I'm Amazed

Reading a post by my friend, John Carver, earlier last week about Superintendents being in the lead role of educational practices by their districts.  I was amazed that many of the things that John said I had said to our faculty at our first meeting on August 13th.  To even have thoughts like Mr. Carver humbled  me greatly and made me feel good.

I have a one year contract at my current district, and I really like it here.  I told our staff that I was approaching this job like I had a multi-year contract, which most superintendents get.  We are going to gravitate to being a google school, we were not renewing our Office license, we are going to switching to gmail over our current email provider, Novell.  I then continued to show them some of the tools we had used at my previous district and how important I feel it is to incorporate technology into our everyday teaching.

Fortunately for me the staff has been very receptive and some have really jumped on the bandwagon.  I've always said we just need to turn the kids loose and they will take off, I have found this to be true with adults also.  I showed a teacher edmodo and what an asset it can be, she shared it and now five other teachers have had their classes sign up for edmodo, this really made me feel good and I also know I need to keep challenging and sharing with them.  It only takes a few to take the bait, and then others will follow.

I then had a teacher from another state want to visit with me about technology, which I was glad to do, his wife teaches in our district and told him about my day one presentation.  We had a great visit, and even discussed me coming to their district for a day of Professional Development, as they are behind technology wise.  I would be happy to do it and then he told me his board had passed a policy that cell phones are not only banned for the students, but also the faculty.  I was amazed, are you kidding me?  To deny people the use of these handy items is right out of the 1960's when I went to high school.  So I told him if I do come over to present please make sure at least one board member or better yet all board members attend.  Behind tech wise I'd say so.

Start Me Up

I wonder when the Rolling Stones wrote that song if they knew it would be played in football stadiums all across America?  I am not going to discuss football, but I am looking forward to it getting started, I want to talk about the start of school.

I get to meet with our full staff both classified and certified on Monday.  I think we have a great day planned for them and I am really excited about getting to meet all of them officially.  I love being so excited, it makes me feel good, and I hope I can excite our staff about the upcoming school year.  I realize the highlight of the day won't be my presentation, but I'm sure eager to share the things I've learned through my twitter connections the past two years.

We are about impart on some new adventures here at Northeast and I hope to bring the staff along and hope they share in my excitement for the upcoming year.  I can't wait to show them some of the educational technology tools I have used in the past and what is available to them.  The primary point is to reinforce that we are learners like the students and school is a joint venture of learning together.  I also know as I challenge some of the traditional educational practices some will be apprehensive and that is fine as long as their minds are open.

We will start classes on Wednesday and I will be firmly planted at the elementary school to greet those young ones as I know their excitement for school is the same as mine.  So come on Mick-Start Me Up.