How to Decide Who Should Make Decisions with Lindsay Lyons Transformative Principal 432

Show Notes

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Lindsay Lyons is an educational justice coach who works with teachers and school leaders to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice, design curricula grounded in student voice, and build capacity for shared leadership. Lindsay taught in NYC public schools, holds a PhD in Leadership and Change, and is the founder of the educational blog and podcast, Time for Teachership.

• Students are not often involved
• Consistency
• 5 key tips
• Mindset - radical collegiality
• Representative leadership team
• Clear when we’re making decisions that are not appropriate for students/others
• Use stakeholder research - perception data
• Meet consistently.
• How to deal with transient students.
• Students presenting to leadership team.
• Dana Mitra’s student voice pyramid
• Why Jethro hates Activism.
• How to be a transformative principal? Take stock of your leadership and how you make decisions

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Creators & Guests

Host

A Jethro Jones

What is Transformative Principal?

Jethro Jones interviews instructional leaders from around the nation to learn and teach what it takes to become a transformative principal. Episodes address topics like Response to Intervention (RTI), Multi-Tiered System of Support (MTSS), Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS), the latest advances in educational research, standards-based grading, and interviews with industry leaders like Bill Daggett, Rick Wormeli, Todd Whitaker and even people outside the education like Seth Godin, JeVon McCormick, Liz Wiseman, and more.

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{[00:00:00]}
{Welcome to transformative principle where I help you stop putting out fires and start leading. I'm your host Jethro Jones. You can follow me on Twitter at Jethro Jones.}
{\pard\par}
{ One of the best pieces of feedback that I've gotten during the pandemic with the masterminds that I run is that principals are enjoying talking about instruction and not just talking about COVID rules and regulations. It's one of the great things that we get to do in the mastermind is focus on the things that really matter.}
{\pard\par}
{And sometimes we try to focus on other things on the distractions that take us away from our vision, }
{[00:01:00] }
{but we're always able to come, come back because our whole goal is to help us get our schools to where they need to be. So I would love to have you in there. And if you've been listening to the podcast for awhile, you've probably heard me talk about it before you probably have questions.}
{\pard\par}
{Just go to Jethro jones.com/mastermind. And let's set up a time to call to talk about it. That's Jethro jones.com/mastermind. And then click on schedule a call. I look forward to talking with you again. That's Jethro jones.com/mastermind.}
{\pard\par}
{ }
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:01:43] }
{to transformative principal. I am excited to have Lindsay lions on the program today. She is an educational justice coach who works with teachers and school leaders to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricular grounded in student voice and built capacity }
{[00:02:00] }
{for shared leadership.}
{\pard\par}
{Lindsay taught in New York city public schools holds a PhD in leadership and change. And as the founder of the educational blog and podcast time for teachership Lindsay. Welcome to transformative principal. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:02:12] }
{Thank you so much, Jethro. It's gonna be. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:02:15] }
{Yeah, it's good to have you here. Now, there are a bunch of things that we could talk about and today you and I are going to focus in on this student leadership by having shared voice.}
{\pard\par}
{And so this is a topic that I am personally really, really passionate about. And we often talk about this as though. We care what students think, but then it turns out that we still just make decisions that are best for us as adults in education. So that's a pretty bold claim, but what's your thought on that piece there, }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:02:42] }
{Oh, I absolutely agree. Absolutely. I think about so many times where I actually just today, even within a conversation via email, about strategic planning, right. we talk a lot about strategic planning and I've worked with turnaround schools in Massachusetts who have been slated for closure, you know, if they don't turn things around, right. }
{\cb3 often, when we look at }
{[00:03:00] }
{\cb3 how the plans are made to turn the school around very infrequently, are students involved or are families involved? And we say, you know, we're making decisions for the students or with the students in mind, but if they're never at the table, if we're never actually centering the students in their voices, literally, then we're not really making decisions in the best interest of the students.}
{\pard\par}
