Deadline for Dental, Notes on RA, CQI

Don't Forget to Sign Up for Free Basic Dental Coverage

The deadline for open enrollment, November 30, is fast approaching, and it's very important that you get the Open Enrollment Change Form in to the Benefits Department in order to receive your free basic dental coverage. That coverage, along with any other changes you make to your health plan, will go into effect on January 1, 2007.

If you are currently enrolled in the AFLAC supplementary dental plan through SNEA and would like to cancel, please email me at snea@aol.com. AFLAC representative, Simone Hite, can answer any questions you may have about the AFLAC dental plan at 863-2211.

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Fall RA Notes

Springfield sent a stellar group of educators to the MNEA Fall Representative Assembly in Jefferson City over the November 10-11 weekend. The group included Melissa Albright (Wilson's Creek), Barbara Bartels (Parkview), Brent Fullington (Cherokee), Rebecca Jamieson-Pugh (Hickory), Kittilu Maxson (Wilder), Patty Pogue (Study) and Vicky Scott (Holland).

SNEA is proud to have so many dedicated individuals who are willing to take on leadership roles at the state and local level. Brent Fullington already serves on the MNEA executive board and is a candidate for state vice-president. The election of MNEA officers will be held at the spring RA in April. Melissa Albright serves on the NEA Convention committee that is organizing our state delegation to the national conference in Philadelphia this July. Kittilu Maxson was appointed to a three-year term on the state PAC committee, and Patty Pogue was selected to represent MNEA at the Women's Leadership Workshop that precedes the Midwest Regional Leadership Conference in Chicago coming up in January. I'll once again be representing MNEA (and Springfield) at DESE's Advisory Council on Virtual Education that meets in Jefferson City later this month.

All this is evidence that representatives from our Springfield NEA are becoming more and more active on the cutting edge issues that are important to public education at the local, state and national level. I would encourage any and all SNEA members to consider taking an active role in your organization. We all benefit from your participation.
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Notes: National Quality Education Conference - Dallas, November 11-14

I was among those representing Springfield Public Schools at the 14th annual National Quality Education Conference in Dallas earlier this month. By now, we are all aware of our own CQI initiative at SPS, and this conference provided great exposure to what is being done in other public school districts across the country and around the world. Teachers and administrators from virtually every state and also from Mexico, Germany, Holland, Israel, India and Japan were in attendance.

More of the Same?

I don't think anybody could blame a classroom teacher for harboring a bit of skepticism regarding CQI. Like most districts, Springfield has had its share of programs and initiatives come down the pike - curriculum adoptions, special ed interventions, new methodologies, still more educational jargon - the acronyms alone can make you feel like your swimming in alphabet soup.

But what if an initiative comes along with the aim of streamlining things . . . of aligning programs, departments, curriculum, professional development, janitorial service . . . of eliminating redundancies, of actually taking things off your plate so that classrooms and schools run more efficiently with a constant look toward improvment?

If you were one of those who attended our last building rep meeting, you heard Anita Kissinger, Executive Director of Staff Development/Quality, speak to these concerns - and I think many in the room felt relieved and hopeful that our district's push for quality improvement will yield good results in the classrooms and schools across the district.

A systems approach to school improvement revolves around data-driven decision making rather than opinions or conventional wisdom. One basic principle of quality improvement in the classroom is the idea that the students, with the guidance of professional teacher/facilitators, are ultimately responsible for their own education and can benefit greatly from tracking their own improvement to that end.

And one other important point regarding CQI in the district. This is not a mandate to teachers to suddenly change the way we do things in the classroom. I would advise teachers to attend CQI training sessions with an open mind and look for things that you think are helpful. In the best of all possible scenarios, the district will model CQI at the administrative level as well, and we'll be able to see the difference.

Have a great Thanksgiving break!