I Liked It So Much I Bought Two....

This is cross-posted, with permission, from the Center for Teaching Quality.  It provided much of the inspiration and ties directly to some of the aspects of the legislation passed in Iowa in the 2013 session.  Dave speaks more eloquently than I do, but this will impact ALL Iowa teachers in one way or another.  Take the time to look.

Posted by Dave Orphal on Thursday, 08/22/2013

Stop reading this post.  Stop right now.  Click on this link and buy yourself a copy ofTeacherpreneurs: Innovative Teachers Who Lead But Don’t Leave.  Come back when you're done.  The post will be right here waiting for you…

Cool!  Welcome back! 

If you are a teacher who wants to effect positive change in your school, district, or state; if you don’t want to leave your classroom and your kids to do this; if you’ve often thought, “There has to be a way to do both,” then this book might be the best thing you read this year. 

Clearly, I love this book, so let me tell you why I bought two copies.  First, I was impatient.  When I first heard about this book, I got so excited, that I pre-ordered a copy.  Then, I found out that the Kindle version was available several weeks before the hard copy would be released, so I bought that one and devoured it in only a few days, thinking about colleagues of mine who need to read this book.  When my pre-ordered copy arrived, I thought, “Sweet!  Loaner copy!”

I wish there had been a concept like “teacherpreneur” fifteen years ago as I was starting my career. 

I’ve been doing teacher leadership for over a decade: 

• Training student-teachers from the local university; 
• Heading our accreditation process or strategic planning;
• Serving as a union leader; and
• Influencing policy makers to pass school-reform legislation that would be good for kids.  

In every one of those incarnations of teacher-leadership, I have always been a full-time teacher, working 10-11 hour days.  I would engage in the leadership half of my role in the evenings and on weekends.  Equally exhausted and exhilarated, I would often wonder if there might not be a better way.  In Teacherpreneurs, the authors show us that teachers can be site, district, state, and even national leaders while keeping a foot firmly grounded in their classrooms and keeping their sanity. 

Perhaps the section I found most powerful were the chapters detailing the stories of several of the Center for Teaching Quality's teacherpreneurs.  Barnett and his team pull no punches and forgo any sugar coating.  They share frankly the successes, challenges, lessons, and barriers they’ve encountered over the past three years as they’ve designed and implemented this new classification of educator. 

The core idea of the book is one that the folks at the Center for Teaching Quality unveiled in their first book, Teaching 2030.  “Teacherpreneurs” are teacher leaders who have hybrid positions.  They work one full-time job, but within that one job, they are in front of a classroom full of students part time, then doing the leadership (or “-preneur”) aspect of their job part time. 

A teacherpreneur might include a high-school teacher who teaches in the morning, then writes, organizes, and delivers the districts professional development in the afternoons.  She might also be a middle-school teacher who teaches classes at the local university, training the next generation of teachers, before arriving at her school to teach 7^th graders in the afternoon.  He might also be an elementary school teacher who hands his class over to his partner-teacher on Wednesdays, so he can spend the rest of the week at the state capitol, advising law-makers on educational policy.

If one of these teacherpreneurs sounds like you, or if hearing about these possibilities, you imagine your dream teacher-leader role, then this book is for you.  When you read, if you are seriously interested in creating your dream role, don’t skip over the exercise and discussion sections that complete each chapter.  These sections can help you plan your way to your dream role. 

Shameless plug: There are discussion communities on CTQ’s Collaboratory and on Facebookthat are engaging in activities connected to the content at the end of each chapter.

Additionally, read the appendix.  Barnett and the team thoughtfully include examples of a teacherpreneur job description, a memorandum of understanding between a school district and an outside organization about how the two would share a teacherpreneur, and other valuable resources.

Teacher leaders, buy this book.   Heck, buy two like I did and have a loaner!  We shouldn’t have to choose between our classrooms and kids and the opportunities to share our expertise with our schools, districts, and states.  It’s time for a smarter, more sustainable concept of teacher leadership.  It’s time for teacherpreneurs.  

