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Barry's "Administrators & Supervisors as Mentors" Training
PAGE INDEX:
Why Supervisors
& Administrators Need to Be Mentors Too
There are at least SIX REASONS why supervisors and administrators
need to be mentors too:
1. Supervisors & administrators must also be effective
staff developers. Their day-to-day interaction with staff
can become a powerful force for school improvement, IF they know
how to grow a more excellent faculty out of the one they already
have.
2. Research data show that the traditional "clinical
supervision" model DOES NOT sufficiently promote staff
improvement. Administrators must know something else to develop
the more excellent teaching faculty their schools need. The process
for doing that, AND simultaneously improving student learning
is High Impact Mentoring. This is so because High Impact MENTORING
is really the model for High Impact TEACHING that teachers need
to use with their own students. In other words, the high impact
mentoring that administrators use day after day with teachers
is a model of what teachers need to do with students every day.
3. The complexity of running schools and educational programs,
and the overwhelming quantity of work to be done, quickly lead
administrators to realize that they can't do it all themselves
and that they need a team of effective school leaders to help
them. However, not every group of people are an 'effective team
of leaders". The administrator must know how to develop such
an effective team of leaders, or their 'help" will create
more work, and will be no help at all! The "administrator
as mentor" model is how you can develop the team you need
to effectively help you lead the many school improvement processes
you lead now.
4. Developing teacher leadership ultimately saves administrative
time. It takes a lot less time for an effective team of leaders
to accomplish tasks than it does for one leader to do it all him
or her self. Whatever an effective team of leaders can do is one
less thing YOU have to do.
5. Developing teachers as positive school leaders increases
the social pressure in a school for improvement of teaching
& student learning. That is, this happens if these teacher
leaders know how to effectively lead and facilitate improvement.
They WILL KNOW HOW IF you have been a mentor to them using the
Best Practice "School Leaders as Mentors" model.
6. No matter how powerful, charismatic, and insightful an educator
and leader you are, your natural strengths mean you also have
natural weaknesses. The diverse strengths of an effective
team, however, provide more resources to target problems and accomplish
work than do the strengths on any one leader.
Possible Data Gathering
Prior to Providing This Training
In the section below is an outline of the typical "School Leaders as Mentors"
Training agenda which Barry Sweeny conducts. If you bring Barry
to your site to lead this training for your supervisors and administrators,
this agenda can be adapted to your specific needs. To do so,
Barry will typically take three steps to gain the data he needs
to customize the training so that it builds on your administrative
strengths, challenges administrators to become the leaders their
schools need, and shows them how to effectively be the chief mentor
for the whole school. Typically Barry will:
1. Ask a series of questions of the contact person regarding
the administrators' prior training and knowledge base.
2. Ask the client district, prior to this training, to distribute,
collect, and forward to him, returns from a participant needs
assessment that Barry can provide.
3. Interview via phone or email, 1-3 administrators whose names
and contact information the district will provide.
A Description of
the "School Leaders as Mentors" Training
Below is an outline of the typical "School Leaders as Mentors" Training
agenda. If you bring Barry Sweeny to your site to lead this training,
this agenda can be adapted to your specific needs. See the
section immediately above for how Barry does this.
- A Comparison of Evaluation, Clinical Supervision, and High
Impact Mentoring
- The Purpose of Teacher Evaluation & Clinical Supervision
& the Results These Do & Do Not Achieve
- The Implications of the Results of Traditional Evaluation
and Supervision
- How High Impact Mentoring Provides What is Missing
- High Impact Mentoring as a Method of Supervision for Growing
the Entire Staff
- The Relationship Among Excellent Leadership, Mentoring and
Teaching
- The Model for the High Impact Conversation
- The Three Most Powerful Debriefing Questions
- Presenter and Volunteer Demo
- Partners Practice the Model
- Creating a Learning Community
- The Five Levels of Mentoring Strategies (Strategic Mentoring
Culture)
- The Need for Both Horizontal and Vertical Mentoring Relationships
- How a Strategic Mentoring Culture Uses Adult Learning to
Impact Student Learning
- Personal Insights Into How YOU Can Become a High Impact Mentor
for Your Staff
- Self Assessment of Your Natural Mentoring Style
- The Mentoring Process Model
- Predicting What Your Mentoring Will Be Like If You Use Your
Natural Style
- Identifying Potential Areas for your Growth as a Mentor
- Goal Setting & Action Planning to increase Your Growth
and Impact as a Mentor
PARTICIPANT
COMMENTS ON BARRY'S "SUPERVISORS AS MENTORS" TRAINING
"We invited Barry Sweeny to work with members of our School
Leadership degree program after checking his references with previous
clients. His reputation is what led us to select him for work in
our program, and we looked forward to his leadership.
The program participants are practicing administrators in Jewish
day schools who come to us from all over the Western Hemisphere
and Africa. The considerable effort it takes to bring these people
together for this program means that the program must be very strong,
provide major insights, and change practices. Specifically, we wanted
these leaders to learn practical strategies to use to build the
strengths of their teachers, increase results for their students,
and be more than managers of their schools and programs.
Barry was prompt and comprehensive in his communication in advance
of the events. His strengths in both the practical and theoretical
areas were obvious to us and just what we sought. Barry's work significantly
helped us to accomplish the program's goals and more. His emphasis
on the specifics of actually developing a learning community were
terrific. Now we know why he has such a good reputation." -
Dr. Stan Peerless, Professor, Bar Ilan University, Tel Aviv,
Israel
"As a principal, I came to this training from
a 'clinical supervision' frame of mind, and thought I was just here
to support teachers in my building who wanted to try the coaching.
Barry, you have really helped me to see that what I do in the district's
teacher evaluation process can become much more of a professional
growth opportunity for my staff. Thanks for the powerful insights
you gave me! I am truly excited and ready to put your training
to work back home." - Wayne A. (a principal in Rhode Island).
"I hired Barry Sweeny to lead a day of training
with about 95 participants in three cohorts of our AEL Program.
The Alliance for Educational Leadership Program is an alternative
degree program in that it accomplishes certification outside the
traditional university setting. As such, the AEL Program has become
known as a practical, performance-oriented, and effective development
system for school administrators. We attract top quality administrative
candidates who themselves have high expectations for their experiences
in the program and the skills they will develop.We cannot afford
to have any part of our program be less than excellent.
I hired Barry because of my multiple observations of his work in
our center's TxBESS Induction program in which I found him to be
consistently outstanding. I also sought and received the personal
recommendation of my colleague, the coordinator of that program,
who had worked with Barry for about 45 days by that point. My directions
to Barry were to provide practical skills and a rationale for principals
to act as staff developers by using his "high impact"
mentoring and coaching strategies. I trusted Barry with tremendous
responsibilites and he did not disappoint! The whole experience
was as outstanding as I expected. - Charwynne Hazelwood, Coordinator,
Alliance for Educational Leadership Program, ESC Region XI, Fort
Worth, Texas
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