K12 HR Solutions Podcast

This is one of the most informative podcasts we’ve recorded. This month we focus on the topic of micro credentials and feature Wisconsin’s Superintendent of the Year, Dr. Patricia Deklotz of the Kettle Moraine School District.  I was first introduced Kettle Moraine’s efforts in micro credentials in the November issue of School Administrator.

Micro credentials may seem like the next fad in education, but Dr. Deklotz and the Kettle Moraine School District aren’t just using micro credentials as an accessory or an adornment in the latest edition of education trick ponies.  When you listen to this podcast you’ll hear how Kettle Moraine has made micro credentials the centerpiece of improving organizational learning and effectiveness in areas related not only to professional development, but also compensation, recruiting, succession planning, and employee engagement.

In this episode of the K12 HR Solutions podcast Dr. Deklotz and I discuss:

What are micro credentials

How micro credentials can be integrated into teacher compensation

The effect micro credentials may have on teacher engagement and student performance

The change management approach Kettle Moraine used to implement micro credentials

How micro credentials have impacted the ability to recruit and retain teachers

Efforts to ensure the micro credential model of professional development and compensation is financially sustainable

How micro credentials provides a viable alternative to “step and lane” salary schedules

Ideas for developing strategic models of succession planning

How micro credentials incentivize high quality teachers to stay in the classroom

 

Also, because the topic of teacher engagement was a key part of this podcast, I am also providing a free copy of our ebook Ignite: A School Administrator’s Guide to Designing Districts that Motivate Teachers.  

 

 

 

Micro Credential Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Here is a short video from Kettle Moraine about micro credentials shared by Dr. Deklotz

November issue of School Administrator, featuring Dr. Deklotz and the Kettle Moraine School District

In the podcast we discussed deeper learning as one micro credential offered by Kettle Moraine. Watch this video to see how one P.E. teacher in the district is using it to engage students in their own learning.

 

Tools for Managing Micro Credentials.

Bloomboard

Digital Promise

 

We are excited about the information Dr. Deklotz shared in this podcast and the resources we’ve provided and we hope you find them useful. Please consider sharing it on Twitter or other social media platforms you may use.

Each November school districts across the country host programs to teach students to honor veterans for their service.  For many districts, depending on their state laws, honoring and recognizing the service of veterans doesn’t wait until November.  Veterans’ Preference in school districts allows districts to recognize veterans in human resource decisions throughout the year.

Too often though, knowledge of Veterans’ Preference in school districts remains low and it’s a topic worth discussing to ensure your district is compliant, and more importantly that it provides select veterans with employment opportunities to serve their community after they have served their country.

 

 

We are providing a free packet of resources to help school districts design hiring processes that are more likely to be reliable, valid, and withstand challenges related to veterans’ preference.  Included in the packet are

 

* Six Strategies to Manage Veterans’ Preference in School Districts

* Sample Guide to Managing Perceptions of Fairness in School District Hiring Practices

* Best Practices for Teacher Selection: From Job Posting to Job Offer

* Sample Application and Resume Teaching Candidate Scoring Guide

 

This is an information packed article.  If you notice at the top of the page there is a sound bar.  We were able to record a podcast interview with attorney Sean Timmons.  Mr. Timmons works with the law firm Tulley & Rinckey  and is a veterans’ preference legal expert.  We have linked to the firm and you can call them directly at (855)-248-9790. The information he shares extends well beyond the information you will find in this article.  We highly encourage you to listen to this episode after you read this month’s article.

 

 

What is Veterans’ Preference and Why Should School Districts Care?

Veterans’ preference was initially established as a set laws created by the United States Congress to assist veterans seeking Federal employment and to prevent them from being penalized for time spent in military service.  These laws provide preference points for employment and other human resource decisions to veterans who are disabled or who served in the Armed Forces during specified periods or in designated military campaigns.  Veterans’ preference laws do not guarantee veterans a job, nor do they give them preference in internal actions such as promotions, transfers, reassignments, and reinstatements.

It is also important to note that not every veteran is eligible to receive veterans’ preference.  Veterans’ preference laws for Federal employment and most state veterans’ preference laws only provide preference points to veterans who meet specific criteria, who are disabled, or who served during specified periods or in designated military campaigns.  Additionally, the number of points awarded to veterans depend on a number of factors.  That will be addressed later in this article.

