Peeling Back the Layers: Group Report Out by candicecooper https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e The Study to inform our Act (PDSA). en-us 2019-02-14 17:51:46 UTC 2026-02-09 18:19:14 UTC hello@padlet.com candicecooper https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/343340545 Administration needs to be more visible to both the students and the teachers. They need to create relationships with the students and become more open an transparent with the staff. Also, many people feel they work in isolation and are unable to trust because they do not have time and/or opportunities to build relationships with other staff members. Activities that bring us together as a school community, such as Christmas BINGO need to be ongoing throughout the school year. It would be helpful to have staff meetings 1-2 times a month to get to know others on staff and hear about what is happening at our school. Emails can only go so far; face-to-face interaction is helpful and works to build relationships. A "lunch bunch" could be implemented for staff members who have the same lunch time a couple times a month, or perhaps, a "first year teacher group" for our first year teachers to get to know one another and to have a support system for others going through similar experiences. The suggestion of reevaluating our current office rewards and consequences practices was made in order to ensure consistency and fairness. Students should not enjoy coming to the office as much as they do. Perhaps after-school detention with the office and teachers monitoring it on a rotating schedule would be helpful to both ending undesired student behaviors and bringing the parents into the process of supporting their student. Finally, many people feel undermined by the frequent exceptions made for various things, and it makes them feel bad because they feel this makes them look bad to our stakeholders. Therefore, when policies and procedures are put in place, we ask that there be no exceptions or that they be very few.]]> 2019-03-20 14:13:30 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/343340545 candicecooper https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344006800 We do not know many people at our campus. This was really illustrated when we lost a staff member and we all went on as usual. It was very sad because it made people feel like we are all that meaningless and disposable. There is a lack of understanding for how important each person and each position is and what they do to serve our school. The same introduction is given for every new person who joins us each year, and that is the last we hear about them (e.g., This person is a rock star. They are going to do a great job!) for the rest of the year. This further illustrates how replaceable we are and that we are all thought of in the same manner. There is too much emphasis on the rewards system, and it is negatively affecting our students' intrinsic motivation and reinforcing disruptive behaviors that negatively affect the learning environment and can create safety issues. Students are very happy after returning from the office and are often more disrespectful to the teacher than they were prior. This affects teacher credibility with students. Changes (e.g., grade level changes, changes in personnel) are too frequent. It makes it hard to establish any kind of consistency and build relationships.

People act in isolation. It is like they have a wall up. We have been very lonely. We feel like we do not know anything about anyone that we work with (in some instances not even names). It is like the "Red Scare." We come in and do our jobs and only our jobs for the kids, but other than that, we do not interact because of the toxic environment (e.g., investigations). "Who is going to report me next? And for what?" We all feel lonely. There is a lack of transparency. We lack a campus culture. We fail to meet regularly both formally and informally. At other schools, we knew we could count on our coworkers both professionally and personally. Lack of emphasis on thoughtful details. For example, "catching someone doing something good" and leaving a nice note on a sticky. First year teachers do not have mentor teachers on campus. This has been difficult!! Support of district mentor is GREAT, but more support is needed. On-campus support would be nice. We do not feel we can discuss things with our administrators and they be kept confidential. We do not trust that the district knows Viridian (e.g., its inter-workings, difficulties of structure and layout, student population), and we are sad because we feel they are disinterested in knowing. Trust comes from the top down. Also, it is difficult to trust coworkers because you do not know them. This can lead to misunderstandings and defensiveness when coworkers attempt to communicate. We are unable to have uncomfortable but constructive conversations with one another because we do not have relationships with one another that allow us to trust. There is a disconnect and lack of awareness for those around you.

