Tag Archives: relationships in schools

Why Do They Leave?

In the rain shadow of the Washington State’s Olympic Mountains, nestled below rugged peaks and ridges, and adjacent to the Straits of Juan de Fuca, sits the small city of Sequim. Continue reading

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At Risk Students: Stress and the Legacy of Poverty

Summary: While the parent/child cocoon is the seat of cognitive growth according to attachment theory, disruption to that relationship within the stresses of poverty can also mean low income students’ frontal cortex does not develop optimally, which becomes a liability … Continue reading

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School Reform and the Demise of the Bureaucrat

Summary: The transformation of Foster High School into a functioning academy for a largely immigrant multicultural population, with improved graduation rates, strong math scores, and a peaceful campus is a study in how communication and respect can melt away the … Continue reading

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At Risk Youth: The Teacher’s the Thing by Which to Catch the Student Being

Summary: Meta-studies of psychotherapeutic outcomes, transposed onto relationships between teacher and student, suggest a preponderance of any change in an at risk kid’s academics stems directly from a positive relationship with a teacher. You know the kid. He sits near … Continue reading

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School Reform, Politics, and Culture: Can We Performance Base Ourselves to the Promised Land?

Summary: Enshrining performance and research based thinking deeply into school reform, and investing accordingly, will invite best practices, promote better life success for students, and in the long run restrict the body of poor outcomes – incarceration, chronic poverty, etc. … Continue reading

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School Culture: The “Disagreeable Giver” and the Culture of Continuous Improvement

Summary: Can evidence of successful leadership style in the corporate world be transplanted to schools and kick start a culture of continuous improvement? Do nice guys and gals finish last and ultimately assholes prevail in the race to the mantle … Continue reading

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School Suspension Reform and the Real School

Summary: As any reform, change in suspension practices will need to be founded upon staff cohesion and communication, a clearly thought out plan that includes both the mentoring of students and accountability for their actions, and sufficient adult people power … Continue reading

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School Reform: Race and Class and Suspension

Summary: Suspension from school for misbehavior has long contributed to chronic school failure particularly for African American and low income students. Alternatives to suspension are cropping up in various locales, many of which seem to intervene with more intensive and … Continue reading

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At Risk Kids: In-School Suspension Re-Imagined

Summary: With calls to find alternatives to exclusion of disciplined students from school, in-school suspension might serve as a vehicle through which adult staff and mentors can work with suspended students in a constructive fashion. In my mind’s eye I … Continue reading

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At Risk Kids: Keeping Them in the Game

Summary: Building of relationships with at risk kids and seeing their misbehavior as an expression of difficulties in their history can short circuit suspension and retain them as part of the school community. This people intensive approach requires deepened funding. … Continue reading

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