Tag Archives for " online registration system "

0 Successful School Leadership: A Conversation with an “America’s Best High Schools” Principal – Part 3 of 4

So far, our blog series on successful school leadership has covered leadership within a school and school leadership as it relates to educating diverse groups of students. In part three of our conversation, we discuss the accountability of educational leaders.

Accountability: Every school is unique in its own right; however, schools share special challenges and opportunities that require effective responses from educational leaders. One such example may be with policies designed to hold schools more accountable. Leadership practices that help schools succeed when they confront various forms of accountability mechanisms may include:

– Creating and sustaining a competitive school.

– Empowering others to make significant decisions.

– Providing instructional guidance.

– Strategic planning.

In the case of University High School (UHS), providing instructional guidance and empowering others to make significant decisions are accountability tools highly regarded by UHS leadership. An example of this is shown as Galen Hunsicker, professor of zoology at Vanguard University for 20 years and currently a science teacher at UHS, points to three main practices that have had the greatest impact on teachers and staff:

1. An open door policy and giving the teachers a “heads up” regarding upcoming issues or events.
2. Continuous positive support for effective teaching strategies through summer reading (Teach Like a Champion) and regular, thought-provoking articles sent via email.
3. Having confidence in the staff’s professionalism and streamlining issues to save teachers time in doing what they do best: TEACH. The UHS administration excels at this! “For example, two years ago during WASC accreditation, our UHS leadership developed focus groups each with an effective teacher leading the discussion,” Galen explained. “Near the end of this process, the leaders of these groups came together to hash out our action plan, which was circulated for editing by any teacher, and released as a final hard copy. We all felt great about our input, time management, and our individual value. At no time was there a sense of a top-down style or a central controller. We all had a voice, all of us were important, and as a result, I believe we became more cohesive and more aware of who we really are.”

Galen went on to say that all UHS administration leads with vision, but they also guide and engage… not micromanage. “In my 42 years of teaching at over a dozen colleges and two high schools, University High School is a unique place, for I have never been in such an organized, positive, and uplifting environment.”

We know that school leadership is most successful when it is focused on teaching and learning, but there is still much more to learn about the essentials of quality leadership, how to harness its benefits, and how to ensure that there is a holistic approach to placing good leaders into bad systems so that they are able to contribute and enrich in a way that is meaningful rather than having a system that will tear down even the best of them.

But leadership goes beyond just teachers and principals. Schools exist within a district, and effective leadership must occur through networked interactions in which schools and districts work cooperatively towards a common goal. School leaders cannot effectively change their poli­cies, programs, and practices without “permission” from their districts. A district’s specific actions impact schools and their capacity to implement school change and attain higher standards.

We’d love to hear examples of accountability from your teachers up through the district!

0 Successful School Leadership: A Conversation with an “America’s Best High Schools” Principal – Part 1 of 4

Scratch the surface of an excellent school, and you are likely to find an excellent principal. Look into a failing school, and you’ll typically find signs of weak leadership. Leaders are thought to be essential for high-quality education. But is this indeed true and, if so, exactly how does leadership work?

School leaders set the tone in a school community. They play a prominent role in defining a vision and driving it forward, but how important are school leaders in promoting learning, and what are the essential functions of a successful leader?

How Leadership Influences Student Learning, a study commissioned by The Wallace Foundation and conducted by The Universities of Minnesota and Toronto, concluded that leadership is not only essential for quality education but second only to teaching among all school-related factors that contribute to what students learn at school.

Based upon research of well-documented and well-accepted knowledge about leadership at the school level, we have identified the following categories of practices as important for leadership success in almost all education settings and organizations:

• Leadership within the school
• Educating Diverse Groups of Students
• Accountability
• Autonomy vs. centralization

Leadership Within the School

Leaders influence student learning by helping to promote vision and goals and by ensuring that resources and processes are in place to enable teachers to teach well. Below are some leadership practices that help successful schools function as high-quality learning communities:

– Charting a clear course that everyone understands, creating high performance expectations, and using data to track progress and performance.