{\cb3 And often the decisions that get made and the plans that get made actually don't result in much change at all for the students. }
{}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:03:28] }
{Yeah, it seems that they often just end up being more of the same. And I know that we make decisions intentionally for. Schools that are better for us as the adults. Cause we're the ones who are doing everything. So what are some pieces of advice you have to help bring students into that conversation more often?}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:03:48] }
{Absolutely. So in my research, I identified in the student voice literature, some really successful schools that were doing this work on a consistent basis. And so I think consistency is actually a big thing. }
{[00:04:00] }
{If you bring them in once a year or, you know, at the end of the year, I think about. You know, We were talking before we started about adjuncting and adjuncts, you know, at college, we always, as students had to fill out that sheet at the end of the semester, how was my professor doing?}
{\pard\par}
{But then it's like, well, I'm not in the class anymore. So I don't get the benefit of whatever that teacher now learned from my feedback. So I think thinking about this in a regular way um, I would recommend, I think, five key tips that I have for really doing this regularly. One is to make sure that. When we're thinking about our mindset that we have, what Michael fielding calls, radical collegiality.}
{\pard\par}
{So really being able to see students as colleagues, seeing them as partners in the learning and valuing, you know, what they say, and taking in feedback as if I, as a teacher can learn as well. I think that's huge. And if we don't have that mindset, that really the other steps don't really matter. The next is a representative leadership team.}
{\pard\par}
{So if there's a way that you can form, I would say 15 members. }
{[00:05:00] }
{A leadership team that includes students and not just one token student, but, and, you know, an equal mix of students, teachers, even family members, if you're able to have them um, as well as teachers, that's key because often?}
{\pard\par}
{what we've found, even in the schools that have the one or two students, there are treated kind of as tokens.}
{\pard\par}
{And they, they feel silenced because they are in the minority. And so that's huge as well as other various identities. In addition to stakeholder identities, we can }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:05:26] }
{Well, let's, Let's pause there for just a second. Cause I think this is a really important piece that we talk about having. Prescripts sometimes and different, you know, stakeholder surveys and different things like that. And really bringing them in to the messy, difficult work that we do every day as school leaders is what you're really talking about.}
{\pard\par}
{So it's not enough to say. You know, We'll go ask these, these groups, these things, but to actually have them be part of the conversation. And I'll just share a quick story about how this was so successful. We had a girl who }
{[00:06:00] }
{was a really, I mean, she just had a lot of problems and she was just against everything that we did.}
{\pard\par}
{And until one day she said, you know, you guys should do something that is like a, a thing where kids can, I don't know, like they can choose their own thing and have time during the day where they get to do their own thing. And we were already planning on that, but she said it at the right time. And as soon as we implemented that, she went and told everybody over and over, this was my idea and they're doing it because I did it because I said that we should do it.}
{\pard\par}
{And it was something that we already had in the works. And she wasn't on a leadership team in particular, but the decisions we were making every day were affecting her. Personally, because she felt like they were holding her back. And so we gave our students the opportunity to do this and what was so cool was because she felt like she was part of the creation process.}
{\pard\par}
{She was that much more invested. And so not just having students on the stakeholder }
{[00:07:00] }
{groups, but really getting input from. The students who are the most challenging in your school, the ones who don't fit in, who don't do well, who just struggle with everything. There's a lot of power in doing that. And it really does help a lot and they become more invested than they would otherwise.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:07:18] }
{Oh, my gosh. I love that you said that because one of the things that we've found when we look at all the schools who are doing this work, I would still say a large percentages of them are folks who are students who are getting A's or students who are already the captain of the sports teams, or, you know, these students.}
{\pard\par}
{Really successful in school already. But when we take an adaptive leadership lens, they love adaptive leadership theory. Cause it, it really gets after those challenging problems. And so when we have an adaptive challenge, one that hasn't been solved for a really long time. What we need to do is find a solution in concert with all of the stakeholders.}
