I originally wrote this article in August, 2019. 

Introduction

For the past three years (2016-2019) I had the joy of teaching and learning at the International Community School (ICS) in Bangkok, Thailand. ICS is a kindergarten to grade twelve not-for-profit international school with 1,150 students. There is a core leadership team made up of the three school principals (elementary, middle, and high) and the headmaster. This leadership team leads ICS by servant-hearted example which empowers the school to provide a top quality education to its students. 

Although ICS does many things well, as systems thinkers it is essential to constantly seek to improve in order to enrich student learning results. One way to do so is by assessing how ICS is doing in reference to the 2016-17 School Improvement Indicators document (New Brunswick Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, 2016). There are two performance indicators from the “Leadership and Teaming” domain which are essential aspects for school improvement. 1) “The principal encourages, welcomes and employs feedback from staff members, students and families” and 2) “School administrators are visible in the school and model quality interactions with staff members and students” (New Brunswick Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, 2016). These two performance indicators are major proponents of ICS’s continuous cultural and academic success. 

Current Practices

(Indicator 1) Currently, the leadership team at ICS works hard to seek out and utilize feedback from staff, students, and families by employing the following strategies, a) Maintaining open communication from the leadership team to parents, students, and staff. b) If issues arise, members of the leadership team can be communicated with in person (more on this later). c) Seeks feedback from stakeholders at regular increments in the school year. Among other examples, “Leadership perception surveys” are sent out every semester to generate feedback from staff, parents, and students. 

(Indicator 2) Currently, the leadership team at ICS makes an effort to be available and to model quality interactions with staff and students by utilizing the following strategies, a) The headmaster is famous for greeting students in the hallway with a signature “fist bump” and a New Jersey accented “How are ya?”. b) The middle school principal is known for faithfully attending every Friday night event. c) The headmaster stayed overnight at the school during a service learning weekend. 

Challenges 

There are a few challenges standing in the way of feedback and quality interactions leading to higher levels of improvement at ICS: (1a) Feedback, takes time to analyze and even more time to draw conclusions about. Depending on the busyness of the leader’s schedule, decisions based on feedback data can be delayed. (1b) When teachers, students, or parents have feedback to contribute, there are times when it goes unheard because the person does not take the time to share it. (2a) Lack of coverage. At ICS it is common to see two principals and the headmaster circulating the campus at the same time after school. Transversely, there are also times after school when none of the leadership team can be found.

Suggested Improvements

Here are a few key improvements that the leadership team at ICS could undertake to improve their system in relation to feedback and quality interactions: (1a) Take more time to plan the purpose of their feedback. Seeking feedback by beginning with the end in mind, not just feedback for feedback’s sake. This strategy will help the leadership team to learn something specific about the school in order to make a measured change. (1b) Improve the quality of incoming feedback by being intentional with wording, timing, method, or sample size of the questions. (2) Scheduling after school visibility time. With a clear schedule, the leadership team can ensure some degree of coverage at all times. 

Best practices

(1) To receive the best possible feedback, The Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement (2006) suggests the following: seek feedback intentionally (plan it), analyze feedback, report feedback to your stakeholders (this step is not mentioned in the article), re-evaluate where you are and where you are going.
(2) As a school leader, be available and ready to listen (S. Ladas, personal communication, November 26, 2018). This is wisdom to bear in mind no matter what the time of day or how many conversations have been had with that stakeholder in the past. Availability is a great way to build trust. 

                                                    Best Practice Leads to Learning

(1) The more intentional the design of the feedback the more useful the results. Useful results beget desired change when analyzed and reported well. At a school like ICS this means the difference between simply improving something and improving just the right thing.
(2) Students who are cared for and who are recipients of positive expectations achieve more (Smith, Jussim, & Eccles, 1999). The leadership team at ICS shows how deeply they love their students daily which helps them to focus on achieving at the highest level.

                                                         Further Systems Thinking

Both asking for feedback and quality interactions are unwritten policy, parts of the culture of caring at ICS that greatly contribute to high levels of school improvement and student success. Both asking for feedback and quality interactions are practices skilfully carried out by each person on the leadership team. Specific to indicator 1, the members of the leadership team at ICS understand that feedback is a process which takes time to gather, analyze, and draw conclusions. Having regular parts of the school year programmed into the calendar to ask for feedback supports this process. Place is specific to Indicator 2, members of the leadership team position themselves in the right places in order to instil confidence in stakeholders. 

Conclusion

Whether focusing on feedback or quality interactions, the members of the leadership team at ICS are great examples of how to use both practices to improve the level of leadership in a system. I plan to share these findings with them in order to help their improvement process in the future. 

References 

New Brunswick Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. (2016) 2016-17 School Improvement Indicators Retrieved from lms.unb.ca/d2l/le/content/166001/viewContent/1583139/View

Smith, A. E., Jussim, L., & Eccles, J. (1999). Do self-fulfilling prophecies accumulate, dissipate, or remain stable over time? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(3), 548.

The Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement (2006) When the Plan Becomes Part of the Problem. Retrieved from lms.unb.ca/d2l/le/content/166001/viewContent/1583123/View

Thank you for taking the time to read this article. It was a pleasure spending time with you today.

Peace & Blessings, 

– Josiah