Field Trip Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Be a Buffalo: Growing Leaders in School Systems Oct 25, 2019

Show notes

What is the single biggest thing that school leaders can do to impact student outcomes? According to Ted Neitzke, it’s to create the conditions that enable everybody in the school system to take on leadership roles.

Ted is the CEO of CESA 6, a consortium that serves school districts in Wisconsin. He is also the host of the Smart Thinking Podcast. Today, Ted shares what he means by leadership, why it’s so important that every employee has the chance to pursue leadership opportunities, and he shares several extremely practical ways leaders can improve schools and help others do the same.

How to recognize people and create processes that will set the stage for people to take on the mantle of leadership
Principles of improvement to apply in your school system
Quick and easy practices that can have a huge positive impact on meetings and working relationships

You may also enjoy:

White Paper: “The Power of Failure: Encouraging Teachers to Take Risks in a Risk-free Environment.” Download Now.

Working with Families in Special Education Oct 11, 2019

Show notes

As a parent, learning your child has a learning disability or other special need comes with a whirlwind of emotion. “Who will take care of them when I’m not here? How will I make sure they get the supports they need?” Fear and anxiety rear their heads. Everything you pictured about your child’s life is suddenly in doubt – including what school might look like.

Today, we’re speaking with three current and former administrators – and for two of them, parents of a student with special needs – to step into the shoes of these families.

What parents go through when their child receives a diagnosis
How these challenges are especially compounded when a family is new to the educational system in the United States
Why school and district leaders need to be thinking about this issue – not only to avoid litigation, but to achieve more productive outcomes
Strategies for supporting families as they navigate their new reality

DIG DEEPER
We think you’ll enjoy this article, too! 5 Strategies to Improve the IEP Process with Parent Participation

Conflict & Leadership: Shattering the Status Quo Sep 13, 2019

Show notes

Paul O’Neill and Dennis Griffin, Jr. are principals in schools hundreds of miles apart — yet they regularly encourage and challenge each other through #EduGladiators, an online community of learners.

The principal’s world includes plenty of conflict. And while conflict is never easy, it’s not always bad. Today, Paul and Dennis talk about leadership and conflict, and how when conflict arises, school leaders have a huge opportunity to encourage growth, impact school culture, and create a better educational landscape for students.

How leaders can channel conflict toward productive outcomes
What happens when leaders simply try to avoid conflict
Fostering transparency and building relationships that lead to positive growth
How to deal with conflict when taking leadership at a new school
Big, burning questions to wrestle with as leaders

For further reading:

Get our eBook: “The Power of Failure — Encouraging Teachers to Take Risks in a Risk-Free Environment.” A look at helping teachers develop a growth mindset.

Beating Teacher Burnout Aug 30, 2019

Show notes

Adam Brown, Ed.D. is an assistant principal for Virginia Beach City Public Schools. As a new teacher, there were days he wanted to call it quits — but he had great support, and got through those tough times. And his research into what causes teacher burnout is packed with insights for teachers, leaders and mentors.

Today, we speak with Dr. Brown and with Basil Marin, also an assistant principal, about their experiences dealing with teacher burnout and what administrators can do to fight it in their schools and give teachers the support they need — whether they’re new teachers or have been in the classroom for decades.

What this issue looks like for novice teachers and for veteran teachers
What the research says about the causes of teacher emotional exhaustion
The impact it has on teacher recruiting and retention
How principals, mentors, coaches and other leaders can support teachers through challenging times

Dig Deeper
Concerned about teacher retention? Check out these resources:

Calculator: How much does teacher turnover cost you each year?
Data sheet: Special Education by the Numbers. When districts struggle to fill positions, special education teachers are often asked to do more with less.

How to Tell If Your Professional Development Is Working Aug 16, 2019

Show notes

Sheila B. Robinson, Ed.D., has spent decades in education, as a classroom teacher as well as working with adults in professional learning and program evaluation. Today, we ask Sheila about:

Frequent challenges in professional learning
How to collect and analyze data to understand if a professional learning program is meeting teachers’ needs and moving the needle on classroom practice
How to ask questions of teachers that yield actionable insight into your PD program
What to be careful of when analyzing the data

Take a Deeper Dive:
Want to take a deeper look at program evaluation? Be sure to download Sheila B. Robinson’s eBook, “Professional Development Program Evaluation for the Win: How to Sleep Well at Night Knowing Your Professional Learning is Effective.” It’s a detailed overview of program evaluation, including how to engage stakeholders, crafting quality evaluation questions, and collecting, analyzing and reporting on data around your professional learning program.