{\pard\par}
{And so it's not a clear path forward. It is messy. It is, requiring what we would call the quote unquote resistors to actually be part of the solution. Like }
{[00:08:00] }
{That's how we solve that stuff. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:08:01] }
{Yeah. And, And in another situation, I was over the student council for the whole district and the district student council. It was on the one hand really disappointing because they really had no opportunity to make any changes at all. And when they tried to, then the district leadership would say well, here's how you're allowed to participate.}
{\pard\par}
{And that's it. And it was very, very frustrating. But then the other piece was that these kids were so busy with their local school student councils, with their extracurricular activities, with their other things they were doing with being involved in music and dance and, and every other extracurricular you can imagine that they didn't ever have any time to actually do anything.}
{\pard\par}
{And so we couldn't ever count on them to be present for anything because they always had something. Else going on. And this is a really good point where it's easy to get asked. Those kids who are straight, a students who are involved in everything to be part of it, but they're not necessarily the ones who are going to have the time going to have the }
{[00:09:00] }
{opinions.}
{\pard\par}
{I personally, I think we choose them because they'll go along with pretty much whatever we say, because they've shown that they are good at following directions of adults. And to be honest, that's an easy way for us to get a lot of things taken care of that. We can just say, what do you guys think?}
{\pard\par}
{Good. All right. Let's go.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:09:19] }
{That's exactly what we've seen. And even in a school, I was a part of, as a teacher, we eventually got, a student representative on that board or that leadership structure. But like you were saying, it was, here's how you can participate and you actually have to leave one time. About important stuff basically.}
{\pard\par}
{And it was like, you can give us your 2 cents, you have 10 minutes to present to us. And we'll just kind of file that back, you know, in, in our notes or whatever. But then once we talk about real things, you know, the, the student has to go away. Like That felt very problematic to me. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:09:51] }
{Absolutely. Okay. So we got of the five tips. First we have mindset radical collegiality, the second, a representative leadership }
{[00:10:00] }
{team. What's the.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:10:01] }
{So the. third one is to really be clear at when we're making decisions. So actually that example. Gave about now, the student has to leave. Cause we're making really important decisions is a good one. I think for this, because there are some decisions that, you know, adults might need to make without students, it might involve sensitive student data.}
{\pard\par}
{It might be, you know, disciplinary, although it doesn't always have to be right. I think restorative justice and peer mediation programs are amazing. Student court are great to give voice, but there are some things, you know, that maybe even the leader without the team of teachers and other adults can make on their own.}
{\pard\par}
{But to be really clear, like these are the decisions that go just to the principal. These are the ones that are maybe adult specific. And these are the ones that the entire board or a leadership team gets involvement on. And even further another step. This is the time when we actually are going to have several feedback loops.}
{\pard\par}
{Like If we're figuring out a huge policy shift for. The upcoming semester, you know, we might say, this is something we want to send back as }
{[00:11:00] }
{representatives, take this back to your, your stakeholder groups. And then we're going to come back next week with revisions and discuss again. It might even go back again.}
{\pard\par}
{And so to really clarify, we're not doing that with every decision, but here's the decisions we do this for. And here are the decisions we make independently without those feedback loops would be number three. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:11:17] }
{Yeah. Yeah, I appreciate that. And less people think that kids should be involved in everything. I don't think either one of us are advocating for that. There are certain things that kids don't need to be involved in, but there are a lot of things, way more than we give credit to right now. That kids could add a voice to that has some meaning and is valuable.}
{\pard\par}
{So don't just shy away thinking, you know, oh, Jethro's talking about crazy stuff again. No uh, maybe a little, but uh, also we really need to bring kids in for the things that affect them and it makes a huge difference when we do that. All right. What's the fourth one. Go ahead.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:11:55] }