– Developing people – providing teachers and others in the system with the necessary support and training to succeed.

– Making the organization work by ensuring that the entire range of conditions and incentives in districts and schools fully supports rather than inhibits teaching and learning.

– Allowing the “right balance of tightness and looseness” to tap into the sources of motivational commitment and energy necessary to make positive changes.

– Creating shared meanings and fostering the acceptance of group goals, while also providing individualized support when necessary.

– Understanding that everything is about human capital.

University High School (UHS) in Irvine, California, is a great example of how leadership practices are implemented to positively influence student learning and motivate a school to focus on high-quality education.

UHS was named the best public high school in California and 8th best public high school in America in 2011 by Newsweek. It was also the highest ranked institution on the list that was not a charter or magnet school.

The school has consistently made Newsweek’s list of Best High Schools and, in 2012, set a national record for the most students (ten) from one school to receive a perfect score on the ACT, a feat that less that 0.1% of all students who take the ACT manage to do.

John Pehrson, principal of UHS, suggests the best things a leader can do to have the greatest impact on the success of their school are to:

• Hire the right people and get out of the way
• Empower people to exercise their gifts and talents to move a school forward in a positive way
• Celebrate accomplishments
• Maintain an open door policy
• Focus on balance in kids
• Encourage and support initiative and risk taking, and welcome mistakes

We’ll continue this conversation next week, focusing on the topic of educating diverse groups of students. Do you think Pehrson is accurate? Are there other ways for a principal to have the greatest impact on his/her school?

0 An Open House with welcoming arms

A good first impression makes a difference! Your first Open House or Back-to-School night gives teachers an opportunity to create a personal connection with parents, gain parents’ support, and establish ways for continued communication throughout the school year.

Before deciding what to do for your school’s open house, walk through your school building and classrooms with the eyes of a parent. Pretend you are walking in for the very first time.  Do your hallways offer a welcoming presence?  Are your restrooms clean?  Are your classrooms colorful and reflective of students work?

Most parents want to see an organized building/classroom with friendly and welcoming teachers and staff.  They are not typically concerned about how many science tests are given, or what materials you use to teach math.  Parents generally want a good understanding of what their child’s school year will be like, how issues will be communicated and handled by teachers/staff, and what they can do to help ensure their child has a successful school year. Here are some ideas to incorporate into your next open house.

Open House School Ideas

Open House

Five Ideas for Open House

Tips for Open House and Back to School Night

Host a Successful Open House

0 First Impressions Matter

First impressions are lasting impressions. It takes just one-tenth of a second for an individual to make a judgment about someone or something, and most likely, that first impression will never change.

In the case of a school, how can you ensure that you are being judged accurately? How can you make a good first impression on parents? Successful schools do it all the time; they make themselves distinctive and memorable.

More and more, school choice is becoming a powerful element for parents, students, and teachers. It is the reason that a parent will travel across town to a different neighborhood daily in order for their child to attend a school outside of their immediate school zone. So what do successful schools do to create a good first impression and make traveling across town compelling enough to parents? Here are a few tips:

Your frontline should be a pleasure

There is nothing more frustrating to a potential parent than calling a school for information and hearing an unfriendly, unenthusiastic, unknowledgeable voice on the other end. On the phone or in person, your frontline staff should be courteous, helpful, and if needed, empathetic. Make an anonymous call to your school’s admissions office and see how you are treated. Email the admissions office and see how promptly you are answered. Note the quality of the response. Does it represent the atmosphere and feel that you want from your school?

School tours and visits weigh more than you think

Nothing sways a prospective parent more than a school tour. Your best people should be put on this important part of the public relations process. Make sure your tour guide is extremely knowledgeable and enthusiastic about the school. Parents like to see students in action, so plan tours during the time of day that most closely portrays "a day in the life" of a typical student. Have examples on hand that show accomplishments, events, or activities that set you apart from other schools.

