Inspiration
How to Extend and Deepen Learning after Professional Development
Amidst a rapidly changing world, educators are charged with not only keeping abreast with the trends in their subject areas, but also remaining curious and growing in the areas of social and emotional learning, equity literacy, and leadership development. And at the school level, leaders know the research—teachers’ job satisfaction is directly linked to access…
Read MoreExpeditions: Self-Directed Professional Development at Sonoma Academy
Sonoma Academy calls its students to be creative, ethical, and committed to learning. The school nurtures inspiring teachers and engages with the surrounding community, and its students communicate across cultures as they prepare to become leaders in a dynamic world. With nurturing faculty central to our mission statement, we know that it is critically important…
Read MoreCamping and The Pleasure of Small Things at Peninsula School
At Peninsula School, our values include authentic interactions, community, equity, freedom and responsibility, meaningful academics, and play. Keeping these core values in our hearts allows our minds to stay focused on our shared goal, our most important goal: creating a better opportunity for our children and collective future. Peninsula School aims to “create space where…
Read MoreConnecting Education to Community Impact
I am going to begin with a true and uncomfortable statement. The schools where we teach are very expensive. Crazy expensive. In fact, tuition for California independent high schools is often higher than the median income in the cities where the schools are based. Gasp. Sigh. Yet, our schools remain committed to principles of responsible…
Read MoreThe Use of Being Useful
One October a few short years ago, a Midland student named Cruz was visiting a college on his application list and found himself eating alone in the dining hall. Being alone did not bother him, but he was troubled when he saw a group of students leave a significant mess for someone else to clean…
Read MoreWhy the Horse Remains Central to the Thacher Experience
The nature of the Thacher Horse Program and the gifts it bestows can test the limits of reason and language. As the program’s longtime director Cam Schryver says, “I don’t think that all of the lessons, the things you learn, can exactly get expressed or quantified… there are parts that go out to the limit…
Read MoreStrengthening School Communities through Intentional Relationship Building
As an instructional coach at San Francisco Day School, I often found myself in situations where I was straddling two worlds. With one foot in the teacher world and one foot in the administration world, it felt like I was straddling a fault line, hoping the rumblings below the surface wouldn’t manifest into the Big…
Read MoreLearning by Teaching: Experiential Education in Action for New Educators
At the heart of Crane Country Day School’s mission is experiential education. Teachers are challenged with creating thought-provoking experiential lessons, which often include culminating projects and events. Similar to educators at any institution, creating successful curriculum is constantly balanced with time management and manpower. To enrich the learning environment at Crane School, more educators were…
Read MoreSeizing the Day Inside and Outside of the Classroom: The Diamond Curriculum
Santa Barbara Middle School offers students in grades 6-9 a profound educational experience, guiding young people as they transition to adolescence. Through ancient traditions and rigorous academics combined with bicycling and expeditions in the outdoors, SBMS aims to teach compassion, kindness, and self-knowledge and solidify a foundation for a child’s self-esteem, self-confidence, and sense of…
Read MoreSupporting Great Teachers to Stay
As a former Dean of Faculty at an independent school and now Executive Director of the California Teacher Development Collaborative (CATDC), I know well the energy and resources that go into recruiting, hiring, and onboarding new faculty. Given the shortage of teachers in California as well as greater attrition and churn, I have been giving…
Read MoreA Case for Ongoing Professional Development
The CATDC’s Ongoing Programs, series of 3-5 meetings led by local educators, are some of our most agile and responsive professional development offerings and the foundation of our unique approach to growing capacity in California independent schools. Easy access to digital and print resources and online courses make continuing education within reach at all times,…
Read More15 Books (and Anti-Racist Resources) to Add to Your Summer Reading List
Read books written by and listen to podcasts hosted by people whose identities are underrepresented and historically marginalized or different than your own–check your biases, prejudices, stereotypes, and assumptions.
Read MoreChanging Lives Through Collaboration
Creative collaboration with teachers in the service of student learning has been a deep current running through my career. As Executive Director of the CATDC, learning with and from other educators has become not only a passion, but one of my primary job responsibilities.
Read MoreRethinking Teacher Evaluation in Independent Schools
Working in schools is a vulnerable act. Every day can feel like a high-stakes performance review in front of an audience of young evaluators: performing effective planning, organization, pedagogy, relationship management, flexibility, patience, community building, knowledge of human psychology and all the additional skills of being an educator. It’s no wonder then that when teachers hear they’re about to be evaluated, anxiety sets in and amygdala hijack takes hold.
Read MoreLeading With the Brain in Mind
Understanding our neurobiological hardwiring plays an essential role in creating environments where teachers and schools can thrive. School leaders have the opportunity to notice the state of escalation occurring in stressful situations and model vulnerability to create space for others to do the same.
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