We are bombarded daily with the clear reality that the demands of modern students and parents are shifting. The value of what people want for the money they spend has exponentially increased in recent years. If people are going to spend money, they want to know exactly what they are getting out of it.
For some, paying for their children to attend school where the Catholic faith is woven throughout the day is good enough. Clearly, based on what we have seen across the country, the number of people willing to do that is shrinking. So what more can we offer?
Safe environment? Certainly one would think that is a cornerstone of our Catholic schools, yet we know that kids are kids and that no school is immune to the developmental phases kids move through and the trouble that can arise out of growing up.
Quality and personal communication? One would think that because our schools are smaller than our public counterparts and our larger private counterparts that this would be one of our greatest assets. It seems to be so, but are parents going to pay money simply to really know how they're child is doing in a more efficient and personalized manner? The fact is that public schools are being held to a high standard for communication and it costs nothing but tax dollars. It seems to me that people choosing to pay for school expect a higher level of communication from their child's school and, quite frankly, they deserve it.
So where does academics fall into this list of high expectations? Sometimes I feel that because a student shows up at our school we assume they are somehow different than other kids and will automatically work hard and engage. That just because the parents want the child to attend a quality institution, the child will automatically follow suit. Now, that probably is the case with most students, but, why then, are we losing students - across the country - as Catholic institutions? Why are some of our schools flourishing and others struggling? Why does our student population contain a growing number of non-Catholics?
All of this is meant as a discussion initiator. We are, as Father Thompson put it at the beginning of the school year, at a point of change in our system of education - both as Catholic institutions and in the broad spectrum of education. We must change how we are engaging students and reach out to our communities to let them know that we hear their voices. We must raise the bar for our instructional practices and do everything in our power to support our teachers through this transitional period while providing an education parents are willing to spend money for.
Professional development has never been so important, in my mind, as it is now. By investing time and resources into the professional growth opportunities of our teachers and school leaders, we can better meet the needs of our changing population of students and their families and the changing landscape of education.
Please post your thoughts and comments online! Constructive criticism and the facilitation of healthy dialogue are the intentions of this blog. Sharing our thoughts and ideas in a professional forum can generate the effective questions that will propel us forward as we strive to provide the highest quality education for students here in Hawaii!
The contents of this blog are intended to inform, invite and facilitate dialogue among educators, parents and students. The views contained in this blog are those of the blogger. Patrick J. Foehr is an Education Consultant working with Hawaii Catholic Schools.
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Thursday, November 8, 2012
A good time to stop and reflect
Just wondering who else is feeling that sense of wonder when glancing at the calendar at seeing that we are into November already? Where did the time go? Didn't we just start school?
Thanksgiving and Christmas are on top of us and we still have so much to accomplish! If anyone else is feeling like this, please respond in the blog and share how you are coping. All of us can benefit from each others' experiences!
We are entering this season of thanks and gratitude. As we do, continual reminders of the challenges facing our Hawaii Catholic Schools network, become even more visible as the pressure mounts during the competitive Hawaii private school recruiting season. Open houses are beginning to pop-up and we want to make sure we highlight all the best points that a Catholic education in Hawaii has to offer. Each of us in our network of Hawaii Catholic Schools can reflect and identify how we are going to contribute to recruiting more students and families to our Catholic ohana of schools. Whether it is through actively speaking with people in the community or raising the instructional bar in our school/classroom/system, there are myriad of ways that we each may contribute. Perhaps if we view our recruitment opportunities as ongoing for the year then maybe we can stem the tide begin attracting students back to the product we offer: Quality instruction, respectful and safe learning environment, extracurricular activities such as foreign language, athletics, computer instruction, etc, and of course, Catholic faith doctrine.
Please know that I am not saying this is an easy challenge we face! Everyone I have met in our network of schools is working hard. Making sure we are actively involved in changing up the pattern, either individually or collectively, as part of the network of Hawaii Catholic Schools, is all that anyone can ask. To look in the mirror at the end of the day and know we did our best for the kids and their families and that we did something to spread the word - not only of God, but of the positive changes we are making in our schools - should make us feel proud of our efforts.
We have resources at our disposal to help promote our work - CCA and their Facebook page, Edmodo and the connections it offers to our parents, PD360 and the connections it offers among our teachers and administrators - private, parochial and diocesan, and of course our own personal conversations with our students, their parents and the parishioners who come and visit our schools. Mass is another opportunity for us to reach out and connect. The more we accept our role as active spreaders of the good word, the more we will attract people to our schools.