Rehearse the entire experience so that you get it right. Take a tour with your designated tour guide from the perspective of a parent. When inspecting a school, parents don’t miss a thing and are easily impressed by enthusiasm, knowledge, and courtesy. Ask questions as if you were looking for a school for your own child.

Your website is your school's welcoming center

A school’s website is usually the first thing a visitor sees. A good website is cohesive, informative, and easy to navigate. Keep it simple and appealing with a logical flow of information and messaging. And most importantly, make sure your website is providing timely, up-to-date information. A school's website should reflect the school's strength and character and speak to its audience appropriately.

Laborious registration = unhappy parent 

First impressions count in marketing your school just as much as they do in any endeavor. Are parents spending hours waiting in long lines to register? Are they required to fill out stacks of paperwork before even setting foot on your campus? Do they have to make several trips to your office over the summer to turn in paperwork? These types of activities create a negative first impression. No wonder parents aren’t excited about signing up for the PTA, volunteering as room mom, or contributing to your annual fundraiser. You’ve given them a bad first impression, so for the rest of the school year, they do whatever it takes to stay away.

Not only does an online registration system help increase enrollment and streamline the application and registration process, but it also portrays a stress-free, open, inviting environment for your parents.

When it comes to schools, school choice is a powerful element that can help create the conditions for a successful school. Families make relocating and home purchasing decisions around which schools they want or don’t want their children to attend. Don’t pass up an opportunity to show your best side. Put your best foot forward in the beginning so that parents receive an authentic impression.

What are you doing to make a good first impression and portray a stress-free, open, inviting environment to your parents?

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0 Are You a School Choice School?

Americans are looking for schools they can trust. Confidence in public schools is on a decline, and an increasing number of parents are opting out of neighborhood schools and entering the chaotic, developing marketplace of school choice.

Charter schools, other public schools within a district, Montessori schools, religious-based schools, and even homeschooling have all become viable options for parents trying to find a healthy, high-functioning learning environment for the education of their child – all in all, a school that is successful.

But the elusive recipe for school success is extremely difficult to convey simply and clearly. Yes, test scores are a valuable measurement, but in many cases, they are overvalued.

One paragraph doesn’t tell the story of a book. Similarly, one test score doesn’t tell the tale of a school. Using one tool that is as limited as a one- or two-day test doesn’t accurately portray a school's success.

Although test scores are important, rarely should they be the sole determinant for examining what makes a school successful. A school is a cohesive entity that relies on many factors to ensure a better education for all students.

Research shows that there is not a single thing that schools can do to ensure high student performance. However, research also shows that high-performing schools tend to have similar characteristics that make them successful.

K-12 Online has shared some insight from a few of our successful schools. Take a look at our blog series on successful school leadership.

0 Top 10 New (School) Year Resolutions for 2014

As a new school year starts, administrators and teachers are gearing up to implement lesson plans that will meet or exceed the year’s school resolution. Just as we make our own unwelcomed but necessary new year’s resolutions at the turn of the year, so does a school or district at the beginning of school. A resolution typically centered around some big initiative that is focused on whatever education problem plaguing the nation at the time.

In some cases, it’s a new name for an existing problem that has already been tackled by a predecessor initiative.   For example, 1:1 laptop initiatives have now become BYOD so that every child has access to a computer. Or “online learning???, changed to “blended learning???, transformed to “flipped classrooms.???

Nonetheless, every year there are a set of infinitives that keep administrators scrambling throughout the year to meet benchmarks and exceed targets so by the end the school year, they have maintained par and have a feeling of accomplishment.

So to properly kick-off your school year, here are 10 current initiatives (in no particular order) for the 2014-15 school year.   And while there are an array of initiatives that focus on numerous topics, we made this list on a broad scale.

