Help Wanted

/ Meridian High School/

I'm looking for someone to join me in leading a team of teachers on the sometimes insane but always fulfilling adventure of progressive school reform.

My district in its first year of a four year initiative to transform a traditional comprehensive high school into a New Tech Early College. What that means is that:

  • Our top priority is maintaining an empowering culture of mutual trust, respect, and responsibility.
  • We strive for 100% of learning to be project- or problem-based.
  • We are not threatened by state initiatives to standardize learning. Rather, we use standards as our foundation for creating curriculum centered on deeper learning.
  • Our teachers partner with outside businesses and organizations to add real-world relevancy to their projects. We have a local support network to make this easier.
  • We are a one to one laptop school with an open technology policy.
  • We integrate courses and subjects whenever meaningful connections can be made (e.g. GeoDesign, BioLit, American Studies, etc.).
  • We have a strong yet supportive, flexible, and understanding teachers' union.
  • Staff collaboration is a rule. Teachers work together to solve school-related issues, critique projects, and to build school school culture.
  • We understand the power of protocols. We use them in both adult and student learning.
  • We assess "soft skills" (like collaboration, professionalism, communication, and critical thinking) in addition to content as part of every course grade.
  • Our future graduates will earn forty hours of community service and 100 hours of job shadowing, exploration, or internship.
  • Our stated goal is to double the number of graduates successfully completing 24 credits in college before the summer of 2017. We are confident that we will get there.
  • All of our students will have an opportunity to earn up to 30 college credits during their first four years of high school.
  • In 2016-17, we will begin offering a "fifth year" to all students interested in having us pay for and support them during their first year of college. This means that students could graduate from our high school with an associates degree in five years. We estimate that approximately 60-70% of our student body will take advantage of this opportunity.
  • As the only full-school New Tech Early College high school in the state of Michigan, we are innovators in our field. This comes with a great deal of pride, but more importantly, it requires a great deal of energy and time.

I've been very fortunate to start these initiatives with a very skilled and experienced administrator who has decided to retire at the end of this year. To replace him, we will need an instructional leader who understands change leadership and believes in the principles of progressive education.

Do you know such a person? If so, please encourage him or her to apply. The formal posting for the position can be found here. For more information, visit our website.