Please share the work you or your school is doing to actively bring students and families to our schools! Be proud of what you have accomplished and willing to share the changes we are making to meet the needs of our 21st Century students and the rapidly changing world we live in. Upload a video, publish some writing pieces, highlight the community outreach that some many of our schools and students are participating in across Hawaii. This is a forum to do that and I welcome all of you join in the conversation!
Hawaii Catholic Schools are AWESOME!!!
Thanksgiving and Christmas are on top of us and we still have so much to accomplish! If anyone else is feeling like this, please respond in the blog and share how you are coping. All of us can benefit from each others' experiences!
We are entering this season of thanks and gratitude. As we do, continual reminders of the challenges facing our Hawaii Catholic Schools network, become even more visible as the pressure mounts during the competitive Hawaii private school recruiting season. Open houses are beginning to pop-up and we want to make sure we highlight all the best points that a Catholic education in Hawaii has to offer. Each of us in our network of Hawaii Catholic Schools can reflect and identify how we are going to contribute to recruiting more students and families to our Catholic ohana of schools. Whether it is through actively speaking with people in the community or raising the instructional bar in our school/classroom/system, there are myriad of ways that we each may contribute. Perhaps if we view our recruitment opportunities as ongoing for the year then maybe we can stem the tide begin attracting students back to the product we offer: Quality instruction, respectful and safe learning environment, extracurricular activities such as foreign language, athletics, computer instruction, etc, and of course, Catholic faith doctrine.
Please know that I am not saying this is an easy challenge we face! Everyone I have met in our network of schools is working hard. Making sure we are actively involved in changing up the pattern, either individually or collectively, as part of the network of Hawaii Catholic Schools, is all that anyone can ask. To look in the mirror at the end of the day and know we did our best for the kids and their families and that we did something to spread the word - not only of God, but of the positive changes we are making in our schools - should make us feel proud of our efforts.
We have resources at our disposal to help promote our work - CCA and their Facebook page, Edmodo and the connections it offers to our parents, PD360 and the connections it offers among our teachers and administrators - private, parochial and diocesan, and of course our own personal conversations with our students, their parents and the parishioners who come and visit our schools. Mass is another opportunity for us to reach out and connect. The more we accept our role as active spreaders of the good word, the more we will attract people to our schools.
Please share the work you or your school is doing to actively bring students and families to our schools! Be proud of what you have accomplished and willing to share the changes we are making to meet the needs of our 21st Century students and the rapidly changing world we live in. Upload a video, publish some writing pieces, highlight the community outreach that some many of our schools and students are participating in across Hawaii. This is a forum to do that and I welcome all of you join in the conversation!
Hawaii Catholic Schools are AWESOME!!!
Monday, September 24, 2012
Professional Development and HCS
Here is a video from the McKinsey group, a policy firm that has gathered compelling data identifying common elements in successful education systems from around the world. This video and the related links on the page (see McKinsey on Society) frames nicely the challenge and the opportunity that lies ahead of us in the field of education. Our world is changing more rapidly than ever. Our students are more savvy and globally aware than ever. Jobs not yet created will be filled by our current students so how and what we teach must change!
In our Hawaii Catholic School system, we are taking steps to meet the challenges of educating 21st Century students. A number of our schools and personnel are participating in professional development opportunities to further their knowledge of effective instructional practice. Through schools participation in the SOTF (Schools of the Future) initiative, utilization of online Web 2.0 tools and recently the construction of a educational leader professional development cohort, HCS Laulima, our schools accept the challenges facing our education system. Throguh collaboration we can better harness the human resources in our system to improve our instructional practice and thus give our students and even better educational exxpwerience!
Please watch the video with the following question in mind: What am I going to do, no matter how difficult, to help my students prepare for the 21st Century work force?
Check back every week for a blog update about what is happening in our Hawaii Catholic Schools!
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Keeping up with the TECH
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2012/06/best-15-twitter-hashtags-for-teachers/
This link leads to a webpage that identifies useful #Hashtags for those of us exploring the world of Twitter. Twitter hashtags are quickly becoming a necessary tool in organizing the masses of information constantly bombarding us.
As teachers, we ask our students to learn by trying. For many of us more veteran educators, here is an opportunity to model behavior we want our students to adopt. With Twitter and other forms of information sharing that are reshaping how we function in the global society, teachers have an obligation to create opportunities for our students and to learn from our students when needed.
Personally, I worry about whether what I have to say is worth immediate and world-wide publication. Kids do not seem to worry about that. I believe that as long as we are open to criticism and able to use comments and viewpoints as growth opportunities, then the risk becomes a necessary one in order to advance and grow in our profession. We cannot afford to ignore tools that our clients are using already.
So, please take a look at this website and begin to gather and disperse information so we can better understand and utilize these wonderful new tools and the positive impact they can have on the field of education. If we do not control our path, others from outside our field will dictate it. We owe it to our students and our selves to risk a bit and push our own learning.
