In This Issue:

  1. Keeping social-emotional learning initiatives on track

  2. A young girl pushes back on “you guys”

  3. A report on Boston’s teacher-evaluation process

  4. Is off-task student talk always a waste of time?

  5. Upper-elementary students engage in robust discussions of issues

  6. Adult bullies in schools

  7. Adding equity as a focus for dual-language programs

  8. A continuum of cultural competence

  9. Thoughts on being a candidate for a job in one’s own school

10. Short item: International Literacy Association book choices

 

Quotes of the Week

“Workplace bullying can thrive only within a workplace that tolerates it.”

            Crisis Prevention Institute (quoted in item #6)

 

“Studies from the past several decades consistently show that students in most classrooms rarely have the opportunity to participate in an open, extended, and intellectually rigorous exchange of ideas, during which they get to formulate and defend their own opinions, and consider alternative propositions offered by their peers… Such a classroom culture hardly prepares students to become active participants in today’s information-rich, globalized, and rapidly-changing society, in which multiple, competing, and, often, false claims to knowledge abound.”

            Alina Reznitskaya and Ian Wilkinson (see article #5)

 

“It’s exhausting to try to correct everyone who uses ‘guys’ to address our daughters. I have been met with defensiveness, and sometimes outright annoyance.

            Jason Basa Nemec (see article #2)

 

“The science of measuring social and emotional development simply hasn’t kept up with the desire to measure it, and school and system leaders should be wary of those who claim to know how best to gauge such competencies.”

            Joshua Starr (see item #1)

 

“It’s no surprise that many critics have begun to push back on the idea that children of color need white educators to teach them to persevere and regulate their behavior.”

            Joshua Starr (ibid.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1. Keeping Social-Emotional Learning Initiatives on Track

            In this column in Phi Delta Kappan, PDK International CEO Joshua Starr says three things worry him about “the rapid and widespread embrace” of social-emotional learning (SEL). First, the concept has become “too fuzzy to be useful” – it can mean growth mindset, grit, anti-bullying, collaborative learning, classroom management, and more. Second, developers are creating social-emotional learning productsand hyping them as ways to transform schools (if we purchase and implement them with fidelity). Third, says Starr, “I worry that the SEL movement hasn’t been careful enough to address the racial divisions that permeate American public education… It’s no surprise that many critics have begun to push back on the idea that children of color need white educators to teach them to persevere and regulate their behavior.” 

            Starr has these suggestions to get social-emotional learning back on track so that it makes a positive difference in schools:

            •Think of SEL as an aspiration, not an intervention. Social-emotional learning is not a discrete program for certain students, he says: “It’s not something you do for 45 minutes on Thursdays and then return to regular programming.” SEL needs to be woven into all student and adult interactions. 

            •Describe SEL in positive terms. It shouldn’t be seen as focused on “fixing” the deficits of some students. Rather, it should be framed as enhancing the overall social and emotional health of the school community.

            •Find the right funding. Starr recommends doing due diligence to make sure money raised doesn’t come with strings attached (for example, buying a specific program).

            •Be skeptical of metrics. Test scores? School climate?  Student SEL competencies? Be careful, Starr advises: “The science of measuring social and emotional development simply hasn’t kept up with the desire to measure it, and school and system leaders should be wary of those who claim to know how best to gauge such competencies.” 

            •Don’t limit SEL to special education. That sends the message that only certain students need social and emotional support. SEL should be for everyone.

            •Reinforce the need for SEL throughout the system. “SEL is for every adult and every kid, all day every day,” says Starr. “Attending to emotions is necessary on the bus, in the playground, in the cafeteria, after school, and during academic classes.”

            • Think carefully about SEL’s relationship to educational equity. “For historical reasons,” he says of the racial dimension mentioned above, “many students and their parents have good reason to be wary of such efforts.” 

 

“Can We Keep SEL on Course?” by Joshua Starr in Phi Delta Kappan, May 2019 (Vol. 100, #8, p. 70-71), https://bit.ly/2Fo3Mhl; Starr can be reached at [email protected]. 

