Transformational Leadership: The Journey to Student Goal Setting
By Sharon N. Williams
As a Leader in Me school, a tenet of our transformational journey from teacher to student-led classrooms is the setting of student academic goals. By doing so, students begin the process of individualizing and leading their learning as well as taking accountability for their learning. At the start of the school year, every student sets a reading and math goal that they work towards achieving throughout the school year. We call these goals WIGS or Wildly Important Goals. Weekly accountability meetings with student-selected accountability partners give students an opportunity to take immediate action when goals are not being met. It also allows them to celebrate milestones along the way to success. As a school, we were looking for a way to effectively increase the academic effectiveness of all students. We believe that having students set their own academic goals will help each of them to see how their success at meeting their individual goals helps the school meet its overall goals. Toro (2021) says that setting student goals along with reflection of the goals can help student achievement and help students develop a growth mindset.
I write about this journey with confidence today, but in the beginning, it was anything but easy. You know how you see the vision in your mind and while you are in this euphoric place, you can see how it will all come together with ease? You imagine the finish line and everyone standing around cheering with signs that read, “We Came and We Conquered” or “We’re Leading the Way.” Then the school year starts and you realize that implementation will be hard and arduous. More importantly, you fear that maybe your vision is greater than your capacity. Where do you go and how do you get there? Is it time for fight or flight? I battled these questions as I watched teacher confusion and frustration grow as we struggled to implement student goals. It would have been so easy to say we tried and it did not work, but deep inside, I knew that we could do it. We just needed a new game plan. Most importantly, I knew that our students were worth the fight.
Here is how we made the journey to successfully execute student goals at Main Street Elementary School of Arts & Leadership. The next few sections will take you through our challenges and successes over three years of implementation.
Year One: Implementation
In June 2019, the entire staff at Main Street Elementary went through Leader in Me training, titled Aligning Academics. During this training, student goals and leadership notebooks were introduced. We spent the previous school year learning and practicing the 7 Habits. We had done an effective job teaching, modeling, and promoting the habits for students. We were on a high and felt confident that we were ready to take on the next step of the process.
During the training, we set a goal of implementation for both student goals and leadership notebooks during the 2019–2020 school year. More specifically, our goal was to have student goals set for reading and math by September 2019. Student leadership notebooks would take longer since students would need time to complete information on each habit, so a date later in the year was set. When school opened in August 2019, we assessed students using NWEA MAP and established baseline goals from there. We also began student leadership notebooks where students could track their goals and share information about themselves and their leadership roles. We selected Wednesdays, naming it WIG Wednesday, as our day for accountability meetings and goal tracking. Each class had a designated spot to display a class scoreboard to track student progress on their goals. That progress was communicated to me as the principal to be tracked on the school’s scoreboard. That scoreboard was prominently displayed on the main hallway right outside of my doorway.
On our checklist of preparation, we proudly checked off assessments, goals, conferences, scoreboards, accountability meetings, and leadership notebooks. Check, check, check — we were on our way!
I can recall the pivotal moment when it became clear that we had started the process, but we were not on our way. Not even close, at least not yet. It was a Friday afternoon as I stood at the school’s scoreboard, sharpie markers in hand and sticky notes on cart, ready to update the school’s scoreboard, when I realized that classes were not sending me their class numbers. I had called for their class tracking of students who had met their goals or were making progress towards their goal. I was so eager to see where we were that I called for each grade level over the PA system. In my mind, I saw this as a celebration so it only made sense to make a production out of our first tracking update. Right? Major wrong! We were tracking student progress each week so it should have been easy to communicate the information forward. Little did I know teachers were desperately sending each other frantic SOS notes asking: What number is she talking about? What numbers did you send? Has she lost her mind today? Okay, I added the last question, but I am certain that is what they were all thinking.
It was clear we were not all on the same page and additional training was required. Once during a professional development session, I heard the concept of “fail fast.” Simply put, it means that when it is obvious that something is clearly not working the way it should, instead of hoping that it will get better, fail fast and make a new plan. So that is what we did. We went back to the drawing board and solicited the help of our Leader in Me coach for retraining. We did not abandon the goals-setting process; instead we took a step back and used the remainder of the year to perfect just setting goals while gradually layering in the monitoring and tracking systems. It relieved stress for the students, teachers, and the leadership team. For me, it presented an additional benefit because I was able to lead with a mix of courage and humility. It showed the staff that I do not always have the answers, and when I do not, it is okay to ask for guidance and help. We were able to course correct, and once again we were on our way again.
Year Two: The Pandemic
And just like that, when you feel that you have hit your stride and all pistons are firing at the same time, the “draw four” Uno card gets thrown from the deck in the form of a worldwide pandemic. We abruptly ended the 2020 school year due to the pandemic, making it impossible to wrap the year up properly and begin planning for the next school year. We went home without real goodbyes, so naturally, all work on the goals ceased.
When school began in August 2020, more than 80% of our student body selected virtual as their mode of learning for the 2020–2021 school year. We quickly began transitioning the goal-setting process to a virtual format. Thankfully, all necessary components were updated by our Leader in Me partners so all we needed to do was implement. For both face-to-face and virtual learning students, we moved to an electronic student leadership notebook. We used Zoom to conduct our morning announcements where students continued to learn about the 7 habits. This format also allowed students to see and recite the school and grade-level goals daily.