Take a look at the list and let us know what you think: Are there any initiatives we’re leaving out? How many of these initiatives has your school implemented?

1. Common Core for 21^st century learning to teach critical thinking and problem solving skills.
2. STEM for global competitiveness.
3. Adaptive Testing to better pinpoint a students learning level.
4. Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) to provide all students an internationally benchmarked science education.
5. Flipped Learning where students gain first exposure to a topic outside of the classroom and use classroom time to assimilate the knowledge.
6. Digital Literacy Skills so students understand how to take information from a computer and use it in multiple formats.
7. Environmental Education to reduce environmental impact and costs and increase sustainability.
8. Healthy Schools Programs to boost the nutritional value of meals served at school.
9. Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) so learning experiences can be more personalized to the student.
10. Race to the Top to spur innovation and reform in state and local K-12 districts.

0 Can Your School Benefit from Online Registration?

Are you (and your staff) working overtime during peak enrollment weeks? Do you find that your current system is outdated and pushed to the limit by relying on manual forms of data management? Would you like to expand your institution and enroll more students?

If any of these apply to your current situation, then you may benefit from an online registration system. But when choosing an online system, consider the needs of all stakeholders: the school, students, admin, district, and parents. Include representatives from each area in the discussion to best assess the needs of each group (parents want registration to be quick and easy, while administrators want to collect a lot of data).

During the decision process, compare systems thoroughly to ensure you are getting the one that best suits your needs. Can the system be used year-round? Can you create your own forms? Does the company provide adequate customer support? Does the system integrate with your current SIS?

Ensuring upfront that a system meets all of your needs can reduce stressful and time-consuming activities later on. Consider features like lottery management if you participate in selective enrollment or a payment processing solution and webstore if you’d like to sell items and collect fees and donations.

Any company can create an online registration system, but companies that specialize in the K-12 market truly understand the needs of K-12 schools, such as residency verification alerts, recouping fees for lost textbooks, and providing customized forms and reports.

0 5 Advantages of Online Registration

Waste of time and materials can make registration time a nightmare for public schools and school districts. Even smaller charter schools struggle to make registration periods an efficient process for administrators, teachers, parents and students. Online registration is a wonderful opportunity for a school district or a charter school to redirect it’s energy towards the parents and students who need it, while leaving the paperwork aspect of the job in one secure, fast, and convenient location.

Five Advantages of Online Registration:

1. It SAVES TIME! With constant cut backs in education funding, the expression, “Time Means Money??? has never been more true. Valuable school personnel can take the time they are spending on paperwork creation/organization and put it where it belongs – in the service of students and teachers. It’s hard to imagine an office without dozens of paper organizers and stacks of forms to be filed. Online registration takes all of that and puts it onto your computer screen with a few quick taps on the keyboard.

2. Streamlined Paperwork Throughout a District. Online registration allows school districts to create uniform online forms that remain in the system throughout students’ education. This means no more lost files or important medical history forms that use precious time and resources to recover. It also allows schools in a district to use the same format for standardized documents/forms, keeping things simple for parents who may have multiple children in the same school or district.

3. Remote Access to Documents and Information: This is a valuable tool for personnel and parents alike. For parents, they don’t have to hear their children’s, “I forgot it??? or “It’s lost??? when it comes to school forms because they will be able to navigate them online.

4. Multi-Language Translation. Globalization allows districts to benefit from a myriad of cultures and languages. However, multiple translation forms are exceedingly costly. Online registration offers forms that are translated in applicable languages without a district having to create multiple copies.

5. Control of Information Access. Districts can make sure that confidential information is secure while allowing general information to be accessed by a wide variety of users. No more locking file cabinets.

0 Fundraising For Schools Increases the Socioeconomic Gap

We all know that there is a growing disparity over fundraising for schools. Some have a parent population that can commit an abundance of time and money to make fundraising for schools an easy task, while others within the same district are barely able to conger up enough parents to conduct a PTA meeting, let alone volunteer to give money or be in charge of fundraising for schools.