{Yeah, absolutely. And I was just going to say too, I think one of the things that is so frustrating is }
{[00:12:00] }
{when we say we're using teacher voice or, or student voice um, and then we just say that without the clarity of here's when we do that um, that can become frustrating too, because if you're just nominally in name, only if you're saying you have voice and then there's not clarity around like, oh, well I know that's a decision.}
{\pard\par}
{I can't be a part of because I know that's part of it. The clear rules and decision-making structures. I think that also helps get student buy-in and support for decisions when they are made by just the leader. So yeah, so number four, sorry. Number four would be to use stakeholder research to inform decisions.}
{\pard\par}
{And so by that, I mean like perception, data is data that I think is often overlooked. We often look at, quote unquote hard data or, you know, data of test scores or academic grades and. Data points are important. But also when we talk about, I often see or hear conversations where we're talking about student perceptions like, do students feel like they belong or do students feel like part of a community?}
{\pard\par}
{Do they feel like their voice is respected }
{[00:13:00] }
{or heard? Did they have opportunities to lead. And often we're just talking as a group of adult educators and there are no students in sight. So again, back to that idea of the turnaround schools or strategic planning teams, not having any students that data is a way, and I would still advocate that their students on those teams, but it is a way to include student voice.}
{\pard\par}
{Uh, Even if students can't be in the room at the time, because as you said, students are really busy and we can't always interrupt what they're doing to bring them in. And families have jobs that we can't always have them in the synchronous meeting, but }
{\cb4 this is a great way to have ongoing survey data.}
{\pard\par}
{\cb4 That's about the experience, the feeling, the safety, the belonging, the dignity that they have at school. I mean, I think it's often a, a source that gets overlooked when we're using, you know, data informed decisions. I think that's often a piece of data that should be included.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:13:49] }
{Yeah, I totally agree with you. And that, that experience piece having written the book on the school experience, school X, I think that that's, that's something where I have a lot to }
{[00:14:00] }
{say about that and I won't uh, I won't, I won't go into all of that here, but I just want to highlight the piece that you said about.}
{\pard\par}
{Their experience matters more than. Than what our policies are. Their experience matters more than what our practices are because our practices influence their experience. And it's important again, for us to have multiple views of that. And we can't only rely on just surveys because not everybody fills those out.}
{\pard\par}
{And even if they do that doesn't mean that they are. Accurate, but that doesn't mean that they are being honest in those surveys. That doesn't mean that they're actually putting in the effort to think through the questions that we're asking. So we need to also then take it a step further and experience what those kids are experiencing on a day to day basis.}
{\pard\par}
{And one of the things that I realized the first time I did a shadow, a student, which I've done many, many times was I realized how incredibly boring school was. And I was busy as the adult, as the principal. Man. }
{[00:15:00] }
{It was boring for the kids, especially for a bright kid who was just sitting through trying to like get through class and, you know, take 20 minutes for class to get organized.}
{\pard\par}
{And then you've got 15 minutes of lessons and then you start packing up to get ready to go to the next class. That was an eye-opener to see what, what those kids were experiencing. And I, if I wasn't shadowing a particular student, I wouldn't have been able to see that. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:15:23] }
{And I love that. I've actually shared that, that piece that I got from you about shadowing students with other leaders to say, you know, We should be doing. If we were speaking about the student experience, you know, of course we get student voice in here, but we also should know like viscerally what that experience is like.}
{\pard\par}
{And so to sit for six hours a day, we need to feel that and be like, whoa, that's nuts. That's what our students are going through. That's why their heads are on the desks. So absolutely. And then the fifth one just to go into that last piece is to meet consistently. So that's the last tip that I think I said this earlier, consistently making decisions with }
{[00:16:00] }
{students, but also what we've found in the research is that a lot of schools who do this, they actually change at the last minute, like the physical location or the time of day.}
{\pard\par}
