Dueling Boards: a Cautionary True Story
The tension in the conference room was palpable, as the superintendent and her board president at one end of the table glared at the educational foundation CEO and his board chair at the other end. I sat in the middle …
Collaboration Trumps Conflict in the Shaker Heights Schools
This article featuring a podcast by then-superintendent of the Shaker Heights (Ohio) Public Schools, Gregory Hutchings, and John Morris, President of the Shaker Heights Teachers’ Association, was originally posted in September 2015. We are re-posting it not only because it …
Talking With Lisa Karmacharya About MASA’s Aspiring Superintendents Academy
The Aspiring Superintendents Academy of the Mississippi Association of School Administrators is off to a great start, as Lisa Karmacharya, MASA Executive director, explains in the podcast she recorded for this blog a couple of weeks ago. You’ll find really …
Thoughts on True Humility and Senator John McCain
Thinking about Senator John McCain this morning – along with millions of my fellow Americans and admirers around the world – reminded me of the critical role that character plays in leadership. Whether one agreed with Senator McCain on one …
Superintendent Luvelle Brown: Leading From the Heart as Well as the Head
Our colleague Dr. Luvelle Brown is an extraordinary educational leader who values the learning culture in the Ithaca City Public Schools at least as highly as up-to-date educational facilities, technology and methodology. His commitment to what he calls the “culture …
Board Committees That Work
A couple of years ago during the first of four coaching sessions, the superintendent of a mid-size suburban school district identified board “micromanaging” as one of his 10 most worrisome challenges as the district’s relatively new chief executive officer.
When …
The Virginia Beach Public Schools and Naval Air Base Oceana: Partners in Innovation
I learned early in my career – during a five-year stint as chief of staff to the president of a three-campus urban community college – that what formal long-range planning does best is codifying and describing strategies already in place …
Turning Your Board Into a Cohesive Governing Team: Part 2
As I noted in last week’s post at this blog, turning school boards into really cohesive governing teams is no piece of cake, primarily because the great majority of school board members are elected. In practice this means that many …
Turning Your School Board Into a Cohesive Governing Team: Part 1
Teamwork in the abstract is neither here nor there for school boards. The only serious reason for developing your board’s teamwork is to help it function as a more effective governing body that gets its governing work done more effectively …
Getting Your Board-Superintendent Retreat Right
Retreats have become a popular vehicle for involving school board members, their superintendents, and senior administrators in accomplishing high-impact governing work that could not be accomplished – at least not as well – in regular board business meetings. Updating a …
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