Once a Bobcat, Always a Bobcat

I’ll never forget one day when I was an eighth grader in junior high school and walking down the hallway with one of my best friends, Michael.  I was a pretty good student from a behavioral standpoint (for the most part) and the staff liked and trusted me.  However, my friend, Michael, was seen as a behavioral issue and was scowled at often by teachers and administrators.  Michael was not a bad kid by any stretch of the imagination, but he would often ask a lot of questions which was viewed as a bad thing. Image Credit: charismanews.com We were two minutes late to study hall in the library when the librarian greeted Michael with a frown and immediately asked, “WHERE WERE YOU AND WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG!?”  He started to explain himself and she immediately cut him off and said, “I DON’T EVEN WANT TO HEAR IT!” Even though I was late as well, not a word was said to me. Image Credit: kidzworld.com What the librarian didn’t know was we were late because ...

There is definitely no shortage of initiatives or focus areas within education; researchers, authors, administrators, teachers, and anyone connected to schools are continually developing new strategies, frameworks, and instructional systems designed to meet the needs of all students.  I have seen a number of changes and program developments in my fourteen years as an educator; some of these changes have been outstanding and truly transformed the way that we teach and learn while others have been "flash in the pan" ideas that have gone away quickly.  Regardless of the intensity of the changes that we have seen as educators within our careers, there is no doubt that we all have experienced many new ideas and have been exposed to the next "silver bullet" in education advertised as the answer to all of our problems. Image Credit: authorsnest.org Change does not scare me and I am always searching for better ways to do business, whether that is a more efficient data...