When I retired in 2005, I had served on multiple committees and processed many hours of training in a variety of learning strategies and organizational strategies. I continued to substitute teach until February of 2008, and it seemed to me that site-based management had become a less dynamic structure for change and transformed into tasks centered on filling in required data to meet a variety of deadlines.
I felt distanced from the process and that my voice was being lost in the now mechanical answering of teacher satisfaction surveys or collecting surveys from students and parents. Other data sources such as testing, demographic information, number of expulsions, rate of graduation and the like, rounded out the process for a needs-based assessment of budget expenditures. Following various stories from the media, I sense that teachers as leaders promoting curricular changes and major stakeholders is a role that has been diminished over time - possibly from exhaustion. There is just too much stress from a variety of sources. No finger pointing at this time, but I'm sure that teachers would love to use automatic out-of-the-office responses to various e-mails.
How can teachers drive important decisions regarding training, class sizes, scheduling, overuse of testing with or without a union? What do teachers care about? What would help educators feel empowered? My only suggestion is that when I was team teaching in middle school, we met as a core team and also as a grade-level team and it gave us a voice. Our core class teams consisted of a math, science, social studies and language arts teacher and we all had the same group of students. We hand-scheduled these children and met on a daily basis to plan lessons, conduct conferences, discuss any students we felt were having difficulties and do what ever else needed to be done. We divided tasks among us and as the saying goes: "many hands make light work".
Each grade level also met on a bi-weekly basis or as-needed to deal with site-based issues and other tasks such as career day, scheduling, text book issues and general "complaints". The eighth-grade team had a real "beef" with the sixth-grade team who kept getting 7th period planning. We felt that this was a "reward" that needed to be rotated so that every grade-level got the benefit of having the last period of the day (when middle school students are most likely to be swinging from the ceiling) free. The spokesperson for the sixth-grade team kept saying that research showed that it was better for sixth-grade students to concentrate on their core-learning subjects in the morning and have their physical activities in the afternoon.
As spokesperson, probably self selected, for the eighth grade team, I finally (politely I might add) asked for the source of this research. I was told to go look it up and responded that I wasn't quoting any research so I felt it was the responsibility of the sixth-grade team to provide the data and that without such results, a fairer way to treat students would be to rotate the break giving every grade-level a chance for seventh-period planning. My fellow eighth grade teachers had my back and it was decided to rotate the schedule. The sixth-grade team never did produce any study backing their claim.
What should your take away be? Amazingly as eighth-grade core subject teachers (12 of us), we considered, discussed and found solutions to many problems. We produced some policies and handouts dealing with homework, behavior issues and projects that unified us. Because we agreed and put aside minor differences, we presented solutions to school-wide problems that were researched, well-written and benefited students in all grade levels, not just ours.
Teaming with other core subject teachers can strengthen your understanding of individual student needs, but combining that with grade-level teaming can give teachers strength in numbers. If we want to drive positive change and deliver quality instruction, it is mandatory that teachers prioritize what will work in the classroom. Don't be a solitary voice - team up for change.
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