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2. A Young Girl Pushes Back on “You Guys”

            In this Washington Postarticle, writer Jason Basa Nemec says his three-year-old daughter loves the coed indoor soccer skills camp she joined last fall – dribbling, kicking, and playing fun games like Red Light Green Light Black Light (the last signals a field-wide dance party). The only problem, says Nemec, is that the coach (a kind, energetic woman who really motivates the kids) constantly would say things like, “Come on, guys!” “Let’s go, guys.” “Way to go, guys!” 

            Nemec acknowledges that “we live in a world in which people regularly use the word ‘guys’ to address a group of people, regardless of their gender.” The English language doesn’t have a gender-neutral second-person plural pronoun like the Spanish ustedesor the German ihr. “You all” is too clunky, says Nemec, and “y’all” too Southern for most folks. Somehow we’ve defaulted to “guys.” 

The word can be traced back to Guy Fawkes, who tried and failed to blow up the English Houses of Parliament in 1605. Back then, the word was used to describe poorly dressed or creepy-looking men. By the 1930s in the U.S., “guys” was no longer pejorative and had become gender-neutral. It’s been argued that using “guys” now conveys a stance of “cool solidarity” with those being addressed. But Nemec “can’t shake the feeling that people who use ‘guys’ to address a group… are acting out of a patriarchal habit, not thinking, and just being plain lazy with their words.” 

When the soccer camp reconvened in January with the same coach, Nemec asked his daughter what she thought about being addressed as a guy: “Does that seem weird to you?” Chewing on a sandwich, she said, “Yeah.” “How come?” he asked. “Well, because we’re not all guys.” With a little encouragement, the girl went up to the coach after a practice and asked how come she was always calling everyone “guys.” The coach promised to address the kids as “soccer friends.” The girl ran back to her father, thrilled with her success. “I was thrilled, too,” says Nemec. “My 3-year-ld daughter was making changes in the world. I was so proud of her, I sang her praises the whole way home.” 

But the next day, the coach was still calling the kids “guys.” This time Nemec went with his daughter and the coach apologized: “I don’t mean anything by it,” she said. “It’s just something I say.” “We understand that a lot of people have a habit with that word,” Nemec said. “Thank you for trying.” But he was thinking about a story he’s heard about two girls falling behind in school and being labeled as having learning disabilities; it turned out that the girls, “being literal learners like most young kids, simply didn’t think any of their teacher’s repeated ‘What do you guys think?’ questions pertained to them. They weren’t falling behind. Someone was pushing them, with language, to the end of the line.” 

Nemec knows that a lot of people think this doesn’t matter, that it’s about being politically correct, but he isn’t giving up. “It’s exhausting to try to correct everyone who uses ‘guys’ to address our daughters,” he concludes. “I have been met with defensiveness, and sometimes outright annoyance. Well, team, I still think it matters: how we use words, how we evolve both through language and beyond it.”

 

“Why I Don’t Want My Daughters to Be Called ‘Guys’” by Jason Basa Nemec in The Washington Post, May 13, 2019, https://wapo.st/30Np0is

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3. A Report on Boston’s Teacher-Evaluation Process

            In this Annenberg/Brown University paper, Matthew Kraft and Alvin Christian (Brown University) report on their study of teacher-evaluation reforms launched by the Boston Public Schools in 2011 and tweaked in subsequent years. In particular, Kraft and Christian looked at teachers’ perceptions of the feedback they received after classroom visits and the district’s attempts (in a 15-hour training program for administrators) to improve the quality of feedback. 

Following a Massachusetts initiative, the major focus of Boston’s 2011 teacher-evaluation reforms was promoting teachers’ and administrators’ professional growth and development (versus accountability). Here are the major components:

-  Teachers self-assess, set goals with their principals, collect evidence of their progress toward professional and student learning goals, are observed by administrators, and participate in a formative and summative evaluation process.

