HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Welcome to the 2011-2012 school year or should I say “Happy New Year!”?  When I think of New Years, I think of New Year’s Resolutions—and just like at New Years, many of our students, teachers, parents and administrators start off the school year with their own resolutions.  The problem with resolutions is they are often broken not long after they begin.  Here are some tips to help you keep your New (School) Year’s resolutions:

1.            Choose goals that are attainable and realistic. 

Think about your previous school year and choose one or two areas where you think you can improve.  Instead of year long goals, consider semester or marking period goals. 

2.            Share your goals with other people.

It is easier to stay on track when other people can support what you are doing.

3.            Write down your goals and post them where you can see them daily.

Daily reminders will help you stay focused on what you are trying to achieve!

4.            Set up checkpoints and allow for some setbacks.

If you are constantly monitoring your progress, you are more likely to take the necessary steps to reach your goal.  At each checkpoint, either celebrate your successes or get help getting back on track.

One of my goals is to keep creating posts for this blog.  If you notice that the blog is not being updated, email me (raabb@rlasd.k12.pa.us, call me, or stop me in the hallway and help me get back on track!  What will your goals be for the 2011-2012 school year? 

The Lions' Den

On August 3rd, approximately 100 soon-to-be 9th graders attended The Lions' Den at Red Lion Area Senior High. The Lions' Den was developed 3 years ago by teachers and administrators who saw a need to provide incoming freshmen with a high school orientation experience. Each year The Lions' Den Committee strives to make the day relevant for the students who are coming to the high school for the first time. The day is packed from 8:30 am to 3:00 pm with a building scavenger hunt, team building activities, and informative sessions entitled, "High School 101". Sessions within "High School 101" include: the Freshman Experience, Freedom vs. Responsibility, Gym - The Basics, Getting Involved at RLASH, What Guidance can do for YOU, and Academic Survival. Students who attended The Lions' Den stated they felt more prepared for high school, but admit they will likely still get lost in such a big building. Rest assured, there will be many friendly students and helpful teachers to transition the 9th graders to Red Lion Area Senior High.

Moving Forward

Summer 2011 is coming to a close and Red Lion Area Senior High is bustling with preparation for the upcoming school year. I am ready! Or am I? My head is swirling with a list of tasks that increases minute by minute; tasks that need to be checked off before students and teachers are welcomed back to the building. However, there is an even lengthier list of things I want to accomplish during the year to increase student achievement and to become a more effective instructional leader. Where did this inspiration come from? Well, part of the inspiration is my competitive nature to be my best for the community I serve and the other part of the inspiration came from the recent ISTE conference I had the privilege of attending in Philadelphia, PA.

I suppose one could call me an ISTE groupie. Drawers full of ISTE shirts are testaments to my travels to conferences in Philadelphia (twice), Atlanta, San Antonio, and Washington D.C. I attended my first conference in Philadelphia and I was hooked. At the time I lived near the City of Brotherly Love and commuted to the conference for 2 days. Anyone who has ever traveled through Philadelphia during rush hour can attest that this cutesy moniker is far from true and because of delays and other commitments, I did not get a full ISTE experience. However, I was determined I would go back and be more of a participant since I knew what to expect from a global organization that hosts tens of thousands of people dedicated to improving education through the innovation of technology.

With a lot of pleading to administration at my former district, I went on my ISTE circuit and every time I came back, my colleagues cringed. Back to the district I came with enough enthusiasm for every one in the district and more “out of the box” ideas that any one school could handle. Some ideas took hold, but not the systemic changes I was envisioning for my school. Week by week, my ISTE glow faded as more and more efforts and resources were spent on issues that did not affect teaching and learning. The gung-ho ISTE feeling left me in isolation and only to influence those that were in my class. The lack of support and encouragement from a larger group across the district was the death knell of my inspiration and motivation.

