Leadership Philosophy
1. What personal characteristics define an excellent administrator?
I believe that an excellent administrator must have strong people, problem-solving, and communication skills. Principals must be able to generate positive interactions with many different groups of people, including students, teachers, parents and the school board members. As a leader, you must be able to bring people together to achieve school goals and achieve collective efficacy. Effective administrators must find ways to motivate their employees to provide maximum effort to ensure success for the school. At times, this requires collaborating with difficult team members with patience and individualized strategies. Administrators must be a boss to teachers, establishing clear goals to give them direction. However, one must also be approachable, so that adults and children feel comfortable talking to you, while remaining professional and authoritative as the head of the school.
An excellent administrator can creatively solve problems that the school is facing. An excellent principal needs to have exceptional analytic skills to develop solutions to all kinds of problems, including disciplinary issues and budget concerns. When leading a school, a principal must incorporate the views and concerns of many individuals when developing solutions and work with the people involved so they feel ownership over the solution.
Finally, an excellent administrator must have outstanding communication and leadership skills. They need to be able to communicate directions to the school's staff so that they understand what is expected of them. They also need to communicate with external individuals and organizations to advocate on behalf of the school. A principal needs to be patient and skilled at communicating with children and young adults because they will be expected to not only develop a vision for the school, but to communicate this vision to teachers, students and the community.
2. From your point of view, how important is technology in education? What technology-related skills can you contribute to a school district?
Please see my website for evidence of my technology related skills that I can contribute to your school district: https://sdallashistory.com/
Technology is an extremely important piece of the overall instructional program. Technology provides administrators with a plethora of data that can be used in the decision-making process. Educational technology like Front Row Ed (now Freckle), Scootpad, Mastery Connect, Imagine Learning, Dreambox and IXL have administrator features that show each individual student’s progress in different content areas. This technology allows an administrator to intervene and help a struggling teacher in the specific area needed. Administrators have a responsibility to ensure that teachers are preparing our students with 21st century skills, which includes computer and technology literacy. Providing teachers with educational technology aides them in providing rigorous, student-centered, and engaging instruction. It cuts down on busy work, so that teachers can focus on developing engaging lessons that teach higher-level skills to our students. Technology, like Front Row Ed, allows a teacher to quickly differentiate reading, writing and math assignments with little to no effort. Instead of scanning the internet for hours looking for multiple reading passages about the same topic at different ability levels, teachers can use one resource and provide individualized instruction in seconds. Most importantly, all data is automatically uploaded for the administrators to observe each student’s progress throughout the year. The administrator can see which standards have been covered and how students are performing in each standard, allowing them to respond with specific interventions to aide in each teacher’s professional development. In conclusion, educational technology can be one of the many tools used to ensure a school’s success.
I believe that evaluating and providing professional development on educational technology is an asset that I can bring to your school as an administrator. First, there are many ed tech companies out there trying to sell their product. I can provide analysis on any ed tech and provide sound advice on the validity and usefulness for a school district. As the Co-Chair of the Technology PLC, I have evaluated a number of products for my Superintendent and was able to provide reports detailing the cost and benefit to our school district. I have also provided professional development for our staff on different educational technology. You can see examples of the Professional Development that I have provided on Instruction, assessment, learning domains and objectives, classroom management and educational technologies on my website at: https://sdallashistory.com/professional-development.html
Additional Information
List any additional information which will help in determining your professional qualifications for a position.
Peer Mediation: As the Peer Mediation coordinator at my school, I have been trained in conflict-resolution skills. I work closely with the school disciplinarian to utilize Peer Mediation in conjunction with the overall disciplinary system.
Computer skills: Google Technologies (Google Certified), Microsoft, Front Row Ed, Mastery Connect, IXL, Scootpad, Peardeck, Socrative Assessments, Playposit, Nearpod, Website Design (Weebly), Edcite, Quizlet, and other various Internet tools
Teacher website: I have created a website with online resources to educate teachers on digital lesson plan development, increasing student engagement and effectively differentiating instruction to meet the needs of all learners: https://sdallashistory.weebly.com/.
Soccer Coach: I was an Assistant Varsity Soccer Coach for 3 years at Cherry Hill East and 3 years at Cherokee High School (State Champions- 2010). I currently coach club teams in Williamstown.