{And oh, now it's during your English class. Can you come during class to this meeting as a student? Like That's a tough choice to make. And so just being really thoughtful about the times the locations. Also another piece to this consistency is when we think about the students, like you said, who are busy?}
{\pard\par}
{I think about a lot of my students who came from low-income families and had to work. I mean, As high schoolers had to work uh, to pay their rent for their families. And so if we're asking those students to give up time that they're getting paid at their job after school, can we find money? Budget, especially if we're paying teachers to stay after and be part of the leadership team, can we pay students as well and value their time?}
{\pard\par}
{Um, And I know budgets are difficult and challenging to maneuver, but that's something that where we've seen it, it's been really successful. And when the budget isn't there, other kind of work around schools have found are like, you know, }
{[00:17:00] }
{offering food and things like this. So at least you don't have to buy dinner tonight.}
{\pard\par}
{You can eat it here. Um, Those kinds. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:17:06] }
{Yeah. Uh, Changing the meeting location and, and all that kind of stuff like that just makes it more difficult for kids who don't communicate in the same way as the adults that they're with. So, you know, For me as a principal, if it's on my calendar, I know where it is and what it's doing, they update the calendar invite and it's fine.}
{\pard\par}
{I mean, To schedule this year, I sent you the link and then you signed up and then we were, we showed up here and we knew how to navigate that. That's not necessarily the case for kids. And certainly if we haven't taught them that, that's what we expect, then it wouldn't really work out. So, you know, I think that these, these five tips are really important.}
{\pard\par}
{I appreciate you sharing them here today. }
{\pard\par}
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{[00:18:00] }
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{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:18:55] }
{I think the other thing that we need to recognize is that. I mentioned it before, but we're not }
{[00:19:00] }
{going extreme saying every single decision, every single kid, certainly not that we need to have their voice as part of what we're doing and start there and whatever you can do this week to start, I think is totally appropriate.}
{\pard\par}
{And that's a good step in the right direction, but you've got to recognize that it. It's these kids who make up everything that we do at school. And so we need to know what what's working and what's not. So there are some challenges, of course. Um, One of those challenges is that Our students cycle through our schools.}
{\pard\par}
{And to be honest uh, I'll refute this first part myself, but, you know, kids cycle through. And so they may not be there that long, but that happens with teachers and principals as well. So, you know, Most teachers don't stay in the building forever and most principals don't stay at a building forever, but as kids cycle through and, and.}
{\pard\par}
{So that's one piece. So address that piece first, how do we, how do we manage that? When you know kids aren't going to be there for as long as adults think they're going to be }
{[00:20:00] }
{there.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:20:00] }
{Yeah, absolutely. So I think another piece of this too, is one of the schools I worked at was a school for students brand new to the country, new to the language. Um, And they would come in at any, any given point. So some of them are only there for a year. Some of them had to actually transfer back. Um, At home to their native countries.}
{\pard\par}
{And so this happened a lot in the last school I worked in as the teacher. And I think one of the things that I think about, particularly with that teacher piece too, like you said they're, they're leaving sometimes as well. I think if the student has any say in, because sometimes the transfer is because the student doesn't feel that experience in that school is not for them.}
{\pard\par}
{And they actually want to go to a different school at teachers. The same. I think this process of shared leadership actually gets to you. Stay longer because there is investment in they're feeling like they're heard and they're valued. And so if there is an issue of, you know, I don't feel comfortable here that kind of helps with that.}
{\pard\par}
{Um, But around the piece of. Of just having transient students. What I see this as is a student }
{[00:21:00] }
{leadership training opportunity. And so giving students who we often say will be leaders out in the world someday, but they're also leaders during the time that they're with us. And, you know, they're humans, they're capable of leading.}
{\pard\par}
{They lead in their own ways every day in their peer groups. It's an opportunity for them to really lead and to have real life experience. And so even if we don't see it. Uh, An investment in our school, which I would argue it is for every student who gets that opportunity. It's certainly an investment in that student's life.}
{\pard\par}