Beyond the obvious reasons related to recognition and honoring the service of veterans, school districts should care about veterans’ preference because many states have passed laws that require public employers to provide veterans’ preference in hiring decisions.  Veterans’ preference was initially created to provide opportunities to veterans seeking federal employment.  However, over the past few decades more and more states have adopted or modified veterans preference laws.

 

 

 

On this episode of the K12 HR Solutions Podcast I’ll discuss:

* Changes from the Department of Labor that will take effect December 1, 2016

* Exemptions under FLSA and which ones are more likely to affect school districts

* How these changes will likely impact school districts

* How school districts can prepare for new changes to FLSA

* A free resource to help school leaders budget for the impact of FLSA changes

 

On May 18, 2016 the Department of Labor (DOL) announced the Final Rule for overtime under FLSA. The new rule will take effect December 1, 2016.   (We wrote extensively about the possible changes in this article about FLSA Changes in School Districts in case you want a more in-depth review of some of the information presented here).

The change will entitle most salaried white collar workers to earn at least $913 per week or $47,476 per year.  The new salary requirement or test is more than twice the old salary requirement of $23,660 per year.

Exemptions Under FLSA Reviewed

* Classified or Non-Certified

* Certified

Exemptions under FLSA are:

* Executive

* Administrative

* Professional

* Outside sales

* Computer employee

* Highly compensated employees

A more detailed description of FLSA exemptions can be found on the DOL website.

 

How FLSA Changes Could Affect School Districts

An employer can choose to classify certain employees as exempt under FLSA if they expect the position to have frequent overtime, fluctuating hours, or some other factor that makes sense financially and logistically to pay an employee salary and classify them as exempt.  If an employee is classified as exempt they must meet three criteria, or tests.

 

* The employee must be paid on a salary basis.

* The employee must perform very specific duties to be considered exempt.

* The employee must also be paid (on a salary basis) a minimum salary.

 

School District Employees Impacted by New FLSA Rules

If a staff member is non-exempt, meaning they are paid at an hourly rate and are compensated overtime (at least 1.5 times their regular rate of pay) for all hours worked over 40, there are not likely to be impacted by the changes to FLSA.

The new FLSA rule does not apply to bona-fide teachers.  Under the professional exemption teachers have a special exemption that excludes them from the salary test.

The DOL clarified rules that allows some district employees within the administrative exemption to be excluded from the new salary test as well.

The administrative exemption is also available to employees compensated on a salary or fee basis at a rate not less than $913 per week under the new rule, or on a salary basis which is at least equal to the entrance salary for teachers in the same educational establishment, and whose primary duty is performing administrative functions directly related to academic instruction or training in an educational establishment.

What School Districts Should Do About FLSA Changes Now

* Identify Exempt Employees, Salary,

 

 

 

Effective and meaningful professional development for school districts seldom happens by chance.  However, recent movements in professional development are relying more on choice and chance. Does your district use a “Genius Hour” or “Ed Camp” model for professional development? Find out how largely relying on these models for professional development in school districts can be masking larger issues related to effective practices in organizational change.

This podcast episode’s guest is Ross Cooper.  Ross is a Twitter Jedi and the supervisor of instructional practice in the Salisbury Township School District in Allentown, PA.  Ross has been recognized as an Apple Distinguished Educator, a Google Certified Teacher, and identified as one of the top education gurus to follow on Twitter.  Ross assists his district and others around the country with curriculum and unit design, inquiry-based learning, assessment and grading, and quality professional development (which is today’s topic).  You can find Ross on Twitter using the Twitter handle @RossCoops31 or at his website where he regularly provides great content related to his areas of passion in education at rosscoops31.com.  I found Ross after reading his widely read article Cheesecake Factory Professional Development that challenges the approach that many school districts are adopting related to professional development.  It reminded me of an article I wrote a few years ago on the topic of professional development for school districts titled What’s the Point of Training and Professional Development? 

Use the media player at the top of this post to listen to this episode or you can subscribe to the K12 HR Solutions Podcast on iTunes.