Fast forward, a couple of years and I am now an assistant principal at Red Lion Area Senior High. Change is a difficult process, but coming to Red Lion has been a homecoming for me. While I did not attend schools in the district, I am from York County and I am thankful every day that my family and I have decided to call Red Lion home. That commitment to the Red Lion community is solidified every day I enter the building with teachers and students who come prepared to teach and learn.

This intense commitment to teaching and learning was exemplified this summer with the generous support of the Red Lion Education Foundation who sent a cohort of administrators, teachers, and board members to attend the 2011 ISTE conference in Philadelphia. As if this amazing opportunity to network and learn with people from around the world was not enough, each person in attendance was presented with an IPAD 2! Equipped with the latest technology, individuals from the Red Lion group ran in a myriad of directions trying to capture as much of the conference as we could through speakers, panel discussions, presentations, poster sessions, and even a meeting with members of the ISTE Board! During the limited down time in the evenings, we continued to maximize the power of the group by sharing what we learned during the day and how we could take these ideas back to the Red Lion Area School District. The topic of improving teaching and learning infused every conversation and ignited my passion to be a better instructional leader. Finally, the support needed to sustain systemic change had been established and I knew 2011-2012 would be the year to bring the spirit of ISTE to the Red Lion Area School District. So while my to do list has grown exponentially since I first sat down to write my first post, I am confident the support that grew out of the Red Lion ISTE cohort will sustain the inspiration, motivation, and innovation needed to challenge our students.

My First Steps

The 2011-2012 school year will be my 15th year in education!  I started my career as a social studies teacher at Robert Smalls Middle School in the Beaufort County School District in South Carolina.  The next phase in my career was as a school counselor and department chair at Lansdowne Middle School in the Baltimore County Public School system in Maryland.  After my tenure as a school counselor, I had the opportunity to be an assistant principal at Towson High School, also in the Baltimore County Public School System, for 6 years and I will be going into my 3rd year as an assistant principal at Red Lion Area Senior High School in the Red Lion Area School District in Red Lion, Pennsylvania.

When I began my role as an assistant principal, many of my mentors prepared me for a rewarding but sometimes isolating job experience.  Fortunately, working in a large school system at that time, I did have opportunities to network with other administrators.  When I was offered a job as an assistant principal in a school district that was less than 10 minutes from my home, I jumped at the opportunity (at the time I had 3 children all under the age of 4, so being close to home was important to me and my family).   At the end of my first year at Red Lion Area Senior High School, I was having a discussion with my superintendent, assistant superintendent and principal during my end of year evaluation regarding opportunities to network with other administrators in the surrounding area.  I shared that one aspect of the job that I missed working in a small school district versus working in a larger school district was the opportunity to network with other administrators.  As a result of this conversation, I was encouraged to seek out different opportunities to increase my professional network.  During my second year in Red Lion, I was given the opportunity to attend the PAESSP State Conference and the ISTE National Conference.  Both conferences were great opportunities for me to network with other educators and I left each conference refreshed and excited about education!

 

Attending the ISTE conference was an “Ah-Ha” moment in my career.  My school district understood the importance of the ISTE vision (Thanks to our Director of Technology, Jared Mader) and our education foundation paid for 20 members of our school community (teachers, administrators and board members) to attend the ISTE conference. In addition to paying for the conference, the education foundation suprised the teachers and administrators who attended the conference with new IPad 2's to use at the conference and for school! The ISTE conference was especially rewarding to me because I realized that there are networks of educators just an email, tweet or blog away!  I also realized that the post conference excitement doesn’t have to end—I can continue to follow other educators and learn from and about their challenges and successes.

 

If I want to be a true instructional leader, I know that it is important to model behaviors that I expect from my teachers.  With this idea in mind, one of my goals that I took away from the ISTE conference was to set up a blog (Thanks to Ben Smith for showing Kate and I how to set up a blog).  I have enjoyed reading many blogs online and now I am taking my first steps in putting my own thoughts into blog form.  I don't know what direction my blog will take me, but I am excited to give it a try!  Any suggestions or advice to a new blogger are appreciated and welcome!