For those with children at VRE, it would be nice to be able to attend their parties or functions held at VRE during the school day or in district functions (e.g., spelling bee, geo bee) at least on occasion.]]> 2019-03-21 20:53:34 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344006800 sheldonbickel https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344008566 More visible administration throughout the campus during the school day. Administrators need to become more involved with the students and the teachers. Get to know the good kids, as well as students with behavior issues. Some/most kids do not mind going to the office because they consider it "fun." We need stronger, more consistent discipline. Staff is not on the same page with behavioral procedures for students in common areas. We need more team building activities. Parents appear to be more valued than the teachers. Accommodating to parents seems to be more important than supporting the teachers. Our students and learning community would benefit from making the hard call and putting in the work to truly resolve the issues at hand versus putting a band-aid on these situations in order to pacify the parent and make it easier for administration. ]]> 2019-03-21 21:00:49 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344008566 shanasinisi https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013403 We do not feel like a school family.  Too many people do not even know each others names.  We are too busy during the day to interact in a social way.  If we could designate a day for team building a few times a year would be helpful.  Eating as a grade level if possible would be nice too every once in a while.  Maybe we could take a "field trip" to each others classes during planning so we could get to know other teachers and what they do.

Trust at Viridian
Teacher are more afraid to go to the office then students.  We really need a consistent discipline plan in place.  People gossip and trash talk a lot.  This could help if we got to know each other on a deeper level.  ]]> 2019-03-21 21:19:54 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013403 jenniferbunker https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013556 There needs to be more accountability/consistency for teacher expectations. Some teachers are made to feel bad or like they are not doing their job when they are here only during contract hours yet some teachers leave early consistently and nothing is said.  Hallway expectations are not enforced by all teachers, which makes some teachers the "bad guys" and some the "good guys." 

Discipline needs to be consistent for all students regardless who their parents are. Not all students are held to the same expectations. Teachers feel like the rewards (candy, snacks, stickers) they receive when sent to the office make the students even more disruptive and disrespectful when they come back. Also teachers feel like parents and students are believed right away with out an investigation which leads to bigger problems sometimes with the district. Teachers would like to have the chance to talk to admin when a parent complains before blame is set to the teacher.

Teachers do not feel like they are a family. Some teachers do not even know each others names. Games like the school wide BINGO were liked a lot. It would be nice to have a way for teams to eat lunch as a whole group every once in a while. Maybe parents could volunteer to do lunch and recess duty one Friday a month. Teachers ave "choir practice" without letting everyone know so some feelings have been hurt. Teachers love the extra time due to lack of staff meetings, however, would like some get to know you activities on district PD days or half days. (games or some sort of competition) When we do have staff meetings have a way to sort teachers so they have to sit with new people and not just their team. ]]> 2019-03-21 21:20:32 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013556 The biggest change that impacts our staff is how much growth we've had that has caused tension across campus. The frequent change in admin has also been difficult because we don't have a consistent expectation/plan to deal with student behavior dictated by the office. These consistent expectations need to be coming from the top down and rules need to be in place and enforced without giving in to parents. We also agree that we need to find a way to facilitate a line of communication between the office and staff regarding behavior. Many teachers do not know what consequences students have received in the office and what the plan is going forward when the students are back in the classroom. Moral is affected when teachers are strict and firm on discipline and rules but then admin gives in to the parents and/or kids. As far as the issue of trust, we feel that it is less about not knowing staff but more about feeling constantly like we are watching our backs and that we are not supported by the administration. We also feel that a crucial change that needs to happen is communication between colleagues. Many people feel that teachers take up issues all the way to admin instead of talking with each other and that admin doesn't stop the complaining but kind of feeds into it. Our suggestion is that admin does not listen to the complaint but instead asks them to talk to their colleague to solve the issue first. If they aren't sure how, walk them through how to have that discussion. Then, if the conflict isn't resolved, the two teachers need to sit down with an admin as a moderator to facilitate the conflict resolution. We also discussed that people do not understand how to interact with each other in a constructive way. We discussed a possible solution learning other people's personalities. They liked the idea of personality colors posted on our doors and even getting into groups based on our personality at a staff meeting and having everyone aware of other people's perspectives on conversations based on their personality. kellylemke https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013848 2019-03-21 21:21:31 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013848 We spoke about consistency is a key factor that is effecting trust. Our group talked about having a consistent behavior management plan throughout the school. Consistency with discipline issues needs to be at the forefront. Teachers need to feel supported when it comes to parent issues as well. catherinebright https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013922 As far as trust some teachers are fearful of colleagues talking to admin about issues they are having instead of going straight to the person were the issues are occurring.   Administration could remind everyone of chain of command. When issues arise the people involved should attempt to work it out before heading to the office. ]]> 2019-03-21 21:21:50 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344013922 https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344254548 Our team talked about consistency being a big problem.  With every year the office changing there are not any norms or expectations established. Depending on who the child is depends on how that child is handle as well as their parents. There needs to be expectations that everyone needs to follow. Students look at the office as fun. They get candy, snacks, stickers, legos, ect. Then when they come back to class, they still don't have respect for us because they know their consequence is fun.

