Craig Hockenberry Superintendent: A Leader Seeks and Incorporates Feedback

By Craig Hockenberry 

 

Three Rivers School District is a welcoming and nurturing small-town school district, even though it encompasses three villages. When I arrived as Superintendent, I was not totally surprised to find they had not done the work of identifying their core values and creating a strategic plan for the future.

 

I had this in mind as I started my listening tour. Speaking in churches and meeting on the occasional dining room table, I learned that residents were fiercely proud of the district. When they identified a community swimming pool as a need - something they lost when the old high school was recently rebuilt - we found a way to combine resources and put one in a new recreation center.

 

So we started the core value work by creating space and time to write. On a Sunday, with time compensated in personal leave, my full administrative team and others met at the Cincinnati Observatory for a full day of brainstorming, writing, and wordsmithing ... and catered meals.

 

At the end of the day we had summed up our past, present, and hope for the future in these three identified values. We would …

-       Cultivate Excellence

-       Inspire Innovation

-       Nurture Inclusion

 

 

We were working with a parent of Three Rivers students, Tim Urmston, who was the founder and CEO of SEEK. He had helped lead Fortune 500 companies through visioning and crafting core values, and his expertise had led us to identify values that resonated with our team.

 

He cautioned me that finding these statements was not the real work.

 

We had a room full of people who believed in them because they wrote them, and because they were from the community. We knew they captured the spirit of who we were and who we wanted to be.

 

But for core values to really resonate, there had to be buy-in from the larger community.

 

We needed to elicit authentic feedback from our constituencies.

 

Our building administrators agreed to go back and speak to their Parent Teacher Organizations, to attend community meetings, and to vet these core value statements at their staff meetings. The goal was to get meaningful community feedback.

 

 

The administrators diligently took these statements to the community. They got valuable feedback that provided powerful insight to the spirit of Three Rivers schools.

 

Perhaps my favorite part of working with this core values process was learning how deeply the Three Rivers community valued diversity.

 

As a rural community, Three Rivers was almost entirely white. However, because we were public schools, we knew the importance of valuing every child as they arrived at our doorstep. We had a large population of students with special education needs, and they were our children.

 

When I hired the district’s first ever black administrator, Ceair Baggett, he was welcomed.

 

In the listening and feedback process, we learned that the members of the Three Rivers Community truly value diversity.  We learned that they were eager to give their students diverse experiences. 

 

We were urged to hire black and immigrant employees whenever possible. Our parents knew that many of their children would work in Cincinnati or other cities, and experience with a diverse set of people would prepare them for the reality of working in the larger world.

 

It’s possible that I expected something different. I could not have hoped for more. Three Rivers was really committed to being diverse and welcoming to all.

 

This feedback was carefully collected and funnelled back to SEEK. They incorporated the feedback into the descriptors that accompanied each phrase. In this way, the voice of the larger community was included in the core values statements.

 

They truly represented our values and our voices.

 

 

We knew that we still had hard work ahead. We needed to present the information in an unbiased way to the community. 

 

Sure, the Board and I could roll them out at a Board meeting, but we needed a trusted member of the community.

 

Again, Tim was the right person for the task. He had worked the process from the beginning, and represented an important voice in the community - he was not just a facilitator, after all, he was a parent.

 

His presentation to the Board and the community was well received. We had identified our values and captured the spirit of our school. The Board unanimously accepted the values, this started phase three - communicating our values.

 

Once you have identified what drives you, this must be shared with everyone in the district. One reason these values are important is because they give everyone a sense of what is important to the organization as a whole. 

 

We put banners in the villages, featuring the core values and pictures of our students. We placed similar banners in our school hallways. We incorporated these values into our lessons, so we could grapple with what they meant to us as individuals.

 

And the core values served a larger purpose. Now every person had something to point to if there was a dispute about how something should be handled, or how to move forward in a conflict. 

 

We would …

-       Cultivate Excellence

-       Inspire Innovation

-       Nurture Inclusion

 

And this could now happen in every corner of the district. From a student’s desk to the central office receptionist’s waiting room, these values could help guide our decisions and unify us like never before.

 

And they would also lay the path to creating our first ever district strategic plan. 

 

 

By Craig Hockenberry Superintendent 

 

As the new Superintendent of Three Rivers School District, I engaged in a series of conversations with the community. I used this time to learn the community’s expectations for the district.

 

I was also using these meetings to lay the groundwork for addressing a gap in the Three Rivers culture. The district had never identified its core values nor, in recent memory, created a strategic plan.

 

The work of identifying our values included four clear steps

-       Gathering the community for visioning and drafting

-       Writing the goals

-       Getting authentic feedback

-       Communicating the core values

 

First, I recruited a trusted and experienced community member to lead the conversations. Then I created the space and time for discussion, as described in a previous post. The main emphasis was that the district compensated people for their time and energy, providing meals and a beautiful space for doing the work.