-  Evaluations are based on a revised version of the Massachusetts teacher rubric, which has four domains: Curriculum, Planning, and Assessment; Teaching All Students; Family and Community Engagement; and Professional Culture.

-  Evaluators conduct 1-4 formal unannounced observations throughout the year and provide written feedback.

-  Evaluators are encouraged to conduct frequent informal 15-20-minute observations followed by face-to-face conversations with teachers.

-  Evaluators are responsible for giving teachers end-of-year 4-3-2-1 scores on each domain and overall, based on classroom observations and evidence submitted by teachers.

-  Teachers scoring 3 (Proficient) or 4 (Exemplary) continue a cycle of self-directed growth, while those receiving the lower two ratings have more-structured evaluation plans.

-  After several repeated low evaluations, teachers may be dismissed.

Between 2012 and 2014, the district engaged principals in an intensive training program designed to improve their skills in face-to-face coaching conversations with teachers after each classroom visit.

            In their study, Kraft and Christian’s drew on teacher surveys in June of 2014 and 2015, which had impressive response rates (56 and 60 percent, respectively). The researchers also surveyed administrators who had attended the training sessions. Here are the major findings:

-  Teachers mostly said they received regular classroom visits (an average of 3.63 unannounced and 1.91 announced a year) 

-  Most teachers said their evaluations were fair and accurate.

-  Teachers mostly said they had mutually respectful and trusting relationships with their evaluators and believed evaluators were committed to supporting them in improving teaching practices.

-  There were limited but meaningful variations in ratings across teachers: 6% Unsatisfactory or Needs Improvement, 76 % Proficient, and 18% Exemplary.

-  Fewer teachers said the evaluator feedback they received was helpful, and only about a quarter said their instruction had improved as a result of feedback.

-  A key factor in these lower ratings was that administrators had difficulty making time for face-to-face feedback conversations: administrators averaged six classroom visits per teacher, but met with them only twice. One-third of teachers reported nevermeeting with an evaluator for a post-observation conference.

-  One factor was the number of teachers each evaluator was working with (around 20) and the amount of time evaluators devoted to analyzing data and writing evaluations.

-  Another factor: “Evaluators rarely pushed teachers to be active participants during feedback conversations,” say Kraft and Christian; “only about one-third of teachers said that their evaluator would ask questions that allowed them to reflect in depth about their teaching practices.” 

-  However, a few evaluators received much higher ratings from teachers on providing helpful feedback that improved teaching. 

-  Less-experienced teachers reported receiving higher-quality feedback than more-experienced teachers.

-  African-American, Asian, and Hispanic teachers reported receiving higher-quality feedback than white teachers.

-  Teachers said more-experienced evaluators provided more-helpful feedback.

-  Teachers overall were less satisfied with the helpfulness of feedback from administrators of color.

-  African-American and Hispanic teachers said the feedback from administrators of color was significantly more helpful than feedback from white administrators – a key correlate being trusting and respectful relationships. 

The most striking finding of the study, say Kraft and Christian, is that the thorough, high-quality, and well-received administrator training had a “null” impact on several key measures: teachers’ perceptions of the helpfulness of feedback; the number of observations conducted; the number and length of post-observation meetings; teachers’ overall evaluation ratings; teacher retention; and student achievement. Worse still, say Kraft and Christian, the study also found “a small negative effect on teachers’ perceptions of school leadership quality, self-efficacy for classroom management, and self-efficacy for instructional strategies.” It’s possible, add the authors, that this was a result of teachers receiving more-critical feedback. 

            Kraft and Christian believe the key factors in most teachers’ perception that evaluators’ feedback wasn’t helpful were: (a) administrators’ time constraints, and (b) administrators’ lack of content-area expertise in the subject areas of many teachers. The authors also comment on the district’s emphasis on observations and documentation versus in-person feedback. “An incentive structure that does not track or reward in-person feedback,” they say, “is unlikely to result in frequent conversations between evaluators and teachers… Our results suggest that improving the quality of evaluation feedback may require more fundamental changes to the design and implementation of teacher evaluation systems.”

