Lighthouse 112

Edgewood Middle School teacher Michael Buss is a long time teacher with a deep background in middle-level education. He shares his personal story including a very personal medical situation. Michael has taught in urban areas, suburban areas, in grades 6-12, in language arts and in the social sciences. He is one of the amazing District 112 teachers and staff members who Inspire/Innovate/Engage each and every day. Please listen and learn about Mr. Buss' background, journey, and his thoughts on the abrupt changes caused by the COVID-19 stay at home order and resulting Remote Learning. Hearing and validating our teacher voice is very important in North Shore School District 112!

Students share their thoughts about e-Learning - what's good, what's not, and what will they do when they can go back outside again after COVID-19 and the Stay at Home Order. Timely, informative, up to date information from North Shore School District 112.

After the first week of teacher-directed e-learning, we asked our students what they liked, what they did not like, and what advice would they offer to the teachers and administrators. Tune in for a quick, 10 minute check-in with our students regarding e-learning.

During the COVID-19 driven school closures, we have four priorities guiding our work:

Our four priorities in this evolving pandemic crisis:

As part of the Governor’s order, he announced that all schools in Illinois will remain closed, with a new tentative reopening date of April 8. On March 12, I ordered all schools in North Shore School District 112 closed until further notice, with a possible reopening date of April 14, this is still our tentative plan. We recognize that this development of the stay at home order may raise questions about the impact on students, staff, and families as well as the school’s vital role of providing meals to students and families while schools are closed. Thanks to the outstanding work of the Moraine Township Food Pantry (and countless volunteers) our children will be fed this week during spring break. District 112 foodservice partner Organic Life will resume meal preparation and distribution operations on 3/30/2020. In this podcast episode, we review what we're doing with respect to preparation, communication, and transition to Remote Learning (priority 4).

In North Shore School District 112, we are proud to report that our present is bright and our future will be brighter! We use various metrics to measure and gauge our success. For reference, check an earlier blog post: Measurement of Success – Blog Post

In today’s podcast, we're sharing information also reported in the Superintendent's Blog, at: http://mikelubelfeld.edublogs.org/2020/01/23/snapshots-of-success-in-district-112-112leads/ where data from two slide presentations and a few extra slides that highlight some recent and current success in the District are shown. The first presentation below was shared with the District’s PTO President’s Council (PTO refers to the Parent Teacher Organization). This is the formal leadership group representing the parents in the District’s 10 schools. In this report, the results of the Family Engagement Survey reveal significant growth in the areas of the school (& District) satisfaction/pride / and perception of our services. Our Future is NOW! in District 112.

Inspire...Innovate...Engage

In this episode, I am sharing a speech that I presented at the K-12 Global Education Research Association's 5th annual conference in Shijiazhuang, Hebei, China. I wrote about this experience on my blog: http://mikelubelfeld.edublogs.org/

Joining educational leaders from across the United States, China, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Italy, Russia, Costa Rica, Finland, Singapore, & Canada, I represented North Shore School District 112 at the Fifth Annual Conference of Global K-12 Education Research Association in Shijiazhuang, Hebei, China.

Through my leadership roles within the education community, including training aspiring superintendents, teaching at the graduate education level, presenting at conferences, and authoring books & journal articles, I am informed about conferences & symposia on global education issues.

I learned about this particular educational conference from the (AASA) American Association of School Administrators (AASA).

Together with superintendents and educational leaders from the nations mentioned above, and leaders from the following states in the USA: IL, MA, IA, CT, VA, AZ, OH, MD, VA, & WI, I was invited to present a speech to an audience of local (Chinese) educators, administrators, & local civic officials. Many of us presented speeches and shared presentations with one another and our Chinese hosts and local educators. This year’s conference topic was Cultivating Student Leadership Skills.

This topic is near and dear to me as I recently co-wrote the book Student Voice: From Invisible to Invaluable (2018 Rowman & Littlefield) with fellow Illinois superintendents Nick Polyak and PJ Caposey.

On October 1, 2019, at the Committee of the Whole Meeting, the Teaching and Learning Department, Dr. Lubelfeld, and Ms. Eleni Speron of ECRA Group presented to the Board of Education and the Community. This presentation provided an update on the efforts of the Teaching and Learning Department over the last two years, with respect to our shared goals of improving achievement in all student groups in North Shore School District 112. In this episode of Lighthouse 112, Dr. Lubelfeld shares excerpts from the Board presentation as highlights of the District's journey in teaching & learning. In 2017-2018, the new Teaching and Learning team came on board and began their work in North Shore School District 112. Aggregate student performance in the District showed a lack of overall growth, with multiple student groups significantly underperforming. At the end of October 2019, the state of IL will publish current proficiency results, and our preliminary data review indicates that 55% of students met or exceeded standards in English language arts and 52% met or exceeded standards in mathematics. Even though we have begun a positive trajectory towards improving academic outcomes for all students, there is still much work to be done.

Today we’re interviewing Mrs. Nicole Bellini and Mrs. Jennifer Convey. Mrs. Bellini and Mrs. Convey are at the helm of the Red Oak School, one of our two Kindergarten through 5th-grade dual language two-way immersion learning academies. In this episode, we’re going to learn more about Nickie and Jen, Red Oak School, and administration in District 112 in general.

The back to school ritual meeting is a time for all staff to reunite, gather as a whole, and get charged up for a great new school year! In this episode, I'm sharing my welcome back speech delivered to our 500+ staff at the Welcome Back Institute Day! Discussing our "why", our "how" and our "what" as I map out the vision for the coming year, with a cool intro from "K-DAWG" - a DJ from the past.