As April winds down and I look ahead to the crazy that I know May will bring, I wonder what my job will look like next year. This is my third year working as a high school instructional coach and coordinator of the Secondary Literacy Program. For the first two years in this position, I felt like I was effective in my role as a “teacher of teachers”, and I was excited about the changes that were happening in our building, especially around teacher collaboration and grading. There was a clear focus on literacy throughout the district, and we were building a high quality staff development model that incorporated elements of the best research and practice in teaching, learning, and leadership. Then, due to budget cuts last year, a few more things were added to my plate, including teaching one section of Creative Writing and coordinating the TAG (Talented and Gifted) program.
I approached this year with a positive attitude, knowing that I would have the opportunity to put the new ideas I had garnered over the last two years into practice in my own classroom, and hopeful that I could continue to build on the coaching relationships that I had developed with staff. It’s only one class, I told myself repeatedly over the summer and into the fall, even as it became clear that my work load was overwhelming and that I would not be able to maintain the same level of staff support that I had provided in the past. As I struggled to keep up with the planning and assessment for my class along with all of the other duties in my job description, the time I spent working with teachers on improving instruction dwindled. While I was incredibly busy, I didn’t feel like I was having much of an impact on students beyond those that were in my own class. Those students were my first priority, and rightly so, but I couldn’t help but feel that the ratio of my time spent on teaching related duties was disproportionate to the actual amount of FTE allotted to that responsibility.
Along with the other four secondary instructional coordinators, I voiced my concerns about continuing to teach in the future, as it was having such a significant impact on my effectiveness as a coach. The outlook for next year was good, we were told, and we soldiered on with hope that this year would be just a bump in the road. Now the word is that our job description for next year will be “status quo.” Of course, nothing is set at this point, but as I consider the prospect of another year feeling like I am not doing a good job at much else but teaching (and there are plenty of days where I don’t feel like I’m doing a good job at that, either), I feel disheartened. I have enjoyed being back in the classroom, and I have learned so much this year implementing both a writing workshop and proficiency-based grading system. It’s just that I feel like our school improvement efforts and staff development have suffered for it, and the momentum of those first two years has diminished.
It will be interesting to see how it all shapes up, especially since we will have a new principal in our building for the first time in eight years. We will also have new leadership in some key positions at the district level. I feel hopeful about the possibilities, but my optimism is tempered with a dose of realism at this point. I don’t want this position to become a dumping ground for delegated administrative tasks and a hodgepodge of other duties that need a home, which has happened this year to a greater extent to some of my colleagues. I would like to see the district leadership refocus on improving literacy instruction in the core, which is why this position was created in the first place. I’m surviving, but, like the title of Cathy Toll’s book on being an effective coach, it’s a long way from thriving, which is where we need to be to effect lasting change.