            [One obvious change would be cutting down on the paperwork required after each classroom observation, freeing up hundreds of hours a year for evaluators to have face-to-face feedback conversations with teachers after every classroom visit and hone their skills in this potentially productive arena.   K.M.]

 

“In Search of High-Quality Evaluation Feedback: An Administrator Training Field Experiment” by Matthew Kraft and Alvin Christian, EdWorking Paper 19-62, Annenberg Institute at Brown University, May 2019, https://bit.ly/2HBXtZQ; Kraft can be reached at

[email protected]

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4. Is Off-Task Student Talk Always a Waste of Classroom Time?

            In this article in Phi Delta Kappan, Emma Gargroetzi, Rosa Chavez, Jennifer Langer-Osuna, and Kimiko Lange (Stanford University), and Jen Munson (Northwestern University) say most teachers assume that when student groups are supposed to be working on a shared task but are chatting about off-task subjects, they’re wasting time and need to be redirected. But in their research with fourth graders, Gargroetzi, Chavez, Langer-Osuna, Lange, and Munson found that off-task chatter is often productive. When students were talking about something other than the assigned work, more than half the time they were talking in ways that led to collaboration. About 20 percent of the time students were chatting to avoid work. And about 17 percent of the time they were off task because they thought they had finished. 

            “Productive disciplinary collaboration requires that all students participate, something easier said than done,” say Gargroetzi, Chavez, Langer-Osuna, Lange, and Munson. “Each time students collaborate, they are grappling with disciplinary ideas and practices, as well as the social world. These dual goals make collaboration a powerful platform for teaching and learning.”

The authors’ careful observation of students working in groups revealed that students often used their off-task talk to “negotiate access to collaboration” in the following ways:

-  Warm-up to collaboration – initial connections to peers so students can begin to work as a group;

-  Gain access to collaboration for self – a student who was previously not participating enters and begins to work with the group;

-  Recruit others to collaboration – this brings non-participators into the joint work;

-  Gain the attention of others – this gets peers to turn toward the speaker and give him or her the opportunity to join the conversation;

-  Resist domination – this is aimed at deflecting efforts by a peer to dominate the group.

Observing these off-task interactions, most teachers would be inclined to intervene and tell students to get back to work. “But doing so,” say the authors, “would ignore the productive functions that these interactions served in supporting students’ collaborative work. In fact, intervention could derail students’ efforts to establish collaboration and undermine their learning how to negotiate the tricky terrain of joint work.” Better to listen in for a moment to see if the off-task talk was brief and fulfilling one of the functions listed above.

            Intervention does make sense, they continue, when students are avoiding work or think they’re done. But how do teachers judge what’s truly off-task? Gargroetzi, Chavez, Langer-Osuna, Lange, and Munson suggest several instances that call for intervention:

-  A student is being excluded and attempts to join are consistently spurned.

-  Off-task chatter goes on for more than a minute without attempts to get back to work.

-  Students need guidance on how to work together productively.

“Productive teacher interventions address the issue behind the off-task talk,” say the authors – for example, giving explicit instructions on how to work together and support each other.

 

“Can Off-Task Be On-Track?” by Emma Gargroetzi, Rosa Chavez, Jen Munson, Jennifer Langer-Osuna, and Kimiko Lange in Phi Delta Kappan, May 2019 (Vol. 100, #8, p. 62-66), https://bit.ly/2HAIMWW; the authors can be reached at [email protected],[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], and [email protected]

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5. Upper-Elementary Students Engage in Robust Discussions of Issues

            In this Voices in Educationarticle, Alina Reznitskaya (Montclair State University) and Ian Wilkinson (The Ohio State University) say studies have shown “that students in most classrooms rarely have the opportunity to participate in an open, extended, and intellectually rigorous exchange of ideas, during which they get to formulate and defend their own opinions, and consider alternative propositions offered by their peers.” Instead, students passively listen to lectures and are rewarded for the answers their teachers are looking for. “Such a classroom culture,” say Reznitskaya and Wilkinson, “hardly prepares students to become active participants in today’s information-rich, globalized, and rapidly-changing society, in which multiple, competing, and, often, false claims to knowledge abound.” 

