Final EDLD 5301 Reflections

Throughout this course, I have been privileged to attend the Rigor, Relevance and Relationships Leadership Conference, assist with staff development for opening day and facilitate a district content curriculum staff development session. I feel like opportunities for leadership are surrounding and propelling the action research wheels into full spin. This last week I was also blessed to attend the district teacher leader/department chair in-service day titled “Growing Leaders.” Each of these new challenges and tasks has placed action research at the front of my future educational goals. For once, I feel motivated, inspired and ready to be the best teacher leader and future administrator I can be. I have a vision of taking my professional career into the next level and I most certainly can attest Education Leadership 5301 has been a positive reinforcement.
First, the interviews with various administrators have been very insightful and helpful. I feel like I learn most from building relationships with people. Meeting other administrators and learning from their leadership ups and downs has been very beneficial. I also feel like interviewing my own campus administrators gives me a chance to talk candidly with how to apply my own solutions to current campus issues and concerns. It is important for administrators to know teachers are ready to address campus problems, especially being willing to work for a positive solution.
Additionally in this course, I feel like the discussion board topics were very relevant. I appreciate our class’s commitment to openly share ideas and comments. I learned from many of my colleagues that they, too, share the same campus concerns for at-risk students. I am thankful to know that despite our geographic location, we all share similar obstacles and challenges.
The resources and tools for this course also seemed very on point and useful. The reflection and blogging is a real world example of how rapid technology and communication are transforming education. Using these tools in this course gives professional educators a chance to explore, enhance, and encourage technology throughout action research as well as incorporating another tool in our teacher tool belt.
In my most recent in-service day an assignment was given to prepare a leadership philosophy. This seemed very pertinent and appropriate, but also necessary. I plan to use leadership to seek potential in others, inspire and motivate the unmotivated, and plant a seed for optimism in the hopeless. Barack Obama said this about leadership; “I shall lead from the back, so that others may rise to their full potential in front of me.” I believe bringing the best out of others proves a great leader has made their mark. Leading is a selfless act engaging determination, passion and support.