momentum and maintain morale. Most thought leaders in education acknowledge that this past year was one of the most, if not the most, challenging year in the history of public education.  This may make it more difficult to sift through some of the frustration and recognize the good, but it also makes it all that much more important. The Arlington Central School District based out of LaGrangeville, NY, recently celebrated its 97th commencement ceremony.  Arlington experienced many of the common difficulties that, at times, overwhelmed a majority of school districts across the country.  Layered on top of that were some truly unique and tragic incidents that made it extremely difficult t...

Spring is a special time for those of us who celebrate Easter, and for those of us who don't, crocuses, daffodils, and tulips emerge, and rhododendron and crabapple, cherry and pear trees flower.  For others of us (myself, included) who think that the four greatest words in the English language are, "Pitchers and catchers report," patience has allowed us to witness the "Boys of Summer" and the "Lords of the Realm" once again put aside their differences, and, thankfully, the umpires cried, "Play ball."  All of this annually leads to a renewed sense of hope for most of us.  But . . . I am not sure who coined the phrase, "Hope is not a strategy," but I have heard many people use it to illustrate a point, including assessment guru Rick Stiggins and one of my dear collaborators and thought leader in the area of educational change leadership, Michael Fullan .  A favorite Fullan graphic of mine is a change matrix that identifies the neces...

ESSER, the Elementary and Secondary School Education Relief Fund, provides significant dollars to help schools mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.  My current district has submitted a plan for utilizing approximately $15M during the 2021-22 and 2022-23 school years.  An inherent dilemma in the requirements of the grant is the timeline over which funds must be expended.  The pandemic is still with us, and while its impact was not catastrophic for all students, children who are the most at risk are the ones who are struggling the most, and there is no disputing the pandemic's detrimental impact on the academic growth for many students and the overall social-emotional wellness of children and school employees across the country.  This will not be "fixed" in two years. There have been many "fixes" introduced into education by this country's policy makers, but most of the legislation has focused on what Michael Fullan , the Global Leadership Director fo...

I have been fortunate to work with Ray McNulty, President of the Successful Practices Network, in various capacities over the years, and my current district has the privilege of doing so now as part of its involvement in the American Association of School Administrators' Learning 2025 Network, a collection of more than 100 school districts from across the country. I remember a dozen or so months back when Ray suggested that a better name for the term "The New Normal" should be "The New Now."  His point being that, in today's world, with the pace of change as it is and the associated unpredictability that results, even when this pandemic is finally over, we will be hard pressed to define normalcy as we once did.  Rather, we must become adept at navigating and thriving in a VUCA World --one that is Volatile, Unpredictable, Complex, and Ambiguous. In 1965 Gordon Moore predicted that number of transistors in a microchip would double every two years.  Though scie...

As we launch the 2021-22 school year, the vast majority of students across the country will be returning to full-time, in-person learning.  This reality requires every person in the system (i.e., students, parents, teachers, administrators, board members, and taxpayers) to not only reacclimate themselves to school, but, also, reimagine what school is, feels like, and looks like. People who want to spin things in a negative light will talk about "learning loss," while those who choose a more constructive course will utilize the term "unfinished learning."  Others will gravitate to the obvious social-emotional and/or equity concerns that were in play prior to the pandemic and have only been exacerbated.  As I pointed out in my previous blog, each are equally concerning.  It is not an either-or proposition. However, even in good times, should anyone recall such a thing, public educators have been challenged to ignore the shiny object.  I call this conundrum "Progr...

In addition to improving and refining specific skills and strategies for classroom efficacy, high quality professional learning in schools builds the leadership capacity of everyone in the organization.   Leadership should not be entirely role specific.  However, when establishing annual professional learning priorities, many districts mistakenly invest almost exclusively in teachers and neglect supporting the growth of those in formal leadership positions who are held accountable for ensuring outcomes are met. According to Marzano, Waters, and McNulty (2005), leadership does matter, but the type of leadership matters most.  Instructional leadership has an effect size of .42 as compared with .11 for transformational leadership. High quality classroom teaching has always been critical to student learning, but as teaching becomes increasingly complex, even the best teachers do not thrive to the maximum extent possible in mediocre schools.  High quality leadership ...

Early in my administrative career, I significantly downplayed the importance of Social Emotional Learning (SEL).  My basic premise was essentially that there are too many children who leave our system unprepared to participate adequately in the economy and achieve adult independence.  Until educators start assessing students properly and can ensure that all students learn, grow, and leave our system with the necessary skills to be employable and productive, then, well, there are only so many hours in the day, so we're going to focus on literacy, critical thinking, writing across all content areas, and, most importantly, assessment. I also felt, as I sometimes do today, that the realm of SEL is more comfortable for teachers and, at times, provides a shield from truly reflecting on instructional practices and the extent to which students are achieving academic proficiency  However, I made a huge mistake.  I committed the mortal sin of leadership that I caution everyone...