By year two, we understood how to help students set effective goals. We used a simplified goal-setting worksheet at each grade level so that the process looked the same schoolwide. Additionally, we used student conferences to help students select appropriate lead measures they could use to track their weekly progress. During our second year of implementation, we used MAP or TE21 data to set goals. NWEA MAP was preferred since students could use the Continuum of Learning to set short-term goals or use as lead measures. For example, a student might say that their goal is to increase their MAP RIT score by 20 points by winter 2021. In order to do so, they will summarize their reading with a retelling or writing each day. The goal is defined and the lead measure is based on skills in the identified RIT range. An example of a student goal sheet with lead measures is displayed below.
Note: Documents are the property of Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved.
Student accountability meetings were still held on Wednesday mornings. With student leadership notebooks being digital, we were able to upload them all to the Google classroom. This allowed for greater visibility for the leadership team to review notebooks and monitor student progress. Representing learning from our retraining, we moved to tracking numbers every other week instead of weekly. Instead of creating a new task for themselves, teachers made the tracking a student leadership role and students took on the responsibility of gathering and reporting the numbers for their class.
We also implemented classroom scoreboards for all classes by using existing exterior bulletin boards. For classes that were virtual, we used virtual scoreboards. We all know that it is critically important to inspect what we expect so we systemized scoreboards by requiring all classrooms to use their exterior bulletin boards as scoreboards instead of just asking teachers to identify a space. The shift from recommendation to expectation gave us 100% participation and helped brand the concept of goal setting throughout the school.
Lead Measures. Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved
We felt good about our progress in year two. We felt more comfortable with the process of setting and tracking student goals. Our takeaway at the end of the year was to help students set shorter-term goals that they could meet prior to the end of the school year. Instead of one goal that students work on for an entire year or until it was met, they would set a fall-to-winter and then winter-to-spring goal. This would allow students to celebrate success more frequently.
Year Three: Systems
The work of years one and two allowed us to practice Habit #1: Be Proactive as we begin the 2021–2022 school year. During the summer, we laid out the calendar for the school year identifying the following: (a) the schoolwide academic goals for reading and math (translated to a Wildly Important Goal), (b) the grade-level goals needed to help meet the school goals, and © the class goals needed to meet the grade-level and school goals. From there, we identified the dates that we would administer assessments at the start of the year so that we would be able to set student goals as early in the year as possible. We decided that it would be best if we administered benchmark assessments within the first 20 days of the school year. Since the needs of the pandemic required additional resources, we have a 1:1 ratio for technology. With each student having their own device, we were able to assess the school at one time in each subject area. This allowed us to assess all students, including make-ups, in reading and math in MAP and TE21 within the set 20 days.
We set a deadline of September 30, 2021, as the deadline to have all student goals set and student conferences completed. This year, we landed on a uniform goal-tracking sheet across grade levels. While the entire school was not required to use one given tracking form, each grade level was required to use the same form to ensure consistency in tracking at each grade level. Student leadership notebooks were started at each grade level in September as well. It is important to note that the goal-tracking form is a part of the student leadership notebook. Over the years, more effective forms that are easier to use have been developed, so we have opted to use those forms in place of the tracking forms included in the student leadership template.
Morning meetings started from the first day of the school year in all classes. Morning meetings are critical to the process of goal tracking as it presents a specific time in the day’s agenda to talk about goal progress. Since Zoom meetings worked so well last year, that system carried into this school year. Each morning, all classes log into Zoom where student leaders carry out the Morning Show. Student accountability meetings are held during the morning meeting on WIG Wednesdays. Students choose an accountability partner once academic goals have been established with the teacher. Each Wednesday, students meet and discuss progress of their goals. Student partners celebrate when they are on track and have mastered their lead measures for the week. They encourage each other when lead measures are not met and discuss ways to be more successful in the upcoming week. WIG Wednesdays allow the entire school to be engaged in accountability meetings at the same time. It also ensures that meetings are not missed or skipped. At the conclusion of the meetings, volunteers are asked to share what they discussed during their accountability meeting.
Classroom scoreboards are still required and are updated frequently by classes. I maintain the school’s scoreboard, which shows the whole school’s progress towards its goals. Students look forward to seeing their name go up on the board after benchmark assessments are complete.
For the first time since the implementation of student goals, we were able to layer in another aspect of student leadership with student-led parent conferences during our recent parent teacher conferences. Student-led conferences are important because it is another way for students to take responsibility for their own learning. It gives them a voice in their long- and short-term goals and encourages a growth mindset.
Due to pandemic restrictions, the student-led conferences were held via Google Meet. During scheduled conferences, students shared the content of their leadership notebooks as well as their academic and personal goals with parents. Parents were amazed at the depth of conversation of their child around their academic goals and growth. One parent wrote, “I must say I enjoyed this new type of Parent Teacher Conference I experienced today. It was a Student-Led Conference presented by my daughter, Taylor, who is a third grader at Main Street Elementary School of Arts & Leadership. She did an amazing presentation about her academic progress so far this school year. She was very thorough where I had no questions at all. My favorite part was the Leadership Notebook.”(Y. Robinson, personal communication, February 24, 2022).”
The journey to this place has been challenging at times but so worthy for students, teachers, and families. We remain committed to the transformational journey each day. I challenge you to consider setting academic goals for every student in your school.
References
Toro, S., (2021). Guiding students to set academic goals. Retrieved from: An Innovative Way to Deal With Plagiarism in High School | Edutopia