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The Bionic Student

Today was the first school day for my classes.  I teach a mix of 9-12 high school students, with one 9th grade class, and most of the others being upperclassmen.

We don't have a 1:1 initiative at my school, but four years ago, I swapped out books for a series of 16 laptops.  That's a great thing for partners, and I use them frequently, but my go-to tool today was a combination of that and the student smartphones and/or e-readers.  Kids can use whatever tool they feel comfortable with; a few kids grabbed laptops, but since more than 80% of the upperclassmen had smartphones, a lot of them just used those.  It's comfortable.  Some text, some talk, some use Swype.  It works for them.

photo credit: William Hook via photopin cc

Back in your brain, you might remember a TV show called The Six Million Dollar Man.    It was about a cyborg, also called a bionic man.   The show, while cheesy, has the tagline that fits this transition into technology.  Can you remember it?  Look further to see why it matters.


So what did we do in today's shortened classes?

1. Downloaded the Google Drive app to most phones.
2. Created documents on Google Drive via app or laptop.  Shared those documents with the teacher account.
3. Downloaded free planetarium software to the App page of Google Chrome (laptops) or smartphones.
4. Took pictures of information on the board.
5. Created a reminder of physics supplies needed for tomorrow's labs.

What will we do tomorrow?

• Tweet our Claim/Evidence/Reason regarding a physics lab.
• Receive instruction at a personalized pace from a class blog
• Look at different views of the sky from varying latitudes.
• Reflect in the shared documents we created yesterday (personal journaling and metacognition)
• Share real-time data.
• Fill out a getting-to-know-you form.
• Write a 140 character summary.
• Take a formative assessment.
• Access a flexbook.

That tagline, mentioned above:

"Steve Austin, astronaut. A man barely alive. Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world's first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before. Better, stronger, faster."
-Oscar Goldman

Sure, there will be days that we use only laptops, when we need to run a java simulation, but they are few and far between.   Because technology is no longer a nice add-on. It's a fundamental way of doing work that is worthy of the world.  That's why I've changed the tagline:

"OUR STUDENTS are the next dreamers and astronauts. Some come to school and feel they are barely alive. We can rebuild schools for her or him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world's best schools.  Better than they were before. Better, stronger, faster to acknowledge that students and their way of doing things matters."
-(apologies to) Oscar Goldman


THAT is what I want for my students, and that is the freedom I NEED from my administration and education as a whole.

A Broken Cog--Teacherpreneur Version

Today was a disappointing day.
I had floated a proposal earlier this summer regarding a solution that I felt was a win-win for a changing world.

• It was based on instructional coaching and content research.  
• I had worked with others in conversations.
• It was grounded in pedagogy.
• It was more economical than corporate solutions.

I thought it was sound.  So did others.  I poured my heart and soul into this vision, as I do into everything that I believe matters.

It was flushed at the last minute after months of work. And I was frustrated.

This is also a stage in being a teacherpreneur.  Because sometimes the chips don't fall your way when you speak up.

Sometimes, teachers are not recognized as an equal partner because they stayed in the classroom.  Teachers may have as much or more education as the other entity involved.  Perhaps they have more pedagogical expertise.  And yet, our educational system is just beginning to come out of a 'parent-knows-best' CEO model and move to collaboration leadership.

As we shift our ecosystem to 21st century thinkers, school boards, administrations, and teachers will have to become equal partners, and will need to make their case to a community of parents, students, and business owners.  That becomes transformation, and a shared vision.

photo credit: GuySie via photopin cc

It's only when we work together as a team that great things happen.   This was a reminder of a singular truth.

One cog, no matter how big, cannot make the entire system work together, but one cog that jams can bring the entire model to a halt.  

Not all my ventures are successful.  And that means that my personality has to be strong enough to deal with the reality of disappointments.  And tomorrow, after a night to revamp, I will try again, moving to a new opportunity.  Because that's what I do.  I believe in education and have the passion needed to help transform it.  That is my story, but it is also the story of teacherpreneurs across the country.