 

 

 

I recruited Tim Urmston to guide us in the process. He had led Fortune 500 companies through this work and - just as importantly - his children attended Three Rivers schools. I couldn’t say no when he told me I would need to co-facilitate the process.

 

My initial groundwork to eliminate barriers to participation was rewarded. On this Sunday, when we gathered to draft our core values, every Three Rivers administrator was present. This dramatically increased the chances that our results would be not only fully representative of our district, but would be widely supported and implemented.

 

The process of discerning core values includes working to lower our social barriers and creating an environment of trust. As residents of several small towns tied together by our schools, there was already a strong sense of community.

 

Then Tim prompted us for specific statements describing what we hoped our schools would be, or what they would reveal about and add to our community.

 

The statements we came up with helped capture the true spirit of the schools as I saw them.

 

When I arrived, we had a vacancy for the High School Principal position. We hired Ceair Baggett, who had been principal of a Cincinnati Public elementary school. While his work in the community, fighting for every student’s right to a chance at success, was remarkable, it was also worth noting that he was the first Black administrator ever hired in Three Rivers. 

 

The Three Rivers community was exceptionally welcoming. The lack of Black administrators was more a factor of being a rural district with almost no Black students or families, and not a measure of any sort of discrimination.

 

Our community was also incredibly supportive of students with disabilities. Ohio law allows those Catholic and private schools to choose their students, and they often lack resources to meet the needs of students with individualized education plans and extraordinary needs. So those students attended our schools.

 

I was happy to see that the descriptions we came up with in our drafts all spoke to our love of diversity and our concern that every person felt welcomed and challenged to be their best selves at our schools.

 

 

What we were hearing from the small groups and seeing shared out in pictures was a common pattern, and it formed one of our values. 

 

I felt the community really captured their heart when one of the values we identified was “Nurture inclusion.” 

 

Many schools and districts claim to be inclusive, but it is done as an afterthought. I was proud that we had adopted it as an intentional practice on our part.

 

Some would see our school system as compromised in some fundamental way. After all, some saw us as a mix of students who couldn’t afford to attend Catholic school and students prevented from attending those schools because of their disabilities. 

 

But we chose to understand that these characteristics made us strong. It made us a community.

 

And, in fact, some parents who could afford to send their kids to Cincinnati chose to keep their students in their community school. This made us strong.

 

And this increased our commitment to excellence - expecting the best from every child and adult in the system. Our next identified value was “Cultivate excellence.”

 

 

 

In the drafting phase, then, we had identified and taken pride in who we were. We would nurture inclusion.

 

We had also proudly embraced who we wanted to be - the best versions of ourselves. We agreed we would “Cultivate excellence.”

 

We had also identified a vision for who we could be in the future. A core value that spoke to our bright future that met our needs and that drew others to our community. A future that perhaps kept a few more families right here at home, while opening new vistas for our existing students.

 

We knew that we could try new things, with the freedom of having a cohesive, successful community school system. So we created a space to invent with our third core value.

 

We would “Inspire innovation.”

 

At the end of a long Sunday together, we knew we had taken an important first step. However, identifying our three core values was the start of a larger process of truly inculcating those values into our school system.

 

That was the work of the next few months - getting meaningful feedback and then widely spreading and applying these values.

 

Craig Hockenberry 

By Craig Hockenberry 

 

Since school boards have the ultimate accountability for curriculum they do need to have firsthand knowledge of the scope of curriculum and the overall programs in all the schools, however their responsibilities narrows down to some very important roles.  I have listed below just some of the roles of the board in curriculum.  

 

§  To be updated regularly on the content and scope of the curriculum. 

§  To be informed of state guidelines involving curriculum and instruction. 

§  To be familiar with textbook adoption policies and procedures.  

§  To be aware of sensitive community values regarding curricular issues. 

§  Work with the superintendent to keep community updated and involved with curriculum.

§  Develop Board level committee work around student achievement and curriculum.

§  Allocate funding to support best practices in curriculum and instruction.  

§  Honor and celebrate student achievement at board meetings.  

 

The superintendent works closely with the board of education to update them on important changes at the local, state, and national level so that they are informed and can make important decisions regarding curriculum development. The updates should include achievement data at all levels and best practices both locally and regionally. 

 

The superintendent must work closely with the board to hire, develop, train and retain highly effective curriculum directors, principals, and teachers and provide them support to implement the curriculum.  The superintendent should be working with community leaders at all levels to seek out resources that will be innovative and resources that can be used to reduce barriers to student achievement. 

 

 

 

Orientations are critically important at all levels in a school district.  Each one is different and requires designs that are on-going and focus on growth as well as orientation.  

