Being an urban educator

In this blog posting, I would like to reflect on being an urban educator in the light of working in a turnaround setting this year and getting my masters degree. I would like to frame this post with the following question. 

• How do the readings from this course coupled with your residency experiences reshape the way you view yourself as an urban educator and the goals you seek to enact in your teaching? (remember to connect personal experiences to the readings)

Throughout this year, I've learned a great deal, from personal experience, working under a strong mentor and from attending master’s courses about what it means to be an urban educator. My views on urban education have also been drastically altered this year, primarily due to the new experience and amount of research I've put into furthering my understanding of public school policies and feeling their impact first hand in the classroom. 

The first aspect that has changed this year is how I view the role of teachers, and staff in a school. In the past, I have thought of teaching as mostly a lone-wolf profession, where each teacher resides in their own classroom, and sets up their own set of routines, rules, and expectations. Consequently, every other teacher's classroom would adhere to the same principle. This, in my opinion, constituted an individualistic community of teachers, each with their own set of educational parameters, working in proximity with other professionals, but not necessary together. As I've learned, that is a very limited model for teaching in urban schools (maybe even any school), where cooperation, team work and unified mission is often needed to establish a safe and predictable environment for students. This year, I have grown as a team player by participating in PD's, multitude of meetings, negotiations and after school activities. I have both given input to the team of residents and have compromised where compromise was needed, and where my cooperation meant a better outcome for the students. I've learned that while you can run a unique classroom, having a unified set of expectations, cooperation with other professionals in the building creates a stronger sense of community and ultimately a better working environment for school staff and students. 

Building that trust with other teachers, by both praising and challenging different viewpoints was a difficult task. As professionals we take great pride in our ways of doing things, and it can be quite challenging to relinquish a level of control over your own ways. But building that trust within the school, has definitely built a stronger sense of collegiality, respect and trust between other members of the school and me. Charles M. Payne writes "The degree to which teachers in a given school trusted one another correlated well with whether the school was improving or stagnating." (p35) I have really come to care about my mentors, my co-residents, the principal, the students and other staff at my training site this year, and have gone out of my way to build those strong relationships through conversations, meetings, after school activities and helping other teachers off the clock. I've seen the return of my investment come back into my classroom with increased student participation, deeper relationships and a sense of mutual respect. I really believe that fostering trust between coworkers and administration can reap numerous positive benefits for the school climate and culture. Strong social webbing within a school can produce results in both the classroom and the neighborhood. This year, we had an increased rise in parent participation, even though we received a new principal. The sense of solidarity between the community and the school seems to be increasing, with more parents showing up to evening events and after-school activities. This week we held a math and science fair, and we've got a favorable feedback from the parents who showed up to participate in two hours of activities. 

With that said, staying on the path of building inter-professional relationships and trust can create a school environment conducive to reform and open to problem solving. The more teachers trust each other and the administrations and are not afraid to share ideas, the less demoralized a school becomes. Oftentimes that demoralization, as Payne calls it, comes as a product of "poor relational trust." So with that said, one of the goals for next year would be to begin establishing positive rapport with different team members of the school. This may look like helping out with activities, holding or creating leadership roles within a school, and having open conversations between staff about challenges of work.