{And like you said, that's why we're here, right? We're, We're creating amazing student leaders who are going to lead throughout the rest of their life. And hopefully we give them enough experiences where they can do that. And on the level of like, where do we train them? Or how do we train them? I've seen.}
{\pard\par}
{Cool uh, school setups where they take maybe an English course or a social studies course, and they embed the leadership training in that course. And so it's actually part of that curriculum as well. So there's some really neat stuff you can do with there.}
{\pard\par}
{to to have it be credit bearing and its }
{[00:22:00] }
{own its own.}
{\pard\par}
{Right.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:22:01] }
{So that leadership experience that they can gain through a training or a curriculum is all well and good. And the reality is, is that no leadership training is as good as actual leadership experience. And so giving them the opportunity, even if you don't know what you're doing, even if the kids don't know what they're doing, just starting somewhere is going to be more effective than not.}
{\pard\par}
{And I would say the biggest thing with that is that if you do start the questions that you ask. You have to respond to them. You can't just say, Hey, what would make our school better? Well, One thing that would make our school better is five extra minutes for lunch. And you're like, no way, we're not going to do that.}
{\pard\par}
{So gee, you just gotta think about whether. If you're going to ask the question, you gotta be able to follow through on a response if they give it. And if you can't, then you gotta, figure that out and nurture that. So what would be your response to that? If, how did, how do principals start if they want to start involving student voice, but they just don't know what kind of questions they're willing to }
{[00:23:00] }
{say yes.}
{\pard\par}
{To when the kids have. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:23:01] }
{Oh, that's such a good question. So I think for one we often underestimate or I've definitely historically have underestimated my students and their capacities. So I. So I know that that's, that's a different league, but I also have seen many studies of schools as young as kindergarten, where kindergarteners were like designing their learning space and making informed choices about like, this is why this needs to be here.}
{\pard\par}
{And this is, should be our schedule and alignment with this, you know, our energy or like really inspiring things that they have done at a really young age. And so what I would say is, Let me tell a story, perhaps uh, when I was teaching a literacy course, I decided it was kind of going to be a literacy justice and leadership course.}
{\pard\par}
{And so I use one of my units as an activism unit where they would actually make change within the school. And So many students actually came up with this is how we would do next year schedule. And this is how I propose swapping, you know, }
{[00:24:00] }
{the, the ways that we schedule students or program students. And I was able to meet with them before they actually presented to the leadership team.}
{\pard\par}
{And the conversations I had with them were really powerful because I would be perfectly transparent and say, here's why they're going to say that this won't work. Here's the challenge behind this. We have these five students who don't fit this and, and these are the um, minute requirements. Credit bearing classes, you have to meet this.}
{\pard\par}
{And, And they went ahead and did all of the math and we're like, yep. Okay. Now we have a solution when they say this, you know, and the level of preparedness that I think that sometimes we don't realize we can push them so much in give them so much detail and say here's, here's where I'm stuck. Here's why, exactly why I can't say yes to that plan.}
{\pard\par}
{Uh, They either want. We'll understand it. I've seen them just be like, okay, that makes total sense. Let me pivot and give a different solution. And they will be solution generators in that vein, but then they also will do the work. If they're passionate, if }
{[00:25:00] }
{they're firm believers in their plan, they're able to comprehend complex things and think outside the box, because I think our deficit in that is.}
{\pard\par}
{We have been in the box for so long. This is then the way that we do school and this is the way that we see things and they help us kind of step out of that a little bit. So I would give them a lot of the information that you might be holding back because you think it's, you know, a little overwhelming um, and see what they can do with that.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:25:23] }
{So you're, you're making me think about something here. One of the words that I really hate is the word activism. And you helped me understand why. So, What I don't like about activism is that it sounds like you have to do things our way and it takes away the collaboration. And what I heard you explain though, was.}
{\pard\par}