 

 

§  Reach out to board members running for office and invite them to start attending monthly board meetings.  This will help orient them before they are elected and will give them an idea of work flow at a board meeting.  

 

§  Arrange a meeting after election results are final to discuss with them the basic roles and responsibilities, board policies manual and direct them to OSBA handbook for board members Board Handbooks | Ohio School Boards Association and information regarding new board members For New Board Members | Ohio School Boards Association

 

§  During the time of November through January before they are sworn into office, include them on important communications and updates to ensure they get a clear understanding of how communication flows through the team.  Also, I would use this time to discuss the importance of CONFIDENTIALITY.   

 

§  Set up weekly meetings with new board members and include tours and other opportunities to meet teachers, cooks, instructional aides, bus drivers, principals and support staff.  

 

§  Set up a social gathering off campus with all new staff in the spring for the purpose of relationship building. Invite principals, key members of their teaching team, and other staff that will be important to their support.  Plan ice breaker activities and give time for new staff to meet veteran staff and others familiar with the district. I would use this day to assign mentors for each of our new hires.  

 

§  Set up a spring meeting with each new staff before the end of the school year to give them a chance to see the school in full operation.  

 

§  Bring all new hires to work one day before all staff reports and prepare a day long agenda that includes; time in their rooms, additional meet and greets, tours, logistics, reports and updates from all departments, and much more.

 

§  Set-up a yearlong monthly meeting with all new hires using key district leaders to develop a supportive agenda and opportunities for new hires to talk about what is going well and what challenges they are facing and opportunities they see during their first year with us. 

There are many options to assess the district operations in maintenance, transportation, and food service programs.  Some of these would include multiple measures of financial impact, safety data, customer satisfaction and staffing. Having quality leadership overseeing each of these departments and meeting with them weekly to discuss opportunities and strategies for efficiency is critical in assessing each department.  Weekly visits to each department and operational updates at district leaderships meetings and to the board of education could also aide in assessing these departments and making adjustments.

 

When dealing with each of these departments, there are many opportunities to create customer satisfaction surveys.  These surveys could follow a work order with maintenance or quarterly surveys for transportation and food service. Reviewing these results and presenting them to the district leadership and board of education can help us all make improvements and support these different departments.  

 

Developing board level committees such as the building and grounds committee and operations committee could help with oversight and these committees could reach out to experts in the community to join and give us feedback and support.  

 

Finally, it could be beneficial to do a professional external audit of each department and get the necessary feedback from professionals outside the organization.  These audits could be used to put together some objectives in long range planning and forecasting.  

 

CRAIG HOCKENBERRY SUPERINTENDENT 

 

 

 

 

 

Craig Hockenberry: Identifies Core Values

By Craig Hockenberry 

 

The Three Rivers School District is a unique animal. It sprawls through the hilly southwestern Ohio terrain along the Ohio River. Parts of it feel rural, and yet a significant number of the residents of this area depend on urban Cincinnati for their income … and their education.

 

Most school districts are housed entirely in one municipality. However, the Three Rivers District, despite not being much larger than many similar districts, includes four different municipalities with their own elected leadership. 

 

The villages of Addyston, Cleves, and North Bend each have their own council and mayor. And Miami Township, which encompasses those three villages, has a Board of Trustees.

 

This means that responsible decision-making in the school district necessarily involved a gauntlet of officials and official bodies. In order to create a district that was responsive to the needs of the community, an effort had to be made to identify common values and concerns.

 

Naming our core values would help focus a district that could otherwise be torn by competing interests and ambitions.

 

If you have worked for a corporation, attended a large church, or assisted with a nonprofit, you have likely encountered core values. You have likely also come across the group’s mission and vision statements.

 

It would be easy to dismiss these ubiquitous statements as unnecessary timewasters - corporate exercises that are meaningless to people doing the real work of the organization.

 

But the opposite is true. 

 

The reality is that core values are a valuable investment of time and energy. When created with authenticity and implemented with integrity, these statements help every individual confidently represent the whole group in every situation. 

 

They align custodians and executives, front line experts with behind-the-scenes professionals, and help create a cohesive unit. 

 

This doesn’t mean everyone is hugging each other and singing “Kumbaya.” It means that when there is a conflict or a concern that falls outside the policy and process manuals, everyone has the same guidelines for how to move forward without waiting for an answer from a principal or a superintendent.

 

And in the business of education, where the experts are on the front lines working with kids in classrooms every day, getting rid of timewasters and obstacles is a crucial part of a leader’s work.

 

That doesn’t mean work can’t happen without core values and mission and vision statements. It can. But conflict resolution then falls more heavily on elected or hired leadership, and might not always represent the values of the whole group.