Ross and I have collaborated to provide a free resource for school leaders who want to plan meaningful and focused professional development for school districts.  This resource includes 8 Strategies for Planning Effective Professional Development and a Professional Development Planning Guide.  Use the button above to download a free copy.

 

Topics for This Podcast Include:

* Common mistakes many districts are making in “Genius Hour” or “Ed Camp” models of professional development.

* An overview of Ross Cooper’s article Cheesecake Factory article.

* Designing professional development for school districts that builds efficacy and engagement  among staff members

* How to design professional development that is focused  and aligned to the district’s mission and core values

* How to sort through the various professional development initiatives and clutter that is found on social media

* Effective methods to evaluate the effectiveness of professional development for school districts efforts (beyond opinion surveys).

* Methods to differentiate professional development among staff members with varied backgrounds and ability levels

 

Additional resources mentioned in this podcast

Evaluating Professional Development by Tom Guskey

Prioritizing the Common Core by Larry Ainsworth

...

School leaders are often looking for effective ways to manage change and improve customer service to internal staff and to the patrons the district serves.  We decided to reach out to a small business owner who is renowned for his businesses’ performance in customer service and bottom up innovation.  In this episode of the K12 HR Solutions Podcast, I interview Ari Weinzweig, Co-Owner and Founding Partner of Zingerman’s Deli.  Ari and the Zingerman’s way has been featured in Inc. Magazine, Forbes, the New York Times, and Oprah.

Some quick background information on Ari.  After studying anarchy and Russian history at the University of Michigan, Ari Weinzweig went to work washing dishes in a local restaurant and soon discovered that he loved the food business. Along with his partner Paul Saginaw, Ari started Zingerman’s Delicatessen in 1982 with a $20,000 bank loan, a staff of two, a small selection of great-tasting specialty foods and a relatively short sandwich menu. Zingerman’s now has multiple business formats and is operated by unique style of leadership principles that has allowed it to become an Ann Arbor institution—that has over 500 staff members and annual sales over $55,000,000 a year.   In this episode school leaders will learn more about:

 

* History of last names (this has nothing to do with change or leadership for school districts, but it was an interesting factoid that Ari threw in at the opening of our podcast when I struggled to pronounce his last name)

* 12 Natural Laws of Leadership

* How to encourage and channel innovation.

* How Zingerman’s manages change and empowers their employees to create change themselves through the Bottom Line Change Principles

Ari Also discusses the concept of Open Book Management.  This is a method of leading where staff members are taught how to read and understand the financials of the business to help lead in a more collaborative and transparent manner. Ari discusses a great book on that inspired his views on Open Book Management titled,  The Great Game of Business by Jack Stack and Bo Burlingham.

 

Additional resources available to brows on the Zingerman’s website are:

* ZingTrain Zingerman’s Training Institute

* ZXI (Zingerman’s Experience Indicator).  A metric Zingerman’s uses to measure and encourage customer service among employees.

* Zingerman’s Guide to Giving Great Service

 

If you want to learn more about Ari’s 12 Natural Laws of Business, here is a keynote address he delivered in 2014 where he discusses each of the 12 Laws.

 

 

We hope you were able to take some good information away from this episode.  Please take a moment to leave us a review on iTunes.  It is the fastest way to help us increase our number of listeners.  Also, in the comment section below, let us know what your district does to help facilitate bottom up change and how your district maintains an environment focused on customer service.  If you would like, share your ideas on the Open Book Management Philosophy and how you think it could work in your district.

On this podcast we discuss how changes to overtime laws will affect school districts.  The Department of Labor has recommended drastic changes to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) wage and hour laws and I brought on Adam Taylor, Co-Founder and Vice President at K12 HR Solutions to discuss how changes to overtime laws will affect school districts. If you prefer to read about these changes, you can read our last article on K12 HR Solutions, How School Districts Can Prepare for Upcoming Changes to FLSA.

 

 

 

In this episode Adam provides a brief overview of FLSA, types of classifications, and most importantly the changes to how school districts classify employees that receive overtime pay.  This episode is full of information to keep you informed of proposed FLSA changes and how they affect school districts.  We are also providing a free packet of resources.

 

Click on the link below to receive our bundle of complimentary resources to help your district get prepared for changes to FLSA for school districts.