Mahalo to www.educatorstechnology.com for the information on their website.
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2012/06/best-15-twitter-hashtags-for-teachers/
This link leads to a webpage that identifies useful #Hashtags for those of us exploring the world of Twitter. Twitter hashtags are quickly becoming a necessary tool in organizing the masses of information constantly bombarding us.
As teachers, we ask our students to learn by trying. For many of us more veteran educators, here is an opportunity to model behavior we want our students to adopt. With Twitter and other forms of information sharing that are reshaping how we function in the global society, teachers have an obligation to create opportunities for our students and to learn from our students when needed.
Personally, I worry about whether what I have to say is worth immediate and world-wide publication. Kids do not seem to worry about that. I believe that as long as we are open to criticism and able to use comments and viewpoints as growth opportunities, then the risk becomes a necessary one in order to advance and grow in our profession. We cannot afford to ignore tools that our clients are using already.
So, please take a look at this website and begin to gather and disperse information so we can better understand and utilize these wonderful new tools and the positive impact they can have on the field of education. If we do not control our path, others from outside our field will dictate it. We owe it to our students and our selves to risk a bit and push our own learning.
Mahalo to www.educatorstechnology.com for the information on their website.
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2012/06/best-15-twitter-hashtags-for-teachers/
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Aloha from the 2012 Kukulu Kaiaulu conference hosted by Kamehameha Schools. Please check the attached link for information from this Technology based two day gathering.
We have only just begun but the wealth of tools and info presented by Will Richardson in his keynote address is mind-numbing.
Mahalo to Kamehameha Schools for putting this on and allowing educators from Hawaii to gather and embrace the challenge we face as educators in the 21st Century and in the most isolated, populated land mass in the world!
I am sitting in a presentation about the growth of a school wide blogging initiative at Kamehameha Schools - Hawaii. Their elementary school has all teachers producing blogs regularly as a source of information and communication. This is a grassroots movement initiated by the teachers and school leadership. Their blogs are used as their newsletters and now a means of showing what is going on in class in real time. Their parents are beginning to appreciate the access they have to their children's education.
I am wondering which of our Hawaii Catholic Schools are making use blogs? Please let me know how our Hawaii Catholic schools are using technology such as blogs to enhance our students learning experiences and engage them in the learning process.
I will be tweeting updates at @4everaloha. Check it out.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Introducing....The HCS blogspot!!!
Aloha and welcome to our HCS blogspot! This blog is for all Hawaii Catholic Schools teachers, staff, administrators and interested persons and is intended to be a safe environment where information can be shared, debated, discussed and introduced that pertains to all things Hawaii Catholic Schools and particularly our implementation of our Systems for Success.
I will upload new posts as topics come up for discussion. New posts will be related to our goals and objectives listed in our Systems for Success strategic plan and may include links to articles, websites and other material designed to foster discussion and dialogue.
This blog will also house links to pertinent information so that, as necessary, we can refer to specific documents in our conversations. The HCS blogspot is a respectful forum that gives us another arena to collaborate and communicate about the many challenges, opportunities, and exciting changes that are facing us as educators in Catholic institutions.
So how about we begin with this talking point:
"What are some ways that we as Catholic institutions of learning continue to effectively educate our students for the 21st century world (one that we are not even sure of what it is going to look like) and infuse our Catholicity throughout our curriculum?"
I look forward to the ongoing opportunity to engage in meaningful and professional dialogue with our Hawaii Catholic Schools educators and people beyond our beautiful islands!
pj foehr
Links to pertinent documents:
Hawaii Catholic Schools System for Success documents
March 2012 Networking for Success Newsletter
I will upload new posts as topics come up for discussion. New posts will be related to our goals and objectives listed in our Systems for Success strategic plan and may include links to articles, websites and other material designed to foster discussion and dialogue.
This blog will also house links to pertinent information so that, as necessary, we can refer to specific documents in our conversations. The HCS blogspot is a respectful forum that gives us another arena to collaborate and communicate about the many challenges, opportunities, and exciting changes that are facing us as educators in Catholic institutions.
So how about we begin with this talking point:
"What are some ways that we as Catholic institutions of learning continue to effectively educate our students for the 21st century world (one that we are not even sure of what it is going to look like) and infuse our Catholicity throughout our curriculum?"
I look forward to the ongoing opportunity to engage in meaningful and professional dialogue with our Hawaii Catholic Schools educators and people beyond our beautiful islands!
pj foehr
Links to pertinent documents:
Hawaii Catholic Schools System for Success documents
March 2012 Networking for Success Newsletter
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