{That you were collaborating with the students and you were helping them see how to overcome the objections that other people would have. And this is, I mean, I'm just, I'm bearing it all out here. So this is one of my problems }
{[00:26:00] }
{with any kind of thing that labels itself as activism is that it's about.}
{\pard\par}
{It's just as bad as the other way, which is the school leadership, doing whatever they want and not involving the kids and activism feels like it is the kids or whatever other group could be. A group of teachers could be whatever they're saying. I want you to do things just how I want, because my way is the right way.}
{\pard\par}
{And that's where, that's where I have a problem. So I appreciate you helping me. Helping me see that I've had, I've had a problem with that for years, even as a student myself. And when I would try to think change things at my, at my college and it uh, and before that as a high school student I hated that word activism because it, I didn't like it.}
{\pard\par}
{So, And I never could articulate why, but always just like bugged me any response to that.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:26:52] }
{Yeah. you're making me think of uh, Dana, Metro, student voice pyramid. So it starts with. Basic level student voices surveys. So we }
{[00:27:00] }
{listened to them and then we do nothing with it kind of is what you were saying alluding to earlier, right? Like we have to do something. We can't just hear their response and then leave it at that.}
{\pard\par}
{Uh, So there's the survey. The next level is youth adult partnership. And so that I think is where the magic happens often is we're coming together. We're collaborating on this. Um, And then the next level is student leadership. And I see from a leadership scholar perspective, I see leadership as.}
{\pard\par}
{Necessarily being collaborative. So I don't see the leadership being students dominating or to that point, the activism, like one person telling the other people what to do. I'm actually in my classmate, gender, race and society class at Merrimack college that I'm teaching right now as an adjunct, we just finished a unit where we evaluated activism.}
{\pard\par}
{Uh, Individuals that were activists uh, also community activist groups and organizations, as well as movements in general. And the whole point was one is their intersectionality. Do they, you know, fight for all identities, not just like one }
{[00:28:00] }
{identity. Um, And so are they inclusive in that regard, but also how do they lead?}
{\pard\par}
{Do they lead with shared leadership? Are they collective? Are they collaborative? And if they're not like, are they, are they really successful, right? Are they really actually giving power to people which is often what activists claim to be doing? Or are they just perpetuating kind of the same model of leadership that caused the problem in the first place?}
{\pard\par}
{And so I think that's really powerful that you, you shared that resistance and that that's where it was coming from.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:28:27] }
{Yeah. So so I have in Russia, I used to live there and I talked to a lot of people and researched a lot about how, you know, communism came to be and how it fell. And there a consistency between the SARS. The communist leadership and the oligarchs who ruled today in Russia. And, you know, we could go have a whole conversation about this, but the simple, short way to say that is that all three of those groups with virtually no exceptions }
{[00:29:00] }
{wanted.}
{\pard\par}
{And wanted authority and wanted all the money and that's exactly what they got. So they put on this idea that, communism, for example, that this is all for the people and, it wasn't. So, I mean, That's just not what happened. And what happened was a few people became very powerful and they also became very wealthy.}
{\pard\par}
{The wealth was different because. They had all the money in the world, but what people told me about communism was we had all the money in the world, but we didn't have anything to buy. And then capitalism came after communism fell and they had all the things in the world that they could buy because trade was opened up, but they never had any money.}
{\pard\par}
{And this is where I really. What, What I'm trying to do. And the path that I'm trying to carve for myself is how do we help kids be involved and care enough about their own education that they're actually leading the charge on their own education, because that's what it really comes down to there, regardless of what we say or think about anything.}
{\pard\par}
{[00:30:00] }
{Each individual is responsible for his or her own education. Nobody else can be responsible for someone else's education. That is a personal thing that you have to figure out for yourself and, and tell kids can start recognizing that and be in charge of their own education. And what I mean by that is that.}
{\pard\par}
{They are fighting for what they need to learn and not just taking whatever a teacher happens to give them. That's where this piece comes in. And that's what I'm trying to, trying to figure out. anyway that's my thoughts. I'm still processing through. So listeners, you know, sometimes I think about things on the show and you know, I don't have an answer yet, but this is, this is what I'm currently processing through.}