Here is what you will receive:

A Budget Impact and Estimation Tool to evaluate the cost of potential changes to and possible solutions.

5 Tips for School District Leaders to Prepare for Changes to FLSA.

A Quick Guide to FLSA Exemptions with school district benchmark jobs

FLSA Exemption and Overtime FAQs for School Districts

Does the employment of teachers and staff members in your district sometimes feel like a revolving door? What are the factors related to teacher turnover in your district and how school district superintendents and principals measure and influence those factors?

 

In this podcast episode we discuss how to use exit surveys in school districts.  We discuss factors every school leader and school district human resource director should consider as they try to manage teacher turnover.  Listen to this episode and find out strategies to create more effective exit surveys in your school district.

If you would like even more information about how to retain teachers and reduce teacher turnover, click on the button below and we will send you three research based articles on the topic of exit surveys from professional journals as well as a few sample questions we use when developing exit surveys for school districts.  

 

Here’s what to expect in this episode:

Broad Exit Survey Categories School Districts May Want to Develop Questions to Measure:

* Perceptions of Fairness and Equity

* Reward and Pay Structure

* Benefits

* Leadership

* Organizational Ideology

* Training and Development Support

* Personal Well being (Physical Health, Safety, Work-Life Balance)

* Job Security and Career Opportunities

Elements of Exit Surveys and the Use of Exit Surveys in School Districts

* Confidentiality– Provide assurances that responses will be in confidence barring the revelation of unethical or illegal disclosures.

* Prove feedback matters– Use onboarding or induction processes as well as annual grassroots meetings to share how the school district has used employee feedback from school district climate surveys and exit surveys to help shape decisions and policy. Don’t wait until an employee is leaving the district to sell the benefit of providing reliable feedback.  Sew the seeds early.

* Clearly state the objective of the exit survey– When employees open an email for an exit survey one of the first things they should read is the objective of the exit survey.  Let departing employees know what information the district will be collecting and how the information will be used to make needed changes.

* Survey remaining peers– Many districts have implemented the use of climate surveys but fail to ask questions about reasons why other employees are leaving.  Departing teachers and staff members talk to their friends about their intentions and reasons for leaving.  It’s a good idea to measure opinions of existing teachers as they relate to factors affecting turnover and compare them to responses from departing employees.

* Standardize the format of the exit survey- The use of surveys provides a far more standardized process compared to exit interviews.  Consider using broad categories and develop targeted questions within those categories with minor adjustment to ensure the validity of responses over time.

* Effective Design and Interpretations– If your school district’s exit surveys are given to departing employees but never really analyzed, what’s the point?  Even worse, if school district exit surveys are not designed in a manner to provide valid and reliable results, it’s doomed from the start.  Finally, and potentially even more dangerous, if school districts using exit surveys don’t follow sound methods to analyze responses  prior to making decisions they may make factors related to teacher and staff turnover worse rather than better.

This month’s podcast episode features former principal, educational technology thought leader, and Twitter rock star Eric Sheninger.  Eric discusses how he was able to bring about change in the high school he led, despite challenging circumstances and how school leaders across the country can develop the right mindset to lead the change they want to see in their district. If you are leading and managing change in schools, don’t miss this episode. At the very bottom of this post is the full transcript of our interview for those who prefer to read it.

 

 

Eric offers a no excuse, get your hands dirty approach that will challenge you to move past tired excuses and educational red tape to create the kind of schools students want to learn in.

 

If you want to learn more about Eric Sheninger we encourage you to check out the following:

* Eric maintains a blog at A Principal’s Reflections

* Eric has written a book, Digital Leadership: Changing Paradigms for Changing Times, that discusses the change he led at New Milford High School and guiding principles for school leaders who want to lead digital changes in their own schools.

* As mentioned, Eric is a Twitter Rock Star. If you want your Twitter Feed to be filled with advice and resources to help lead in the digital age, follow Eric on Twitter @E_Sheninger

I hope you enjoy this episode.  If you have follow up questions or comments for Eric or myself related to this episode tweet them to us using #episode2.  You can find me Chett Daniel @k12hr_solutions.