Five Generations at Work Aug 02, 2019

Show notes

Ian? He’s of Generation X. Erin is squarely in the Millennial camp. Today on Field Trip, they explore the differences between the five different generations currently represented in the labor force: Traditionalists, Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials, and Generation Z.

Why understanding the characteristics of each will help administrators and district leaders communicate better and tap the strengths that each generation brings
How to foster intergenerational collaboration and “reverse mentoring”
Why this all matters to school culture and how it impacts hiring and retention

This interview with Ian Halperin, Executive Director of Community Relations at Wylie ISD and Erin McCann, Director of Communications and Public Relations at Crandall ISD is one that every education leader should hear.

Don't Miss:
Field Guide: “Recruiting Millennial Teachers” — How to effectively market your school district to young prospective teachers, plus strategies for enriching your applicant pool through online recruiting.

Learning to See Dyslexia Jul 19, 2019

Show notes

Garland Independent School District serves thousands of dyslexic students. Dyslexia is a learning disability that has profound effects on students as they move through high school — so identifying students early on is incredibly helpful. But how do you do that?

In this podcast we find out how Garland ISD is empowering people to work across departments, train teachers to become dyslexia therapists, and help teams working with special education and dyslexic students to work together.

What dyslexia looks like, and how dyslexic students experience school
How schools can work across teams to better serve dyslexic students
Takeaways from seeing dyslexic students thrive after identification and intervention

Teacher Job Stress (and Why It Matters to Principals) Jun 07, 2019

Show notes

Teaching today is more demanding than ever — and whether or not that leads to stress and exhaustion is often up to the principal and how he or she leads the building.

Today we speak with Dr. Brad Owen, Assistant Superintendent of Burkburnett Independent School District in Texas, about his research into teacher stress, faculty trust in the principal, and what principals can do to increase that trust and reduce that stress.

The long-term impact that teacher stress has on a school
The correlation between collaborative leadership behaviors, faculty trust and teacher job stress
What principals can do to increase trust and reduce teacher stress

Further reading on a growth mindset:
eBook: “The Power of Failure: Encouraging Teachers to Take Risks in a Risk-free Environment”

How to Get Parents to Take an Active Role in Your School May 24, 2019

Show notes

From lunch-and-learns and chat-and-chews to food trucks and taking events out into the community, Hatboro-Horsham High School principal Dennis Williams means it when he says he wants to hear from parents. In this podcast, he shares how they’re working to get parents more engaged in the school lives of their students:

What the changing socio-economic makeup of the community means for parent engagement
Why getting active participation from parents is so important for students and the school as a whole
What roadblocks and questions they’ve had to grapple with as they’ve made parental engagement a priority
How any school can work toward the same kind of success with parents and the community

Also recommended:
Podcast: One District, Two Communities — How does a district strive for equity when it serves two distinct, racially-diverse communities?

Flood Recovery: Livingston Parish Revisited May 10, 2019

Show notes

In our interview, we asked Bruce Chaffin about:

The 33″ of rain that Livingston Parish got in a 24-hour span, and the impact it had on the district
The financial impact the district faced, and steps Livingston Parish Public Schools is taking to rebuild
Using gamification with principals to reduce teacher absences
How the district saved $63,000 on substitute costs in the first 19 days of school in August 2017, compared with the same time frame 2 years earlier
The impact this reduction in teacher absences has had on student achievement
What they have learned about using data to make strategic decisions
March, we caught up with Bruce at the Frontline Insights Summit in Orlando, and had a chance to find out what’s happening with the rebuilding effort now in 2019, and whether they have continued to see the same impact on teacher attendance and student achievement that they did initially. Stay tuned at the end of the episode for that conversation.

More Resources
Get more details on how Livingston Parish Public Schools used Frontline Absence & Time to unearth teacher absence data and save hundreds of thousands of dollars.

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