COMPETENCIES
A competency is a combination of knowledge and skills that one needs to effectively implement the practices. The following 21 competencies are identified as important for the development of school executives. Artifacts and their descriptions are listed beneath each competency.
Communication
- Socialize staff to district and school health and safety protocols including staff health screening, rules surrounding eating and drinking, and maintaining social distancing. Ask for staff feedback on implemented protocols and adjust when necessarily.
- Utilize the various communication methods when sharing important information with staff, students, and families (e.g. staff meetings, emails, face-to-face conversation, Monday Memos, etc.)
- Continue to analyze and problem solve student data in across various settings -- School Improvement Team (SIT), SIT Committees, Intervention Team, and Professional Learning Teams (PLT).
Change Management
- Co-lead the Equity/Diversity 20-member team that kicked off in September and held monthly meetings since with the goal to effect positive change throughout the school.
- Revise the school's Equity Value Statement for clarity of purposeful action steps toward the overall school's vision of an equitable school environment.
- Support of the implementation of the school-wide PLC+: Better Decisions and Greater Impact by Design book study and district-provided professional development on successfully implementing blended learning in a virtual setting.
- Collaboratively support the different School Improvement Committees as they take their individual and specific action toward meeting the school's overall goal to increase student achievement.
- Ability to respond and pivot to state and district changes as these two entities respond to the global pandemic.
Conflict Management
- Support the Special Education Department as lead teachers and instructional assistants develop a plan of action to ensure the effective collaboration for the benefit of the students they supported the school as a whole.
- Use the work of Adaptive Schools by continuing to practice their seven norms of collaboration and effective listening skills when responding to conflict.
- Model teamwork, collaborative skills, and positive attitudes to dispel toxicity in the Front Office and other spaces where conflict arises.
Creative Thinking
- Support weekly PLT meetings as teachers collaboratively problem-solve around different learning environments, progress monitoring, assessments, and student engagement and participation.
- Team up with the Family/Community Engagement Committee and other committees as they creatively think how to engage families and students within the school community, especially 75% of students and families remain in a virtual learning environment.
- Partner with the Intervention Team as they create a for teachers to effectively track student participation and engagement, as well as have students set goals to increase their low participation and engagement.
- School administration constantly pivoting as the school district makes and changes decisions impacting student learning environments.
Customer Focus
- Collaborate with school teams (PLT, SIT, SIT Committees, Intervention) to ensure every decision made puts students first and is in their best interest.
- Participate and co-facilitate parent engagement information sessions to ensure families have updated information as they make decisions about their child's learning environment.
- Throughout the school year, worked to contact families about their needs for their child(ren) to be successful during the school year. Family contacts were about ensuring students had the appropriate technology, basic food and clothing needs, or school supplies. These contacts would sometimes result in home visits and delivering supplies to those without transportation.
- Use the information presented in the PLC+: Better Decisions and Greater Impact by Design book study during Equity/Diversity Team meetings to maintain a student focus by asking "Who benefits and who does not benefit? when analyzing school policies and practices.
- Actively support the school's Parent Teacher Association.
Delegation
- Oversaw the establishment of the FAST Center, a space where staff members' children went for their virtual learning. Instructional assistants (IA) rotated student supervision. While serving as a FAST childcare center worker, IAs set up the classroom, created student activities at the conclusion their learning time, and created classroom expectations that met student and adult needs.
- Continue to support the SIT Committees as they make team decisions to positively impact students, staff, families, and school culture.
Dialogue/Inquiry
- My participation on various school teams has allowed me to engage staff and families in conversations hindering school performance, as well as problem solve on how to improve performance.
- SIT Meetings
- PLT Meetings
- Formal and Informal Observations and Evaluations
- Intervention Meetings and Tier Meetings
- SIT Committees (Magnet, Instructional Practices, Equity/Diversity, Media and Technology, Family/Community Engagement, and Core Behavior)
- IEP Meetings
Emotional Intelligence
- Quickly form relationships with staff through short interactions (e.g. Google Meet introductions, PLT Meetings, informal conversations), and continue to make myself available for conversations with school community members.
- Strongly advocate for myself and ensure my personal and professional needs are met to be an effective school leader.
- View all opportunities as learning opportunities as I continue to reflect and grow in the school leadership role.
- Participate in the district-offered Leadership Styles Assessment course leveraging my potential and effectiveness as a school leader in WCPSS.
Environmental Awareness
- Prior to the start of the 2020-21 school year, review available student and staff data on the school to be informed of internal and external trends to better prepare for my time serving in a school leadership role.
- Aware of state and school district updates, and ensure alignment to the school's practices.
- Read EdNC articles for educational updates.
- Attend Principal Meetings and review the principal updates on the intranet to remain aware of district mandates, procedures, and changing directives.
- Listen to the bi-monthly Wake Board of Education meetings to understand and follow the direction of the district, specifically the reopening schools and maintaining safety.
- Partner with the Office of Equity Affairs for specific training on culturally relevant teaching and its positive impact on all students.
- Attend offered training on Dreambox and iStation to understand the assessments teachers use, how to access student and teacher data, and look for trends within the data.