 We would also like to see admin in our rooms more, not always with pen and paper but to just pop in, see what were doing in our classrooms, making connections with the students. We need positive feedback or even ways to improve something. We like having freedom in our classrooms to be ourselves but we also need exact expectation at times so everyone is on the same page. We would also like more team lead meetings to help keep on top of all the information we get.

When we brought up trust, it wasn't all we don't trust one another a lot of us don't know each other to say we can trust them. We would like more staff building activities like fun games between teacher through out the year, BINGO was so fun and even the kids got excited and hype with us. We also have a hard time trusting because people run to the office about something so small and don't even confront the person first to try and resolve. When this happens we feel the office always takes that persons side and the other does not have a chance to tell their side. Some feel the office doesn't have our backs and when its out of their hands they just shove us out the door or act like they don't care and it really effects the teachers. Sometimes a simple explanation of why they cant help just shows us hey we tried but our hands our tied. Having those crucial conversations are very important. We also don't feel the office has our backs when parents are involved they just try to make the parents happy and not whats the right thing to do. We also talked about bringing more programs to our school to bring parents, students, and staff together. On testing days we should all be wearing our shirts to show we are supporting the testing kids, think of a chant we can chant to them as they walk to their classes, just something to show we are a family here! ]]> 2019-03-22 15:05:18 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344254548 Changes aprilsani https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344328931 Our group mainly talked about how the number and diversity of our students have changed so much these past 4-5 years. This building is filled with groups of students from very different demographics and parenting styles. Since our students are so different we found that we (the teachers) are having to approach behaviors in so many different ways. My team also felt that behaviors are are not being dealt with fairly. Some students are being sent to AEP/Crossroads while others are getting ISS for the same behaviors. Although we understand that students are different and situations are different we would appreciate a more universal and clear behavior plan/expectation. We also understand behavior expectations have changed so much because of the number of APs we have had and we hope that as the years go on the behavior plans are more concrete. In regards to changes in within staff and staff overturn, we understand that life occurs and everyone has their different reasons to leave but we did wish that changing classrooms or grade levels did not happen as often so that we are able to build relationships/morale. ]]> 2019-03-22 17:39:11 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344328931 Trust aprilsani https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344334952 From what I heard from my group, we are all part of very trusting teams and we are all grateful for our teammates. We began to discuss why others might feel that they can not trust their teams and/or staff members. We believe that past administrators created a "hard to trust", "fearful" environment. Also having investigations on campus, created that "looming" effect in the building that may have contributed to the trust factor. In conclusion, my group felt that although that was the environment last year, we believe that the trust on campus will get better with having a solid and consistent administration team. We also discussed how hard it is to get to know everyone on campus because of the lack of team building. It would be nice to meet more than a couple times during the year and when looking at the bigger picture we think that a few more meetings or gatherings for team building can help all of us get to know each other better and create a "family" environment. ]]> 2019-03-22 17:50:34 UTC https://padlet.com/candicecooper/d00vs6o68a1e/wish/344334952