{\pard\par}
{Any thoughts on that? Lindsay?}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:30:41] }
{Yeah there's, there's so much in there that this is really powerful stuff, I think. And one of the things that I would say, one of the things that I've done anyways and had some success with is bringing in that activism piece. And again, activism within like the collaborative solution generating uh, voice fostering.}
{\pard\par}
{[00:31:00] }
{Um, Is to be a spark. I see myself as a teacher, my role being a spark for that passion for education. By the time I think, teaching high school goes both ways. One, you have students who have are older, have more life experience are really excited to take on that leadership role in some ways.}
{\pard\par}
{And in other ways, they've been in the system for so long and that system exists. This very traditional way and in many schools and to break them out of that is actually more challenging than a kindergartner who comes in with all this creative energy. Right. And so it's interesting. Part of me is to kind of, part of my role is to reignite that spark and that passion for learning.}
{\pard\par}
{And so one of the ways I do that is to create projects that have real life impact. And so if we're studying a current event that's of interest to them, something that's happening in the world, then I can create a project for them. You know, Open up opportunities for them to create projects that actually make a difference in whatever that issue is that we're studying and has an authentic audience beyond just I'm }
{[00:32:00] }
{submitting this to get a grade.}
{\pard\par}
{And typically that has generated a lot more energy in my students and a lot more passion. And I would say even advocacy kind of what you were describing to me sounded like self-advocacy. Uh, For their education. Then if I were to follow a traditional curriculum that teaches them something that they may or may not be passionate about, but if I'm learning what they're passionate about and, and infusing that regularly in the lessons, I'm seeing a much greater spark and that advocacy feels like it follows pretty naturally afterwards.}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:32:27] }
{Yeah, I I've definitely seen the same thing for sure with me. And I don't know if I made the point, but I think the point that I was trying to get to was that if activists then do the exact same bad things that the people they're activating against Were doing before then? How is it any different?}
{\pard\par}
{We're not creating any kind of a different system. And that's why I brought up the Russia thing, but I don't think I ever finished it yet. So, So I appreciate you sharing that about being the spark. I think that that's really important and to, to help kids see that. }
{[00:33:00] }
{All right. Well, This has been just a fascinating conversation.}
{\pard\par}
{It's caused me to think about a lot of things and I appreciate you being here, Lindsay, as my final question, what is one thing that a principal can do this week to be a transformative leader?}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:33:12] }
{I would say to really take stock of it, you make decisions and who is on your leadership team. So }
{\cb5 I actually have a workshop. I don't know if I should share that link with anyone, but um, that's that li bit dot L Y slash shared leadership. It's all lowercase, a bit dot Lee slash the shared leadership worksheet.}
{\pard\par}
{\cb5 And that goes through several questions that you can just ask yourself and think through, you know, what am I doing around shared leadership practices? How can I get more student voice and student leadership in my school, making school decision making practices. And I think that's something that if you just take five minutes of your day, sit down and think about those questions.}
{\pard\par}
{\cb5 You will have a lot of things that become clear and a lot of pathways to move forward that become inevitable. }
{}
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:33:56] }
{Yeah, that's very good. To that in the show [e-mail] slash }
{[00:34:00] }
{podcast, that's B, B I T dot L Y slash shared leadership worksheet. Is that right? }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:34:05] }
{Yep. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf1 Jethro Jones: \b0}
{[00:34:06] }
{Okay. Yep. So I got that in the show notes and Lindsay, thanks so much. I wanna remind her buddy uh, you can connect with uh, Lindsay at uh, Lindsay Beth lions.com.}
{\pard\par}
{And she has a blog there and a podcast called time for teachership make sure you check that out and again, thank you Lindsay, for being part of transformative principle today. }
{\pard\par}
{\b\cf2 Lindsay Lyons: \b0}
{[00:34:24] }
{Thank you so much for having me Jethro.}
{\pard\par}
{ }
{\pard\par}
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{\pard\par}
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{[00:35:00] }
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}