Building a PLC at Your School: Functioning as a Collaborative Team

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Building a PLC at Your School Functioning as a
Collaborative Team

• Rikki K. Wheatley
• Center for the School of the Future
• Utah State University

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Session Goals/Outline

• Prepare you to form and participate in your own
  PLC
• Commit to building your own PLC
• Cache High Code of Conduct
• Understand the PLC process
• Being data driven

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Your Schools PLC

• Will serve the students and faculty of your
  school by acting as a
• School improvement
  vehicle
• Planning and management
  team
• Professional
  development and
• training tool

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Step One Commitment

• Schedule
• Dates (weekly or twice a month)
• Time (before or after school?)
• Place (convenient for everyone)
• Prioritize
• Everyone attends every time!!!
• Start and end on time

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Step Two The Rules

• There are many different kinds of professional
  teams and communities. Each of them has one thing
  in common a need for rules to govern itself.
  Rules play a crucial role in success.

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• A team willing to create rules is a team willing
  to show self-discipline and accept responsibility
  for its behavior.
• Teams usually judge their members by how closely
  they conform to the rules members who most
  closely conform to the rules earn the greatest
  respect.
• - Deborah Harrington-Mackin

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Code of Conduct

• Code of Conduct a set of ground rules under
  which the team operates. This code is usually
  written and posted in the meeting place. It
  should be created by consensus with the input of
  all members.

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The community Code of Conduct is designed to

• Create common expectations and understanding
• Encourage desirable behaviors
• Enhance self-management of the team
• Provide written record of guidelines
• Help new members know what is expected
• Bring problem behavior back into line
• But most of all

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Some Positive Assumptions ALL members of our
community are

• honest and trustworthy
• hard-working
• deserving of respect
• able to learn from their mistakes
• willing to work for the best interest of the
  school
• generous and willing to forgive
• advocates of justice and fairness for all

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Code of Conduct Guidelines

• Short (3-5 statements)
• Agreed upon by all members
• Must be written
• Positively worded (what TO do instead of what NOT
  to do)

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Positive Statements

• Code of Conduct
• Respect others by allowing them to disagree
• Share information and expertise openly
• Allow others to fully express their thoughts
  without interruption or ridicule
• Allow others to learn from their mistakes without
  blame
• Be present

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Create Your Code of ConductThis is YOUR
statement about how your Professional Learning
Community should operate.
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Step Three Roles and Responsibilities

• Four major roles
• Should be assigned at the beginning of each
  meeting
• May be rotated or set
• Should be respected and taken seriously

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The Facilitator

• Often is the principal
• Creates the agenda by prioritizing input from
  other community members
• States the goals at the beginning of each meeting
• Facilitates the discussion
• Directs the group through the agenda items

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The Timekeeper

• Paces the meeting to ensure it ends on time
• May need to urge other members to make quick
  decisions, move on to other items, or alter the
  agenda

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Process Observers

• 2 for each meeting
• Ensure all members abide by the Code of Conduct
• May need to ask members to clarify points so all
  views are expressed
• Can call a short recess if passion for issues
  threatens productivity

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Scribe

• Reads previous meeting notes at the beginning of
  each meeting
• Takes meeting notes for current meeting
• Records task lists and responsibilities for each
  member

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Step Four The Meeting

• Approximately one hour in length
• Should begin and end on time with all members
  present

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The Meeting (Facilitator)

• Clarify meeting purpose and goals
• The goal of this meting is to rewrite the
  school attendance policy and to set a date for
  the Spring Dance.
• Define behaviors that will help/hinder progress
• In the last meeting we tried voting
  anonymously on policy decisions. It may be more
  helpful this time to have each member to express
  their viewpoints to the group.
• Set time limits for the agenda items
• We will take the first 30 minutes to hear
  different views, 15 minutes to make a decision,
  and we will use the last 15 minutes to decide on
  a date for the dance.

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The Meeting, Continued

• State the problem
• (Review the data)
• Discuss alternatives
• (Determine ways to collect data)
• Agree, by consensus, on actions to be taken
• Identify or assign tasks involved

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What kinds of issues can our PLC address?

• School-wide increases/decreases in academic
  achievement data
• Implementing new programs
• Student behavioral problems or noncompliance
  with rules
• Individual student academic or social needs
• Increasing parental involvement

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Collecting the Data Is it Really that Bad?

• It is a capital mistake to theorize before you
  have all the evidence. It biases the judgment.
• - Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle as Sherlock Holmes
• Define the problem and then collect evidence
• Surveys
• Observation
• Interviews
• Be objective (get outside help if needed)
• Quantify the problem numerically

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Using the Data

• Look at the data carefully to determine IF you
  have a problem
• Set a reasonable goal for change
• Build an intervention (research the issues)
• Collect more data
• If you are not meeting your goals, dont get
  discouraged, try something else!!

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