my version of transparent, collaborative leadership...with a Teamann twist

Do you even blog any more?? #leadLAP #LeadWithAppreciation

by 1 Comment

Bless it.

 

I do, I promise.

 

Mostly though? I blog in my head. I think through the title, the content, and action takeaways…but the actual GET TO THE BLOG part is where it all falls apart!!

HA! again…bless it.

 

Where’ve I been?

  • Starting YEAR 5 as principal and partner with our amazing team
  • Trying to handle being the MOM OF A SENIOR (God help us all.)
  • Celebrating a certain campus that achieved 4 (YES, 4!!! distinction designations from the state of Texas!
  • Celebrating a certain campus that earned the highest (yes, highest!) academic gains in the past four years, and was at the TOP of our district!
(Why does that matter? When I try real hard not to focus on test scores or standardized testing? B/C it’s the system in which I work and am evaluated. It also represents the HARD WORK my teachers and Wolves put in and how much they grew in our academic year.

I can be sunshiney and blog all the darn time, but if my students aren’t growing? aren’t learning? what kinda principal am I actually?

Click To Tweet

  • Feverishly working on “The Leadership Vault”, a subscription site for leaders designed to meet the needs and contribute to leaders from all over!

 

Annnnnnnnnd, finally, something else that has been taking up my time…another reason I have been M.I.A…… My principal BFF, Melinda Miller, and I have been working hard this summer to get this published so it can get in your hands!


Publish date should be in October…but I will keep you posted! We are super excited about this book…it’s the culmination of the Facebook groups and ideas shared over the past three years in our Staff Appreciation and Morale Facebook group. More on that soon!!

 

 

All this to say, I am here. I am principaling. And I hope all is well in your world too!

 

 

 

 

Amber

Leading as yourself…why do it any other way? #leadership

by 2 Comments

During the summer months, my word is relatively calm and quiet. The halls and classrooms and halls are silent.

Luckily last week my former (sigh.) counselor came by to see me. I am always actually smarter after she leaves me, which is a rare gift.

This time we had a great conversation about the people in our space. I struggle with having a “‘person” in my world. Do you have “A” person? Like your very best friend? The one you play with, work with, snack with, share with, vacation with?

I don’t. Well. I do.

I have all kinds of people who do all the things…but they vary based on season, decade, or shoot, sometimes geographical location. At times though, I am sad that there isn’t one person who has been there through it all. LIKE all. This is where I found myself when Shari the awesome visited. There’s something of value in a long-lasting friendship that has seen you through the phases of your life, ya know?

Per usual, her perspective challenged what I thought I was thinking.

What if instead of a person, you have people? What if in different seasons of life, you have different needs, priorities, or focuses?

What if it was incredibly unfair to place the expectations of meeting ALL your needs on the back of one?

Not only did this challenge a thought (literally) that I’ve had since high school..but as a result, it released a WHOLE lot of feelings I’ve probably silently (and not so silently) harbored for a really long time.

I hope you surround yourself with people. People who are like you, and people who are different. People who are there for you for a season, those who are there for a longer time. I hope you remember that as the leader you become one of your team’s people. The one who delivers good news and the one delivers bad news.  And when you do have bad news to deliver… you’ll find that you need your people as well.

You can’t lead well from the sidelines, friends. You gotta be down on the field with them.

Click To Tweet

I’ve seen so many posts lately about leading/sharing separate facets of who you are…for example, the professional person vs the personal person.

I have no interest in people only seeing the professional side of me. It’s incomplete without knowing #allthethings, like how I love football or snacks, or how I read voraciously. You have to know I’m a wife, a mom, a daughter, and a sister. That I yell at football games and I’m a terrible sports mom. You’d miss how very interwoven my principal-ing is with who I am.

If you didn’t know those things and so many more about me, you wouldn’t know me at all. And that’s no way to lead.

Turns out maybe I don’t need a person. I have my wolf pack. And that’s just fine with me.

 

Openly &

 

 

Easy appreciation…gamify your appreciation! #leadership

by 2 Comments

One of my favorite things to do is to reward our staff. We’re going to give away birthday books this year, and thanks to our Staff Appreciation and Morale group on Facebook, there’s no end to the clever ideas shared. Leaders from all over share how they treat, appreciate, reward their teams throughout the year.

One popular way to show appreciation was the prize wheel, where the slots are filled with jeans passes, sonic drinks and early release passes. These are fun but I worry about trying to fill up the slots. That’s quite a few sonic drinks! I loved the idea of gamifying my gift giving. And then tada…I discovered this!