            The authors worked with upper-elementary students in Ohio and New Jersey to implement “inquiry dialogues” in which students develop deep conceptual understanding of complex issues by following this curriculum structure:

-  The teacher poses a big, contestable question that is open to multiple interpretations.

-  An example: students read an article about Zack, a 13-year-old boy who had a concussion playing football, continued to play, suffered a brain injury, collapsed, and spent months in the hospital. The question: “Who was responsible for Zack’s injury?”

-  Students take positions, supporting them with reasons and evidence.

-  Students clarify their understanding of classmates’ arguments.

-  Students test their arguments to see which are strongest and best supported.

-  The teacher monitors the discussion and intervenes strategically, pushing students to engage in collaborative and intellectually rigorous argumentation.

-  The lesson ends with a possible answer to the initial question, or at least a greater understanding of the arguments that survived students’ critique.

Inquiry dialogues require teachers to shift from being the “sage on the stage” with the correct answer to skillfully guiding and facilitating the class’s conversation. 

            “To do this,” say Reznitskaya and Wilkinson, “teachers have to develop an ear for quality argumentation and step into the discussion as needed to highlight the strengths and weaknesses in students’ arguments with carefully chosen talk moves.” Here are their suggested criteria and guiding questions (quoted verbatim):

-  Students explore different perspectives together. If someone disagreed with you, what would you say? Is this the only explanation?

-  Students are clear in the language and structure of their arguments. So are you saying that… ? How does this relate to what Kim said? Is this a reason for or against… ?

-  Students use reasons and evidence that are well examined and accurate. How do you know this? Is that always true? Is [value] more important than [value]?

-  Students are logical in the way they connect their positions, reasons, and evidence. Does this follow from what Jim said? What’s the link between this reason and your position?

Reznitskaya and Wilkinson say they are pleased to share their inquiry dialogue materials with schools (see contact information below).

 

“Teaching Students How to Think and Argue Together” by Alina Reznitskaya and Ian Wilkinson in Voices in Education, Harvard Education Publishing, May 7, 2019, 

https://bit.ly/2W618rC; the authors can be reached at [email protected]and [email protected]. 

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6. Adult Bullies in Schools

            In this article in ASCA School Counselor, counselors Rachel Luks Petraska and Patricia Tomashot (University of Vermont) relate several cases of adult-to-adult bullying that included: unkind teasing, comments on physical characteristics, spreading rumors, belittling, undermining, exclusion from meetings, overloading with work, setting impossible deadlines, removing job responsibilities, harshly criticizing, yelling, public humiliation, and outright sabotage. Most schools have guidelines for handling bullying among students, but what about when the bullies are adults? 

Petraska and Tomashot define adult-to-adult bullying as “repeated, health-harming mistreatment of one or more persons (the targets) by one or more perpetrators with abusive conduct that takes one or more of the following forms: verbal abuse, threatening/intimidating/ humiliating behaviors (including verbal), or work interference/sabotage, which prevents work from getting done…” Adult bullying could, for example, be boss to employee, employee to boss, teacher to teacher, or parent to educator. Within schools, there’s a pernicious pattern: it’s often the least competent employees who bully the most effective, compassionate, and kind, perhaps because the former feel threatened by the latter. The consequences are well documented: stress-related health harm (hypertension, ulcers); emotional and psychological harm (anxiety, depression, PTSD); harm to social status (loss of friendships and social standing, ostracism); and economic harm (salary, quitting, losing a job and having to take one that pays less).