I believe that an excellent administrator must have strong people, problem-solving, and communication skills. Principals must be able to generate positive interactions with many different groups of people, including students, teachers, parents and the school board members. As a leader, you must be able to bring people together to achieve school goals and achieve collective efficacy. Effective administrators must find ways to motivate their employees to provide maximum effort to ensure success for the school. At times, this requires collaborating with difficult team members with patience and individualized strategies. Administrators must be a boss to teachers, establishing clear goals to give them direction. However, one must also be approachable, so that adults and children feel comfortable talking to you, while remaining professional and authoritative as the head of the school.
An excellent administrator can creatively solve problems that the school is facing. An excellent principal needs to have exceptional analytic skills to develop solutions to all kinds of problems, including disciplinary issues and budget concerns. When leading a school, a principal must incorporate the views and concerns of many individuals when developing solutions and work with the people involved so they feel ownership over the solution.
Finally, an excellent administrator must have outstanding communication and leadership skills. They need to be able to communicate directions to the school's staff so that they understand what is expected of them. They also need to communicate with external individuals and organizations to advocate on behalf of the school. A principal needs to be patient and skilled at communicating with children and young adults because they will be expected to not only develop a vision for the school, but to communicate this vision to teachers, students and the community.
2. From your point of view, how important is technology in education? What technology-related skills can you contribute to a school district?
Please see my website for evidence of my technology related skills that I can contribute to your school district: https://sdallashistory.com/
Technology is an extremely important piece of the overall instructional program. Technology provides administrators with a plethora of data that can be used in the decision-making process. Educational technology like Front Row Ed (now Freckle), Scootpad, Mastery Connect, Imagine Learning, Dreambox and IXL have administrator features that show each individual student’s progress in different content areas. This technology allows an administrator to intervene and help a struggling teacher in the specific area needed. Administrators have a responsibility to ensure that teachers are preparing our students with 21st century skills, which includes computer and technology literacy. Providing teachers with educational technology aides them in providing rigorous, student-centered, and engaging instruction. It cuts down on busy work, so that teachers can focus on developing engaging lessons that teach higher-level skills to our students. Technology, like Front Row Ed, allows a teacher to quickly differentiate reading, writing and math assignments with little to no effort. Instead of scanning the internet for hours looking for multiple reading passages about the same topic at different ability levels, teachers can use one resource and provide individualized instruction in seconds. Most importantly, all data is automatically uploaded for the administrators to observe each student’s progress throughout the year. The administrator can see which standards have been covered and how students are performing in each standard, allowing them to respond with specific interventions to aide in each teacher’s professional development. In conclusion, educational technology can be one of the many tools used to ensure a school’s success.
I believe that evaluating and providing professional development on educational technology is an asset that I can bring to your school as an administrator. First, there are many ed tech companies out there trying to sell their product. I can provide analysis on any ed tech and provide sound advice on the validity and usefulness for a school district. As the Co-Chair of the Technology PLC, I have evaluated a number of products for my Superintendent and was able to provide reports detailing the cost and benefit to our school district. I have also provided professional development for our staff on different educational technology. You can see examples of the Professional Development that I have provided on Instruction, assessment, learning domains and objectives, classroom management and educational technologies on my website at: https://sdallashistory.com/professional-development.html
Additional Information
List any additional information which will help in determining your professional qualifications for a position.
Peer Mediation: As the Peer Mediation coordinator at my school, I have been trained in conflict-resolution skills. I work closely with the school disciplinarian to utilize Peer Mediation in conjunction with the overall disciplinary system.
Computer skills: Google Technologies (Google Certified), Microsoft, Front Row Ed, Mastery Connect, IXL, Scootpad, Peardeck, Socrative Assessments, Playposit, Nearpod, Website Design (Weebly), Edcite, Quizlet, and other various Internet tools
Teacher website: I have created a website with online resources to educate teachers on digital lesson plan development, increasing student engagement and effectively differentiating instruction to meet the needs of all learners: https://sdallashistory.weebly.com/.
Soccer Coach: I was an Assistant Varsity Soccer Coach for 3 years at Cherry Hill East and 3 years at Cherokee High School (State Champions- 2010). I currently coach club teams in Williamstown.