Springfield teachers, staff asked to 'share truths' with superintendent, suggest changes

Four months ago, Superintendent Grenita Lathan launched a process to revolutionize how she seeks input from and collaborates with teachers, support staff and school leaders.

Her focus with the new "Superintendent Solutions Outcomes" framework was to identify and work on critical needs impacting students and seek strategies for improving existing structures and practices.

At the school board retreat Tuesday, Lathan provided her first update and invited participating teachers to also give their impressions. Their work has been focused in four areas: curriculum and assessment; special education; student behavior; and teacher professional learning.

In all, 131 employees of Springfield Public Schools have been involved. They included early childhood, elementary, middle and high school teachers plus staff involved in special education, choice programs, the related arts, gifted education, alternative schools and virtual learning.

"What I wanted to hear from our teachers and our administrators is what was working, what do we needed to slow down on and maybe what we needed to stop," Lathan said.

In putting out the call for participants, Lathan said she asked building leaders to recommend teachers "who don't always agree" with school principals.

"Those are the people who will tell you truthfully how things are," she said.

Jennifer Givens, who teaches a split classroom with grades 3-4 at Delaware Elementary, said she appreciated being asked to participate and to hear from teachers and staff in other buildings.

"It kind of warms your teacher's heart when other teachers are saying and thinking some of the same things. Some of the same things are working and some of the same things aren't," Givens told the board. "And then we got up as a whole group and we rotated around the room, recording that information on big chart paper."

In her remarks, Givens said that after going through that exercise as a group, she expected the meeting to end. "But Dr. Lathan took those big chart papers and slapped them up on the wall and she said 'OK, give it to me. What do these things mean? What is really working?"

She said teachers responded for "probably longer than she would have hoped" but it was cathartic.

Givens, who has been working in the district for 21 years, said teachers and staff were asked to identify "quick wins" as well as changes that may take longer.

"I left there just being very grateful that she listened to us that day," she said.

Givens added: "It was just nice to be able to share what works, to be able to speak honestly about what doesn't sometimes."

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'Trusted as a professional in my classroom'

Clarissa Pohlman, a Spanish teacher at Pershing Middle School, has been in the district for 14 years.

The first meeting she attended was at the Kraft Administration Center and she said walking in and seeing familiar faces put her at ease. She described it was a "welcoming and friendly atmosphere" and that made it easier to open up.

She said it quickly became apparent that teachers and school leaders had similar hurdles during the school year.

"This immediately bridged a gap in my head that I often feel exists between administration and teaching staff. And we rarely have the opportunity in the hustle and bustle of everyday school life to recognize that we're all facing the same challenges," she said. "There is just not enough time to talk about it all."

Pohlman said it made her feel like "maybe we aren't alone." She was also able to ask principals to clarify certain expectations of teachers that did not make sense.

She and others raised concerns with the district common assessment, or DCA. "I hope changes can happen to better serve students," she said.

In the meetings, Pohlman said the emphasis was on finding solutions and not "complaining."

"It's easy to get caught up in the negative in any profession. I am guilty of it myself," she said. "We were not posting complaints into thin air, as we often do with online surveys, but we shared truths about what we live out daily in our classrooms. Being asked to give our input made me feel trusted as a professional in my classroom and my subject."

She added: "Teaching can sometimes feel isolating but being part of this process and understanding the why behind initiatives feels really key to staff buy-in."

Pohlman said teachers know what is best for their students and classrooms and their voices "need to be some of the loudest."

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Finding 'quick wins' in key areas

Though the discussions were in-depth, Lathan said one goal was to find some "quick wins" — changes that could be accomplished in a short period of time and at little or no expense — in each of the four focus areas.

"One of the things we heard from teachers is immediately the first day of school, you're expecting us to jump into curriculum and start teaching and we need to be teaching those routines around academic expectations and behaviors," Lathan said, citing an example. "And so we've built that into our curriculum guides for the upcoming school year."

Teachers and staff told the district they want to modify the length and number of required tests and get the results back faster so the data can be helpful.

In the area of special education, feedback led to a call for more training for teachers and paraprofessionals. "There has been a continuous disconnect and it has been for years ... of understanding special education," she said.

Lathan said classroom and general education teachers need to know the specifics of how special education works, including the requirements and the laws.

She said next year "Special Ed 101" will be available for school staff. She said board members will also be invited to participate. "We need to spend some time making sure you also have that information."

The "quick wins" available in student behavior include ongoing staff training regarding the use of the "Focus Room," a space in each school to support and calm upset students so they can return to learning. Part of that is encouraging staff from other schools to visit a Focus Room that is showing success.

Lathan said teachers wanted a "lesson bank" for the Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports, or PBIS, framework widely implemented this school year.

She said they also requested "money for incentives" and focus room supports.

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In the area of professional learning, teachers asked for more choice, a menu of options spread out over the school year. She said the training needs to be different for veteran and new staff.

"Not a one-size-fits-all is what we heard," she said.

At the end, Lathan asked school board members to say which of the four focus areas was of the highest interest.

"You are going to work with me collaboratively throughout the course of the next year on that particular area that you are assigned to," she told the board. "We will get together, we'll talk about that, you will be part of those presentations moving forward for your assigned area."

Here is the area each board member picked:

• Curriculum and assessment: Steve Makoski, Shurita Thomas-Tate

• Special education: Susan Provance

• Student behavior: Kelly Byrne, Maryam Mohammadkhani

• Teacher professional learning: Danielle Kincaid, Judy Brunner

This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Springfield teachers 'share truths' about what works in classrooms