This year…drum roll please…we’re going to introduce STAFF PRIZE PLINKO! Look at the cuteness!!

That’s only 4 slots! I can easily think of four ways to reward/celebrate our people!

 

If you haven’t seen the wheel, it’s also fun. It’s just more than I can be creative for, ha!

Would love to see what you put on your wheel o’ appreciation!

 

Spinningly &

 

A leadership retreat…an ADVANCE for leaders!

by Leave a Comment

I recently had an opportunity to take our leadership team away for an overnight retreat. We’ve had retreats in the past, and they’ve been on site and usually right before the beginning of the year. When meeting with our fab friends at Boosterthon, one mentioned how much cooler a leadership ADVANCE was than a leadership retreat. Once he said that I was hooked!

This leadership retreat was going to be different!

First I surveyed a date and gauged interest before I even booked the place. Making sure everyone WANTED to be there was important! Dates ranged in April and May and we settled on an overnight in April. Just one night, so they still had a part of their weekend to themselves.

I also conveyed what our purpose was going to be right up front. We were going to review leadership teams, detail what we thought were home runs from the past year, and also some strikeouts. We were going to discuss the school calendar and add all of our events so that we were all on the same page for #allthethings. It’s amazing how the tone can change when you give teams the opportunity to have input on dates vs just telling them when to be somewhere. They have such valid input on why scheduling something on Tuesday vs a Thursday made more sense. Things I wouldn’t have thought about and don’t necessarily have a hot sports opinion about. Our leadership team consists of our team leaders and our PLC leaders. One set of leaders handle the logistics of things happening and one set handles curriculum conversations. Each is responsible for conveying any info shared with the rest of the team.

What I brought for each teacher:

  • a binder with a paper calendar, with dates already marked (holidays, state testing, etc)
  • erasable pens 
  • post its
  • pencil

Just so you know the schematics….we were able to book a cabin a couple of hours away. We planned on cooking one meal, having a grab and go breakfast, and then we would all go to lunch at a local restaurant. I tried to keep it as simple as possible. We worked on teams and committees on Friday night and tackled the calendar Saturday morning.

The organic conversations were incredible. The time spent around the fire Friday night, listening to everyone’s “where I started” stories were irreplaceable. Their input made a huge difference and I am so thankful for a team that is willing to be IN the trenches with me. It’s taken four years for us to get to this place where we can share freely, openly, and know that we’re in the green zone together.

 

I highly suggest you “advance” at your next opportunity!

 

Cabin-ly &

Birthday book cart and #principalselfies

by 3 Comments

What in the world did principals do years ago without the IG and FB groups of the world?

 

All the great ideas are ideas that people share that you can adapt, tweak, and make your own just make my principal world so happy.

 

For example, the great Jessica Gomez on IG shared her birthday book cart. She gifts every student at her campus, (and every teacher too!) a book on their birthday!

To make this work for my Wolves, I waited until we had our Scholastic book fair, and then used a considerable amount of points to let some of my teacher leaders choose books across a variety of levels and interests. (and yes, I even used points to buy the cart!)

I used book bins to sort and arrange on my cart. I have big vinyl plans to decorate the end to reflect what our goal is…for every student to find a book they WANT to read. I bought picture books, I bought comic books, I bought graphic novels. I bought books Pernille Ripp said I HAD to have and I bought #allthebooks Brad Gustafson said I needed.

I am ready.

My plan is to use our campus master list to announce their birthdays on the announcements, have them come down to the office, check their name off the list, and grab a book! Holiday birthdays will be delivered when we get back, and I’ll do summer birthdays before we leave!

I mean, really! Who wouldn’t want to choose a book from all these choices???

I’m going to add a sticker inside each with a birthday message, like so!

Fujifilm Instax Mini 70 - Instant Film Camera (White)

Now how could one “level up” the birthday cart?? What if you added PRINCIPAL SELFIES, for instance? What better way to let a student celebrate their special day with a mini pic of you and them and their birthday book?? This this mini camera was gifted to me,  Fujifilm Instax Mini 70 – Instant Film Camera (White), to instantly print out a mini pic! I saw this idea shared from the #momsasprincipals group, and as a result, I was hooked! This camera is relatively inexpensive and provides an instant keepsake for my Wolves. Win, win, win…

 

 

 

 

 

Combined, hopefully, all our Wolves will feel celebrated on their special day in addition to getting something new to read! Am thankful for a PLN that not only does great things but shares them out so that we can all celebrate those around us!

 

How do you celebrate your students and staff on their special day??

 

 

Selfies &