Case Study  #1  Effective communication

ISLLC Standard 1     

 

A school administrator is an educational leader who promotes the success of all students by facilitating the development, articulation, implementation, and stewardship of a vision of learning that is shared and supported by the school community.

 

Key Questions

 

1.         Can the principal establish effective communication among the leadership team as well as the faculty?

 

2.         How does the principal communicate her vision and mission for the school?

 

Purpose

 

The purpose of this study is to determine how communication is used to foster a principal’s vision and mission for a school.

 

 

Description and Explanation of the Situation

 

            Sally has been the principal of Clementine Middle School (CLMS) for the last four and half years.  During this time she has watched one assistant principal retire, one move to a different school, and one transfer after only one year.   All of these assistant principals stated their biggest concern for CLMS was the lack of communication.  A new assistant principal was brought to CLMS who has demonstrated a tremendous difficulty with communication.  Both Sally and the new AP have difficulty expressing their ideas through writing as well as orally.  An example of a problem with communication was when the new assistant principal schedules meetings with county resource people and fails to notify staff members.  Sally herself has a great deal of problem with consistency in her communication.  She will tell one person one thing and then say the exact opposite to another person.  Favoritism runs rampant at CLMS and those who are “favorites” get the communication.  The rest of the faculty wonders and guesses about what is going on; thereby adding to the rumor mill.   On several occasions teachers have received email from both Sally and the new AP with grammatical errors.  Many of the errors are with sentence structure and spelling.  The big joke got to be when Mr. New AP decided to use “big” words that didn’t fit the context of the sentence.

            The leadership team is composed of four administrators.  The administrators hold meetings but, they don’t effectively listen to one another.  This situation has created misinformation and confusion.  Frequently, CLMS is left out of the picture when other schools get resources due to the lack of communication within the leadership team.  Deadlines go by because no one discussed what was needed.  Sally neglected to notify department heads of an important state mandated meeting with a consultant.  This made our school look ineffective.  No one knew what was going on. No substitutes had been called to cover the teachers’ classes.  Teachers were pulled from their classrooms with no advance notice and therefore no substitute lesson plans.

            Communication concerning school improvement gets brought up at the beginning of the year and then rarely discussed after that.  CLMS has been a needs improvement school for five years.  Effective communication has been on the school action plan each of those five years.  When asked what the school mission statement is many people have no idea.  Most students and faculty have seen a copy of it and yet they have no idea what it is, how it was developed and what it means. All teachers are required to have a mission statement posted in their room for “show”.  Sally recognizes the need for communication with all stakeholders and yet she still struggles. 

 

 

Answer to the Questions

 

1.         Can the principal establish effective communication among the leadership team as well as the faculty?

 

            Yes, Sally can establish effective communication among the leadership team as well as the faculty. In order for communication to be improved, CLMS will need to learn how to communicate.  Sally will need to bring in a consultant to conduct staff development on being able to communicate.  The staff needs to be able to brainstorm ideas without being concerned about retribution.

Sally can increase the use of communication by sending out weekly memos on the State of Clementine Middle School.  Through these written communications she can address problems that she is aware of and highlight strategies that help achieve school improvement.  Prior to sending out these memos, she needs to have a peer edit them.  This will make the message of the memo more important than the errors.  Faculty members will develop pride in their principal when she looks good in writing.   She should further require that all correspondence coming from the leadership team go through the process of peer editing.  This not only makes the message the “main thing” it could also reinforce to students the need for editing ones work.  Sally should own up to her difficulties with communication to all stakeholders and seek their help.

            A quarterly newsletter would be another way to foster communication with all community members.  This newsletter should be geared toward school improvement.  The newsletter needs to plainly describe why CLMS is considered needs improvement and what the community can do to help this school achieve adequate yearly progress.  The vision and mission of CLMS needs to be communicated to everyone at all times. 

            Morning announcements should begin with reading the mission statement and describing what it means to all stakeholders. When everyone is aware of the mission to improve CLMS then improvement is more likely to take place.    Students are the ones that can make the mission come alive but it needs to be communicated to them in such a way to help them understand what the mission statement means.  Sally could be more effective with sharing her vision through the mission statement by talking individually with students.  Students need that buy-in.  Once they are on board, they can then bring their parents into the mission of the school.

            To prevent miscommunication in regards to scheduling of events a master calendar should be posted in the office.  All events are recorded on this calendar.  The calendar will need to be in a central location so all faculty members as well as leadership team members have access.  This calendar should also be posted on the school website for all stakeholders to view.  This will increase communication throughout the school community.

 

Question #2   

 

How does the principal communicate her vision and mission for the school?

 

            Sally does not communicate her vision and mission for the school effectively.  Each year the school hires new employees that have no idea what the vision and mission for the school is.  They go an entire year before someone even mentions the mission statement.   Sally needs to have staff development at CLMS that deals with effective communication.    Sally should practice sharing her vision to inspire enthusiasm among faculty and staff.  The building leadership team spent two days during a summer rewriting the school’s mission statement.  When questioning Sally about her particular vision she stated it was up to us to create it. 

            Recently, Sally chose to implement learning communities within the building.  Groups of faculty members with common bonds were to meet weekly to go over data concerning school improvement.  The faculty, for the most part, was enthusiastic about this new program.  The program fell apart after the first nine weeks of school came to an end.  No one monitored this new idea to make sure it was kept on track.  Learning communities was part of Sally’s vision for achieving school improvement.  She backed up the proposal with research based studies and whipped us into a frenzy over the challenge she was proposing.   She finally shared part of her vision.  Sally discovered that you can’t just state your vision without following up on its implementation.

            Sally communicates her vision and mission for the school through posters around the school.  She should go further by explaining to the leadership team and faculty what she “sees” for CLMS.  Where does she want the school to go and how does she plan on getting the school there?  Without a clear vision and mission the school seems adrift.  Sally needs to take the time to develop her own vision based on test scores, demographics of the school and community and faculty.  She should begin every meeting bringing up her vision of the school.  It should be discussed and amended as she sees fit.  Once all stakeholders know what Sally expects then it is more likely to happen. 

 

            This case study is a developing one.  There is some evidence that the principal knows that she needs to communicate her vision and mission clearly.  Effective communication is a stumbling block that this administration needs to handle.  Working with peer editors is one way that the errors in communication can be controlled.  Sally knows the importance of written and oral communication but is tentative when putting information in writing.   Sally does hold meetings to develop and implement strategic plans however; she fails to communicate the findings of those meetings.  This case study demonstrates to me that Sally is looking for continuous school improvement she is however unsure how to share her vision for school improvement.