Face-to-Face Class Meeting: Reflection

This past weekend's cohort meetings were informative, overwhelming, interesting, and...overwhelming again!

We started with a presentation about school law on Friday. It was mentioned several times by both the speaker and professors how we are entering into quite a different era of education than has ever been seen before. With today's technology, school law is that much more complicated. The presentation was incredibly informative, but, while I am still in the classroom, I hope I will not have to deal with some of the legal issues that were discussed until I am in administration. With that being said, it was really helpful to hear the presentation and, especially, be given the presentation in the handbook to refer to later. It was interesting to play "Stump the Lawyer" with various issues that have come up in school regarding: search and seizure, personnel issues, and more.

On Saturday, the day was broken into four segments. The first was focused on meeting management, where we discussed and participating in several activities that will help us all run more effective and collaborative meetings. I thought the discussions regarding planning the agenda and thinking about the process by which to accomplish goals at the meeting were very useful.

The second part of the day was quite interesting, but incredibly overwhelming. Dr. Kevin Torosian, supervisor of Child Welfare and Services in Central Unified came out to talk to us all about student discipline, our role in the procedures of suspensions and expulsions, and the Ed. Code. While it was A LOT of information, I really liked how Dr. Torosian presented it. He was direct, to the point, and very inspiring. One metaphor that I feel is worth repeating is how working with student discipline can often be like being a mediocre golfer. You don't make most of the shots, sometimes you hit it in the rough, or lose the ball entirely. However, every once in a while, you hit a shot that is just beautiful and the feeling that it gives you is enough to make you want to continue golfing. Working in education, especially in student discipline, you won't be able to reach every student all of the time. But, every so often, you will help a student change their life for the better, and that feeling will inspire you to continue. I really appreciated Dr. Torosian's perspectives and insight.

The next two parts of the training dealt with change/motion leadership and dealing with personnel issues using the FRISK model. Both of these were incredibly informative and I think will have real life application, both now as a teacher leader and when I become an administrator. Not that I'll be sending a FRISK letter to a fellow teacher anytime soon ;)

While I wouldn't have necessarily have chosen to spend about eight hours in class over the weekend, I was glad that it was well worth our time as a cohort. It was a TON of information, but all very relevant to our journey as leaders and administrators.