Global Perspective
- Apply my knowledge and understanding of 21st Century skills and Bloom's Taxonomy when visiting classrooms and providing feedback to teachers.
- Review whole-school data, including staff and student data, to determine subgroup trends and identify gaps in skills needed to be successful in the current and future economy.
- Continue my learning of skills needed to be successful in the current and future global world by reading education and leadership articles found on EdNC and EdWeek.
- Form relationships with students and families throughout the school year in order to get to know our diverse family population but to identify and support their individual needs for the betterment of the school community.
Judgment
- Systematically processes through scenarios and issues to come to logical and appropriate conclusions using past experience as a classroom teacher and instructional facilitator. Collaborate with colleagues who are experts in the school building to come to fair conclusions always in the best interest of all students.
- Toward the beginning of the school year, converse and decide which books are appropriate book choices for elementary students when teachers select diverse books for their classrooms.
- Apply learned TregoED decision making systems and actions when analyzing situations and factors surrounding decisions made in the best interest of our students, staff, and families.
Organizational Ability
- Maintain a Google Calendar to organize scheduled meetings and events, as well as ensure I observe instruction and maintain visibility.
- Refer to Fuller Master Calendar of Events when planning Equity/Diversity Team meetings and other school events.
- Plan and coordinate staff health screening training, FAST childcare center rotation, and Care Center communication procedures. Seek feedback from staff to monitor implementation.
- Use Equity/Diversity Team feedback and data to create team next steps and possible activities to complete over the next three years.
Personal Ethics and Values
- Consistently follow and model Wake School Board policies, including but not limited to maintaining student and staff confidentiality when handling suspected cases of COVID-19.
- Develop and maintain trusting relationships with staff members by executing and following through on assigned activities.
Personal Responsibility for Performance
- Actively seek feedback from mentor principal, assistant principal, and staff about professional performance by asking questions when no immediate feedback is given.
- Seek and attend professional development sessions offered by the school district, NCSU, and other organizations accessible to me. During the 2020-21 school year, I attended the following sessions for continued learning:
- Zones of Regulation
- WCPSS-created Blended Learning courses
- iStation Training
- Dreambox Training
- Increasing Family Partnerships
- Introduction to Latin Culture
- Budget Manager Training
- Leadership Styles Assessments
- Serving as LEA in IEP Meetings
- Observations and Evaluations
- Crisis Prevention Training
- Color of Education
- Carolina Hunger Initiative
- Dudley Flood Center's Student Voices Webinar
- Zones of Regulation
Responsiveness
- Develop a clear communication system when responding to situations. Depending on the situation and the urgency, use email, Google Classroom, Monday Memo, staff meetings, or directly on the phone or face-to-face.
- Intervene, when necessary, when needs arise to assist with resolving. For example, update student information in PowerSchool when the data manager took leave, and create a systematic, school-wide process to communicate to both families and staff when a student is out sick.
Results Orientation
- Collaborate with school teams (PLT, SIT, SIT Committees, Intervention) to ensure every decision made puts students first and is in their best interest.
- Review overall school data, including progress monitoring results from iStation and Dreambox, to ensure the school is working toward to meet its overall goal of 75% student proficiency.
- As small issues arise with teachers and students, work with appropriate personnel for prompt response to resolve issues.
Sensitivity
- Develop and build relationships with students, families and staff to respond to individual wants and needs for the betterment of the school community.
- Partner with the school district's Office of Equity Affairs to further own learning on increasing family engagement, specifically with families who are historically marginalized, and learning about Latin and Indian/Pakistani cultures, two subgroups I have had limited interaction with during my professional career.
- Practice and model effective listening skills with staff, students, and families, posing questions when necessary to gather needed information for possible next steps. Practice listening skills when working with staff, use confidentiality when needed to communicate necessary information.
- Ability to view multiple perspectives and perceptions when responding to situations.
Systems Thinking
- Support and collaborate with school school teams (SIT, Committees, Leadership, Intervention, and PLTs) as they create systems and processes in alignment with each other to advance school achievement.
- Build community partnerships with business and church organizations and the PTA as they support the work of the school.
- Implement policies and directives at the school level from varying Central Office departments.
- Review the daily district updates emailed through the WCPSS's Chief of School's Office.
Technology
- Access and use own instructional technology expertise, specifically instructional design models like ADDIE (analysis, design, develop, implement, and the evaluate) when support classroom teachers with designing and implementing instruction in an blended learning environment.
- Participate in the district-offered blended learning professional learning to assist teachers with their technology and implementation needs, and use the information provided to co-facilitate a professional learning session for the school's specialists.
- Determine and model for staff members the best digital applications to enhance professional learning, communication, and productivity.
Time Management
- Utilize agendas and norms during school team meetings, as well as embed protocols throughout the meeting for effective collaboration, communication, and time management.
- Maintain a personal and professional Google Calendar to organize scheduled meetings and events, as well as ensure I observe instruction, maintain visibility, and complete work tasks.
Visionary
- Create, manage, and facilitate the Equity/Diversity Team's learning as the team worked to define team vision and goals in order for meet the school's overall vision of having an equitable school environment for all students. The team revised the school's Equity Value Statement, which states the actions the team will take to support the staff working toward an equitalbe school environment.