The Teacher As a Leader Program

Luisa Hays

08/01/2010

The Teacher as a Leader Program

The “Teacher as a Leader” Program was a program in the Mountain Brook school system that opened the eyes of many future leaders. This program took individuals from several different buildings within the school system that had leadership qualities and carried them to a new level of understanding of leadership. To develop these chosen leaders they where engaged in self-awareness activities and personality inventories. Other sessions added to the development of these leaders where how to lead in a group, and how to function under stress. In addition to all the personality inventory activities, they had information session on education, leadership and team building. All of these training sessions put together made a successful training tool.

I believe the reason it was so successful was because the program took such a deep look into each leader’s needs, strengths, and weaknesses. Addressing the strengths and weaknesses of the individuals it allows them to feel empowered and in control of all situations.

I love to feel empowered and confident about projects and myself as a leader. I feel that I am a very confident leader and strong in many areas. I enjoy taking control of situations and making things happen. I also feel I have room for growth and improvement in the area of leadership.

One of the steps that I am currently taking to improve my leadership abilities is obtaining my masters degree in Leadership. Also, I improve my skills is by reading leadership articles and asking my mentors for advice. To have a good mentor is a great way to gain leadership skills.

Our leadership climate at our school is far from the article that I read. It has been for many years the administrator had total control and little need to develop anyone else. I am not sure why there has been little development of leaders in our school because we have gone through several administrators. I do not foresee a lot of change with our current administrator that came aboard this summer. I do hope to get a chance to prove myself as a leader to the new administration.

I have recently brought ideas to the administrator in hopes for successful changes to be made for the new school year. We will see as the year progresses whether or not she will be receptive to my leadership ideas. I will also keep being a mentor to the new teachers in the high school area. I will be one of three returning teachers this year so I can assist some of the new teachers as they come aboard this school year. I would also like to form a teacher collaborative group that would meet several times through out the year to assess things that we can change to help our students. This would be my start to improve the leadership qualities at my school.