7 Months in Paris

7 Months In Paris

For the last 7 months I've had the privilege to serve as the Assistant Principal at Paris Elementary in Aurora, Colorado. As the school year and my time at Paris come to an end I'm taking time to reflect on my experience. Reflection causes experiences to become insight. 

Our family moved to Colorado the in the Summer of 2011. My first teaching position in Colorado was as the Physical Education teacher at Paris Elementary. I remember going on a Community Walk with our staff the week before school started. Our families and students were so warm and welcoming to me and my colleagues as we dropped off backpacks and school supplies at a number of homes. Seeing and feeling the love from our families and our students despite the struggles that surrounded their lives touched my heart and soul. Instantly, I was "all in" for this community. 

I can still remember my first day of teaching at Paris. 30 Kindergarten students in the gym and 1 of the 30 students spoke English. Instantly, I knew needed to get better for my students. I reached out to people locally and across the country who were experts in teaching Physical Education to English Language Learners. Dr. Luis Columna  and Dr. Kymm Ballard (who also supported me early in my teaching career) are two people who supported my learning and helped me be a better teacher. Experiencing struggle as a teacher here at Paris the first few months I was here made me a better educator, prepared me to be a school leader and made me a better person. Again, all in for this community! 

During my second year at Paris, tragedy hit. The Aurora Theatre Shooter lived across the street from our school. If you recall, the shooter had booby trapped his apartment to blow up upon entry. Many of our families received knocks on the door from law enforcement in the middle of the night asking them to board a bus to another location. I cannot imagine the fear of our families having frantic police officers knocking at your door at 2am asking them to board a bus. I’ll forever have the events of that night and the next days and weeks engrained in my mind. In all my years in education, those days and weeks were among the most challenging. The theatre shooting ordeal shook the school community at it's very core. The events of that evening coupled with internal issues within the school set in motion the trajectory the school went on over the last 5 years. 

At the end of the school year that May, I left to pursue another position in other school district which had a partnership with the University of Denver for a school leadership program known as "The Ritchie Program", which is a renown school leadership preparation program. Entering into Ritchie that summer one of my professional goals was to come back to Paris as a school leader. Coming back to Paris to serve with an increased capacity to impact the school community was on my leadership bucket list.

This November, I received the opportunity to return to Paris as the Assistant Principal. I will be forever grateful for the opportunity to return to Paris to serve. Again, I leave a better educator, leader, and person from the experience. 

The school has been in what our state department of education deems "Priority Improvement" for 5 years in a row. On its fifth year of priority improvement, one of the lowest ratings the state gives, Paris is one year away from being on the list of schools requiring state action if it doesn't improve.  

As we used to say on the playground growing up it is literally "do or die" for the school. Improve or face state action. 

One of the promises I made to the school community is that together we would move out of priority improvement and off the state accountability clock. As a community we've done some amazing things in the 7 months since I rejoined the team. The amount of students reading on grade level has more than doubled from this time one year ago. We've seen almost a 12% decrease in students that identified as chronic or at-risk attendance students. As a school, we've exceeded our targeted growth for all students by 27%. The growth percentage in a number of classrooms is anywhere from 137% to 160%. All but one grade level has a growth percentage that exceeds the 100% goal. Amazing work by our staff and students. I’m so proud of them. Their tenacity to achieve our goals will serve as a constant reminder to me of the power of grit and determination.

Improving the supports provided the community was very important to me. Every Friday through a partnership with the Food Bank of the Rockies called "Totes For Hope" enough food to serve over 100 families goes home with students. A Food Bank is being developed inside of an unused mobile classroom on the campus. Outreach partnerships with the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical campus have been developed to support both basic needs and academics. 

One of the partnerships developed was to bring STEAM programming to the school. Thinking outside of the box I sought to bring STEAM programming to every student, every day through integrating STEAM programming into the existing "specials" block. With the school being a block from the Anschutz Medical Campus forming a partnership with them to support STEAM programming and project based learning makes a great deal of sense. Unfortunately, we were not able to get the program off the ground this year, however, the school itself is transitioning from becoming Paris Elementary to the Paris STEM Leadership Academy. I'm excited to learn what becomes of this initiative as it stemmed from my learning, growth, and development in transforming learning and redesigning school. 

Reflecting on a next step for me -- it would be to assure that changes in pedagogy are occurring after our professional learning. We had some great professional learning around rigor, accountable talk, supports for English Language Learners and a half day session with Eric Sheninger on Instructional Design. I missed the opportunity to personally assure shifts in pedagogy were occurring after our learning sessions by following up directly with teachers through observation and feedback specific to our learning. While our Instructional Coaches provided biweekly coaching/feedback for all teachers -- I needed to follow up directly with teachers by observing instruction and providing feedback to the shifts we expected based on our learning together. ROI - Return on Instruction. Moving forward, I will be certain to directly provide that feedback and develop the systems and structures to support the work and capture the trajectory of our learning and implementation. Reflecting upon experience makes you better at what you do. I encourage everyone to “watch the game tape” of what was their school year. What worked? What didn’t work? What do you need to do better? Take the time to go beyond your formal evaluation and really sit with your experiences this school year. Be vulnerable. Open yourself up with a critical lens on you! Remember, the greater you become the greater capacity you have to serve others. Strive to get better. Change always starts within your heart. 

As for what’s next for me - as of this evening - I’m not sure. A friend jokingly called me a “free agent.” I’m 100% committed to serving others, helping them learn and grow. My drive is for empowering others through an unrelenting service to achieve their personal excellence in school and in life. I believe in people. I believe any child can succeed - Regardless of their zip code. I’m thankful for the last 7 months in Paris and depart with a happiness in my heart knowing we have changed outcomes for members of the school community.

Thank you for the opportunity to serve you once again. Always in my heart. 

C.J.