Petraska and Tomashot say few schools have guidelines on how to handle adult bullying. They quote the Crisis Prevention Institute: “Workplace bullying can thrive only within a workplace that tolerates it.” Some general advice for those who feel bullied:

-  Document the specific actions as objectively as possible, including date, time, exact words, e-mails, letters, memos, notes, and witnesses.

-  Ask for help immediately, and involve union representatives, an ombudsperson, or a human resources representative.

-  Stay involved in work; don’t fall into isolation.

-  Engage in self-care, paying attention to physical and mental health.

-  If support isn’t materializing in the workplace, consider consulting a lawyer. 

-  If the situation doesn’t improve, look for another job.

 

“When Adults Are the Bullies” by Rachel Luks Petraska and Patricia Tomashot in ASCA School Counselor, May/June 2019 (Vol. 56, #5, p. 24-26), no free e-link; the authors can be reached at [email protected]and [email protected]. 

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7. Adding Equity as a Focus for Dual Language Programs

            In this article in Theory Into Practice, Deborah Palmer (University of Colorado/ Boulder), Claudia Cervantes-Soon (Arizona State University), Lisa Dorner (University of Missouri), and Daniel Heiman (University of North Texas) say dual language bilingual programs have three core goals for their students:

-  Academic achievement;

-  Bilingualism and biliteracy;

-  Sociocultural competence.

The authors suggest adding a fourth goal: critical consciousness. That’s because, in their view, equity is an ongoing challenge in dual language classrooms and schools; there’s a tendency for the playing field to tilt in favor of more-advantaged, white students, with less emphasis on maintaining minoritized students’ home languages and cultures. 

Inspired by Paulo Freire, Palmer, Cervantes-Soon, Dorner, and Heiman define critical consciousness as “the ability to read the world: to reflectively discern the differences in power and privilege rooted in social relationships that structure inequalities and shape the material conditions of our lives… also… recognizing one’s role in these dynamics.” They believe critical consciousness has four key components:

• Continuously interrogating and transforming existing power structures – This might include periodic “equity audits” to check on access to programs, classroom resources, curriculum offerings, students’ participation in classes, the quality of assessments, family engagement, governance, and learning outcomes for different groups.

• An awareness of history– This means studying the history of the different groups represented in classrooms (often former colonizers and colonized), the successful struggle for children’s right to speak and learn in their home language, and the goal of balance between the dual languages and cultures. 

• Critical listening– This involves “curiosity and attention, sharing, caring, reciprocity, and responsivity toward others,” say Palmer, Cervantes-Soon, Dorner, and Heiman, as well as making sure some students don’t dominate discussions, offering simultaneous translation in parent meetings, and families visiting one another’s neighborhoods and homes. 

• Engaging with discomfort– All the above can be “messy, risky, and potentially painful,” say the authors. Teachers may feel awkward discussing difficult topics with their diverse students. Parents from both language groups may be wary discussing issues that surface in meetings. “Ultimately,” say Palmer, Cervantes-Soon, Dorner, and Heiman, “discomfort, when embraced and used for critical reflection, can move people to action.” For some white families, this means acknowledging privilege and moving from “charity to solidarity” (Rick Ayers, 2014). For marginalized families, the authors hope that an increased focus on equity will lead them to “embrace the discomfort of persevering in voicing their concerns, disrupting instances of oppression, reflection on how they might be complicit in hegemony and oppression, and remaining hopeful despite inevitable setbacks.” 

 

“Bilingualism, Biliteracy, Biculturalism, and Critical Consciousness for All: Proposing a Fourth Fundamental Goal for Two-Way Dual Language Education” by Deborah Palmer, Claudia Cervantes-Soon, Lisa Dorner, and Daniel Heiman in Theory Into Practice, Spring 2019 (Vol. 58, #2, p. 121-133), https://bit.ly/2VQluR0; Palmer can be reached at [email protected]. 