 

Full Transcript

“There is a huge difference between leading change and directing change”

 

Hi this is Chett Daniel, Founder of K12 HR Solutions. On today’s episode I have guest Eric Sheninger.  Now, if you don’t know Eric Sheninger you must not be on Twitter—Eric is a rock star on Twitter.  He’s a former principal and now a Senior Fellow at the International Center for Leadership in Education (ICLE). You can find Eric on Twitter at @e_sheninger where he has over 78,000 Twitter followers.  If you don’t follow me on Twitter, chances are you probably don’t, because I don’t have anywhere close to 78,000 followers, you can find me Chett Daniel at @k12_hrsolutions.  Today’s interview with Eric mostly focuses on the topic of organizational change.  Eric has a no-excuse, get-your-hands-dirty approach to change.  And I hope you feel empowered as you listen to him and hear him talk about becoming the change that you want to see in your district. 

 

After listening to today’s episode, if you have follow-up questions or comments about topics that we have covered, please go ahead and tweet them to Eric or myself on Twitter and we’ll do our best to follow up.  Now let’s get to this latest episode of the K12 HR Solutions Podcast.

 

Read about Eric’s background and experience on his website:

http://ericsheninger.com/esheninger/home

 

 

 

First of all, I wanted to thank you for coming on today.  Your bio clearly represents your passion for education.  Can you take a quick moment and just talk to the listeners about the path that brought you from the classroom to becoming a school leader and now someone who is helping work with schools across the country to shape educational policy and practices?

 

As a teacher I really strived to get involved with as many students as possible and I knew I could really only have a direct impact on those that I had in my classes.

If you are recruiting teachers it’s important to make sure you are using effective hiring practices. We are providing a free resource to help you ensure you are using fair and reliable hiring processes.  As we discuss in our last strategy, hiring effective teachers is one of your best recruiting tools.

This packet of resources provides:

* A best practice guide to managing perceptions of fairness in school district hiring practices.

* A step-by-step selection process guide to help your district create hiring frameworks that can be perceived as fair and reliable.

* A sample scoring guide for applications and resumes to allow for reliable judgements of applicants’ hiring materials.

 

Even if you feel your current process is effective, you may want to compare these resources to your current methods.

 

 

Without formal teacher recruitment strategies there is no real direction for evaluating successful recruiting pipelines, managing the message you convey to potential applicants, and quickly identifying teachers who have the ability to help your district pivot in this new era of education.  If your strategies to recruit teachers are as modern as the mimeograph, these teacher recruitment strategies may be useful for you.

Last spring I spoke with an aspiring teacher who had recently attended a job fair hosted by a local university.  She said it was nice to see so many districts that were looking for good new teachers and she felt encouraged that she would find a job. I asked her if any of the districts stood out.  She said, “Yeah, one really stood out to me and I kind of felt sorry for them.”  I asked her what she meant.  She said many districts had posters that displayed their schools.  Some had large TVs showing footage of their campuses and the community.  Several others had informational handouts and were passing out USB drives with more information about the district as well as applications loaded on them.  “So what about the one you felt sorry for?” I asked.  The aspiring teacher said, “Well, he was just standing there next to a bare table with a stack of applications.”  She went on to say, “It reminded me of the kid who had an undecorated oatmeal can for a Valentine’s Day box when everyone else spent time putting something cool together.”  I asked if she went up to the table to learn more about the district, she said, “Yeah, but it was hard to take them serious after seeing how much effort everyone else had put into showcasing their district.”

Don’t be the kid with the last minute Valentine’s Day box when you are recruiting new teachers this spring.

How Modern Are Your Teacher Recruiting Strategies?

Does your school district have modern effective strategies to recruit teachers?  It’s hunting season for school administrators.  Typically when you think of hunting season you think of the colors of autumn and the cool crisp air of fall.  For school administrators though, hunting season begins in the early spring when college students are graduating from teacher education programs, and experienced teachers can be wooed to your district before new contracts are signed.

Let’s stay with this analogy of hunting and recruiting teachers for a moment.  Over the past 50 years the sport of hunting has evolved and changed utilizing every advantage imaginable from the clothing, weapons, game calls, scent block, and a multitude of technological tools ranging from cameras to mobile apps.  Meanwhile, the demand for effective teachers has never been higher, yet many districts operate without any modern strategies to recruit teachers beyond replacing job postings from bulletin boards in the teachers’ lounge and ...