It is not uncommon for a gap between the have and have-not’s to exist within a school district. Public schools are meant to provide all children equal access to quality education; however, there are great disparities throughout the public education system. Private donations made to schools in more affluent communities makes this disparity an even greater gap.

The question then becomes, how does a district provide a level playing field for all schools within their district? One suggestion is to pool funds and redistribute to schools according to need. Some schools have successfully transitioned to such a shared system, however, parents with the means to step up and help offset budget cuts have threatened to stop donations because of centralized funding systems.

The reality is that parents at the “not so well-to-do??? schools are just as passionate about education as those wealthier ones; they care just as deeply about their children. But making large donations to a school for families at the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum just isn’t an option.

So what is the right approach? Do parents have the right to pay for goods and services at one school when they are not available at other schools within a district? If districts attempted to move towards a “share the wealth??? system, would it create backlash for the districts, reducing the amount of donations they receive?

In most districts, fundraising for schools is done on an individual basis, and the differences can be huge. If parents at top fundraising schools were told that some of their donations would be redirected to other schools, parents may be discouraged to give and/or work hard to raise funds, which seems unfair to the schools that have the potential to raise large amounts of money to fund foundations and support programs that would otherwise not be available.

So what’s the solution? The truth is that there are no bad guys here – not the parents who can afford to sponsor programs and services so that their children receive a better education; and not the families at schools in lower socioeconomic communities who are desperate for more help so that their children can also receive a quality education.

There is no clear-cut across the board remedy that will satisfy all, but the uncomfortable truth is that until some steps are made to help close the disproportionate fundraising for schools, the gap between the public school have and have not’s will only increase.

What do you think is a happy medium for bridging the socioeconomic gap?  Has your school / district developed a policy that has proven successful?

0 K-12 Online Helps Solve School Problems with Budgeting

One of the toughest challenges in education is managing a small school. Budget cuts instituted on a statewide level affect both large and small districts, however, smaller schools tend to feel the crunch more when operating on an already meager budget.

In an age where everything is shifting towards digital, small school problems include falling behind with the inefficiencies of paper registration. K-12 Online is the first online school enrollment and registration system to cater to small schools. Although the web-based application is designed for any school or district, the product offers an option for small school problems by making the solution more affordable.

This could not be more apparent than in a recent encounter between K-12 Online owner, Michelle Sam, and a private school principal.

Upon returning from lunch, Michelle was saddened to hear a voicemail from a small school who had a demo scheduled for later that day. The caller, who in a proactive attempt not to waste anyone’s time, apathetically decided to cancel the demo. She had just completed a demo with two other online registration companies and had come to the conclusion that the software would just be too expensive for their little school.

Michelle immediately returned the call, outlining K-12 Online’s benefits and providing a rough estimate of cost. The caller was elated! She decided to go ahead with the demo and ultimately the school became K-12 Online’s newest client – the burden of affordable online school registration had been lifted.

“This is why we exist,” explained Michelle Sam, owner of K-12 Online. “I want small schools to have the same advantages and be able to operate with the same efficiencies as larger schools and districts. Because we are committed to improving the education system as a whole, making our product affordable for small schools in the end ultimately benefits parents, teachers, administrators and students alike.”

Savvy schools know their future requires them to become more integrated with parents, teachers and students. The world we live in is becoming increasingly interconnected and small schools can’t afford to be left behind for the sake of our children, nor can they afford to pay large amounts of money to implement the necessary improvements.

K-12 Online was developed to combat school problems like wastefulness and the excessive time and energy required to register K-12 students year after year. K-12 Online’s solution further helps to overcome school problems like application, registration, enrollment, and lottery management hassles and streamlines the process to be more cost effective and eco-friendly.

Finally, small schools and school districts can afford an online student application, enrollment and registration system that not only saves them time, money and resources, but also helps generate money through fundraising tools.