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8. A Continuum of Cultural Competence

            In this article in Theory Into Practice, Reyes Quezada and Viviana Alexandrowicz (University of San Diego) suggest a spectrum of cultural proficiency, starting at the negative end of the scale:

            •Cultural destructiveness– “Here, one seeks to eliminate references to the language and culture of others in all aspects of the school and in relationship with their communities,” say Quezada and Alexandrowicz. Examples include English-only policies and attempts to eliminate bilingual education.

            •Cultural incapacity– This involves trivializing a language community, showing bias, stereotyping, and assuming a paternalistic posture toward a “lesser” group. 

            •Cultural blindness– This is the belief that color and culture make no difference and all people are the same. Those at this point on the continuum pretend not to see differences in socioeconomic status and culture in other groups and choose to ignore their experiences within the school and community.

            •Cultural pre-competence– At this point, there’s an awareness “of what educators and the school don’t know about working with English-learning communities,” say Quezada and Alexandrowicz. 

            •  Cultural competence– People at this stage accept and respect differences, attend to the dynamics of difference, continually assess their own cultural knowledge and beliefs, expand their knowledge and resources, and embrace the goal of including English-learning cultures and people who are new or different from the school majority. 

            •Cultural proficiency– School leaders at this level “hold the vision that they and their school are instruments for creating a socially just democracy,” say Quezada and Alexandrowicz. Their schools are committed to “serving the educational needs of various culturally diverse and socioeconomic and English-learning cultural groups.”

 

“Developing Culturally Proficient Teachers for Dual-Language Classrooms” by Reyes Quezada and Viviana Alexandrowicz in Theory Into Practice, Spring 2019 (Vol. 58, #2, p. 185-193), https://bit.ly/2K7Bewr; Quezada can be reached at [email protected]. 

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9. Thoughts on Being an Candidate for a Job in One’s Own School

            In this article in Independent School, Tim Fisher (Spartanburg Day School, South Carolina) writes about the tricky dynamics involved in being an inside candidate for a leadership position in the school in which one is employed. Fisher had this experience himself, competing with external candidates for an administrative position after teaching at the school for 12 years. 

            Inside candidates have obvious advantages, he says: they’re a known quantity, which can be comforting if the school is going through other transitions, and they know the school. However, says Fisher, “Familiarity cuts both ways – some on the search committee will want to dig even deeper than they would with external candidates, and some won’t dig deep enough… Familiarity bias can place the internal candidate at a disadvantage.” Some members of the hiring committee may begin with a fixed view on whether the candidate should be promoted. There’s also the question of whether an internal candidate who’s rejected might have hard feelings and leave the school.

            Those are reasons for potential inside candidates to have a behind-closed-doors conversation with their school’s leader before applying so they know up front if they’re unlikely to get the job. “Moving forward as a courtesy or a way to protect feelings is not an option,” says Fisher. He has the following suggestions for inside candidates (quoted verbatim):

-  Is the position you’re considering a natural continuation of a path you have been on?

-  Do you understand the demands of the job, or are you interested in applying because people around you think you should?

-  Have you pursued opportunities that will give you the experience you need for the new role?

-  Is there a trusted colleague who can give you an honest appraisal of how you are perceived?

-  Have you made your desire known to others that you’d like to be promoted?

-  During the interview, can you articulate how you will be able to offer change/see the school with new eyes, even though you are not coming from outside of the community?

-  What happens if you do not get the job? Will you stay? Will you leave? Are those both realistic choices?

 

“Inside Story” by Tim Fisher in Independent School, Summer 2019 (Vol. 78, #4, p. 46-51), no link available; Fisher can be reached at [email protected].

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10. Short Item:

ILA book choices – The International Literacy Association’s annual recommendations have just been posted online – books for children, young adults, and teachers. To download the lists and find out how to volunteer to get involved in selecting next year’s books, just go to https://www.literacyworldwide.org/get-resources/reading-lists

 

“Titles You Can Trust” by Sherry Harrington in Literacy TodayMay/June 2019 (Vol. 36, #6, p. 14-15); Harrington can be reached at [email protected]. 

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