By Cathy Gassenheimer

Imagine educators having the opportunity to spend an entire day working with colleagues to discuss and clearly identify what effective teaching “looks like.” “Wait a minute,” I can almost hear you say, “Don’t educators already have a clear image of effective teaching?”

Apparently not, according to Tony Wagner and his colleagues at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education.

“Achieving a shared vision of what is good instruction is much more difficult than most people imagine,” contends Wagner Read More...

By Cathy Gassenheimer

What if every school in every district in Alabama were a true learning organization? What if every adult in the building were a life-long learner, who collaborated with colleagues to ensure that every day every student was engaged in quality work that was rigorous and relevant … and that required them to do most of the work themselves?

What would that look like?

Well, that’s the question we asked of members of our Superintendents Leaders Network a few weeks ago ...

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By Sallie Owen Gowan

When education consultant Jackie A. Walsh, Ph.D, isn’t driving the work of the Alabama Governor’s Commission on Quality Teaching or delivering professional development for the Alabama Best Practices Center, she writes about effective questioning. Her latest effort is “Leading Through Quality Questioning” from Corwin Press, which Jackie co-authored with Beth D. Sattes.

“Questions are more transformative than answers,” according to author and community engagement evangelist Peter Block. With that in mind, Jackie and Beth have put together a practical, nuts-and-bolts book that explains not only why school leaders should work this way – but also how to do it.

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By John Norton

(We are delighted to welcome John Norton, the former vice president for communications at the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), to our new website and blog.)

A series of stories about districtwide accountability and reform in the magazine of the American Association of School Administrators has me thinking about the leadership of Roy Nichols in Mobile County.

The February issue of “School Administrator” features a cover article by Harvard professor Robert Kaplan, who co-created a progress-monitoring tool for business called “The Balanced Scorecard” and has since helped adapt it for school districts. In the story, Kaplan and co-author Dylan Miyake describe how the Atlanta Public Schools system has used the tool to drive many positive improvements in the past decade.

Over at the Public School Insights blog, Claus von Zastrow hailed the scorecard as an example of educators learning the right lessons from business. Claus also highlighted Atlanta’s progress using the Balanced Scorecard, but he could have looked to an Alabama example ...
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By Cathy Gassenheimer

Many educators dream of a school environment where the curriculum is driven by projects and problem-based activities that challenge all students to learn more deeply and apply what they learn to the real world.

Some educators believe this kind of schooling simply isn’t possible in today’s high-stakes accountability environment. Winterboro School in rural Talladega County is out to prove them wrong.

Winterboro serves students in grades 5-12, about 85 percent of whom are on free or reduced lunch. As far as state testing benchmarks, the school has consistently met those, but it didn't take a fortune teller to see problems lying ahead... Read More...

You told us that you wanted a user-friendly, “one-stop shopping” website, and today we are launching our best effort to meet your needs. Highlights include:

• Easy online registration, right from the homepage
• What We’re Reading tool lists resources ...

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