I love when people claim students and say that these are "my students," it shows an ownership and a responsibility along with an acknowledgement of that responsibility. Saying these are ‘my’ students automatically instills a different sort of feeling and reaction when it comes to working with them. There is an investment there that isn’t present even when we say that they are ‘our’ students. 

When we say ‘our’ students we sometimes dilute the ownership of them and tend to think that someone else will look after things rather than taking that on. Granted there are very tight and cohesive teams that use the word ‘our’ as a rallying cry to ensure that everyone has an equal responsibility in the care and well-being of a student. This can be further strengthened by creating teaching and learning teams whose primary focus is on a particular class or group of students where there is an investment by the group into those students and each holds the other accountable. Even though as an administrator I don't often teach directly, I still definitely have a few students who I consider 'my' kids. 

You cannot assign ownership though and expect the same results. A principal or teacher saying that these students are ‘your’ students is problematic because it can feel more like you’re passing off responsibility. In this sense, you may also inadvertently be blaming the person for student performance or misbehavior which is also not fair to do. Yes, as educator’s we are responsible for the education of our students, unfortunately for some, they believe that means that they are responsible to deliver curriculum but not necessarily that students learn it. 

One of the reasons we tend to absolve ourselves of responsibility is by assigning labels to students. Things like this are English Additional Language students (EAL), or these are Special Needs students. Labels get a lot of hate from educators since students are more than their label (absolutely!), but they do also give us valuable information about the student quickly. But more than than, assigning a label to a student either consciously or unconsciously transfers ownership in our minds so we match them up. Ownership of Special Needs students gets transferred to Special Needs teachers. Again, this is not a formal transfer or often even something intentional, it is part of our unconscious bias that matches and sorts information. The effect though is that we may feel that someone else will take care of that student's needs rather than doing it ourselves. 

A solution to this is as simple as changing our language and re-framing how we view our students. My students who have Special Needs are different from "Special Needs students." My students who avail of EAL support are different from “EAL Students.” This may not seem like much, but by reframing it like this keeps the ownership squarely with you and us a comment on their program rather than defining them by their program. 

Our language helps to shape our thoughts, so by changing how we talk about students, it changes how we view and feel about our students as well as our responsibility to them. To be clear, a team approach is always the best approach since students may need many different things and it can be more than one person can give. In order to meet the needs of our students we will often need to use a lot of skill sets and different educators. But we need to be mindful that we are not simply expecting someone else to take over the entire care of the student. It really does take a village to raise a child and it takes a school to raise a student.