Imagine for for a moment that you could hook an EKG up to your school and measure the heartbeat. What would the graph tell you? How can the board know that the school truly is viable moving forward?

I believe schools can be designed
I believe schools can be designed to achieve dreams
I believe schools can be designed to inspire dreams
I believe schools can be designed to inspire hope

(Continued from yesterday's post)

The school board meeting is the primary forum for this vital group to perform its duties. This is their place to function and grow the school by providing the leadership required to do great things.

Motivated and effective boards are not the result of low expectations

Does your school board set high expectations? Or do you tend to have a soft sell: “Please come in and be on our board. We need you and it won’t be that hard--we just really need you on the board?”

Setting meaningful annual goals is one of the Habits of a Sustaining Board. Such goals might include signing the conflict of interest statement, giving to the annual fund, and/or attending a high percentage of board meetings. When it comes to setting school board goals, though, is there one goal that seems to exceed all others when it comes to shaping board behavior and results? Actually, there is one ultimate goal that captures the value of most other options.

(Continued from Yesterday's Post)

Peer Review Process

So what’s the process to assess board culture for continuous improvement? The frequent peer review is highly recommended because of value of the data and the ability to promote conversation about these important traits for effective leadership. We recommend conducting the peer survey every few weeks focusing on one of the seven traits that most contribute to a healthy culture.

High performing schools consistently have high performing boards.

The Sustaining Board understands that culture always trumps structure. Much of the discussion around boards is about committees, officers, the chain of command, etc. Those elements are important and should be wisely structured. You can have great structure with lousy culture, however, which will have a long-term negative impact on the institution.

In a blended learning classroom teacher quality is still the number one strategy to improve student growth. This week I shared a post regarding blended learning and implementation strategies, and included our finding that age is not a reliable predictor of success in such a technology-enabled classroom.

"Blended learning is your destiny, Luke!"

Sounds like the kind of quote you'd hear in a movie called, "School Wars," doesn't it?