Design

Describe your action plan and how each of your four chosen competencies will influence its design and implementation.

For my capstone I have decided to focus on the importance of teacher mentorship and the pivotal role it plays in education for teachers and students. The overarching competencies I chose to work from are Personal Effectiveness and Interpersonal Effectiveness. These competencies will influence moving forward as I work closely with colleagues to engage in reflective practice, establish expectations for improvement, and use this data to develop a plan for the future of my school. The pathway of my capstone is Instructional Leadership in Coaching and Mentoring. I continue to work beyond my current practice by taking part in professional development opportunities. The Foundational Competency I have worked through is Explore and Challenge Inequity. This has pushed me to reflect on a personal level and acknowledge my background of privilege, beliefs and biases. In doing so, I am aware of the many perspectives that come into play when working toward a goal. I have embraced those differences and recognize that diversity is a key part in creating a well-rounded program.

I will meet with my principal and share the feedback I received through email responses (Evidence #12) and the staff survey (Evidence #11). I will share my thoughts and be open to new ideas to move forward. My next steps in promoting mentorship and building relationships among the staff at MCMS by creating a google slide. This will be filled out at the beginning of the 2021/2022 school year by each staff member. The slide will ask members to answer years of service, grade levels taught, certifications/degrees obtained, skills they are proficient in, and any other information that may assist other teachers and be applicable to the subject or content area. My goal is that the information provided will be a resource to all staff, especially new and incoming members. First day of school introductions are great, but we do not retain all the information as the year goes on.

How will your leadership leverage the strengths and address the needs of diverse stakeholders to support the action plan, develop capacity, broaden decision-making, and learn collaboratively?

I am building relationships with staff members, administration, and instructional coaches. Knowing so many share the same thoughts about mentoring beyond what our district currently has in place is helpful. I am receiving feedback from stakeholders to influence what steps to take from here on out (Evidence #13).

How will you use collaboration, questioning, data, and reflection during the implementation of your action plan?

After seeing data from the survey, email responses, and talking with my staff, I plan to implement a google slide that will allow staff to connect and share their knowledge and experience to help others. I will encourage staff to share if there is anything additional they would like to include on the slide. Collaboration is helpful in determining what the majority would like and improvements that could be made. I will reflect on this project once our school year is in full swing and make adjustments as needed. From there I hope this project evolves within our building and creates meaningful and useful connections with all staff. This is one way I have found to implement mentorship within my building.

How will you address obstacles that you may encounter in implementing your plan?

I anticipate obstacles about time, money, and participation in mentoring. I will propose my idea by starting small with our staff and using the feedback to help direct the direction to go next. Just like any new idea, implementation takes time. My hope is for mentorship to become routine and not seem like another burden added to an already overloaded schedule. The biggest challenge moving forward is the vision I have for the teacher mentorship program in our district. Will there be a reason to implement a program like this district-wide, and if so, what are the next steps?

How will you know if your action plan is successful? What evidence would support your claim?

My goal is to present information to staff that is meaningful and useful. I want our new staff to know who they can go to for specifics and also feel part of a community, while also being able to revisit the information provided by our staff. Success will be measured from the feedback I will receive from staff about the pros and cons of the slide information. I will send out a form to my staff to see if they utilized this information during the school year and if there are any changes or improvements that could be made.

Evidence #12: Email sent to staff & responses