 

When I arrived at Three Rivers, there were no identified core values. My predecessor was a beloved and effective administrator, and in a small rural district like this one, significant issues pop up less frequently than in larger and more diverse districts. 

 

Choosing to take these steps to identify our values was not a way to say previous leaders had been less effective. But what it did do was give me a chance to learn from the community that was a neighbor to my own community, but was very different. I lived in Price Hill, on the west side of Cincinnati, just a few minutes’ drive from Three Rivers. But my urban neighborhood and this rural township were very different from each other.

 

This process also gave members of the community a chance to talk with each other and identify common strengths and beliefs. I had been warmly welcomed into a school district that was successful on the state report card, but that was losing a battle to keep some of their children in their own district.

 

Being so close to the urban core of Cincinnati meant that some families, especially Catholic families and those families that could afford it, sent their children to Catholic high schools like Elder and Seton.

 

I felt that one of my responsibilities was to build a school system that tempted more of those families to make the shorter drive to Taylor High School rather than the longer, and more expensive, trip to LaSalle. 

 

I knew that if we came together as a community to talk about our values, we could build a bridge. And I believed that if we set appropriately ambitious and inclusive goals, we could create an even stronger school district. One that met the needs of the entire community. 

 

So I started the process to identify our core values, as detailed over several following posts.

 

I remember taking Mr. Schiff on a tour of Oyler School in December of 2010.  We started with all the different services throughout the building that included; Mental Health, medical, college access, tutoring, parent center, vision center, social services, and I showed him the future plans for dental services.  I then took him through the high school, middle school, and elementary.  He was very engaging and interested in the concept of the Community Learning Center and with our partnership with Darlene Kamine.  Mr. Schiff had many questions about student achievement, social work, and other systems we have put in place to remove barriers for kids growing up in poverty. He asked all the right questions and I could tell right away that he wanted to be a part of the success at Oyler.  

We continued our tour of the school and talked in great detail about breaking the cycle of poverty. As we moved through the conversation and through the tour I could almost feel the question coming from him that I knew was going to change Oyler School forever. We went back to my office and within a few minutes the question came and I was READY! 

Mr. Schiff asked me if there was one thing that Oyler needed more than anything else to help continue with the great success what would it be? I started my answer before he even got all of his question out.  I looked him right in the eyes, and told him we needed to capture the students from Lower Price Hill when they are infants and develop them as toddlers, preschool, and then seamlessly transition them into Kindergarten.  In short, I told him we needed them inside this facility 3-4 years before they hit a Kindergarten seat and while they were here we needed them involved in top quality early learning activities as part of their development.    

Days after the tour, I was told that the Schiff Family would be donating funds to create the Robert and Adele Schiff Early Learning Center at Oyler School which would allow us to operate one of the most innovative early learning centers in the entire region.  Their impact has been tremendous and the partnership has been truly one of a kind. Children age 6 months to 4 years of age have access to top quality childcare giving them opportunities to prepare for Kindergarten. 

 

By Craig Hockenberry 

By Craig D. Hockenberry 

 

The early days of my career as a school leader in Cincinnati Public were filled with some extreme behaviors of students that pretty much took over my entire day and in many cases my evenings.  When I was principal at Oyler School in Lower Price Hill from the time we turned the lights on until the time we turned them off, most of the time we were handling behaviors that were totally out of our control.  We had situations that called for hours of physical restrain, attempted suicides, bizarre sexual behaviors, schizophrenia, and many others.  

As you can imagine we spent countless hours away from instruction trying to solve these behaviors and protecting other kids.  The amount of loss instructional times was overwhelming and it played a critical role in our early days of poor student performance, however after many sleepless nights we came up with a way to treat these mental health issues and became one of the first schools in the region to develop a mental health partnership that had a huge positive impact on our school.  

I was introduced to several people at St. Al’s Orphanage who has a 190 plus year history of working with students in the Cincinnati area.  The introduction quickly turned into a tour of Oyler and then almost immediately turned into them placing a mental health therapist inside our school.  His name was Bob Ryan and within weeks he had a FULL case load.  I remember him coming to me and saying, “Craig Hockenberry, we need another therapist and you are going to need additional office space”. 

The weeks that followed turned into St. Al’s putting yet another full time therapist inside our school.  The two of them worked together shared some office space, worked out a schedule, and were very flexible in supporting our mental health needs.  (CRAIG HOCKENBERRY)

 

After six months are caseloads at Oyler continue to grow and grow and within two years of our partnership with St. Al’s we had added four full time therapist. Before I left to become superintendent of Manchester Local in Adams County we had added a psychiatrist and a doctor 3 days a week.  We had many amazing partnerships at Oyler and St. Al’s was right up there as being one of the most impactful.  They had a very efficient way of dealing with mental health issues that our students were experiencing by using therapy, medical, and adjusting placements.