Janie Andrich 21st Century Learning

Still accepting applications for the 2024-2025 academic year. Find the latest open positions on our careers page: https://hubs.ly/Q029QFxp0

Now accepting applications for the 2024-2025 academic year. Explore current job openings on our careers page. https://hubs.ly/Q0293k4l0

As we look to the begining of a new school year we need to be mindful of how our calling impacts our lives. As leaders we often burn the candle at both ends and allow the ”Out of My Control” items to suck the energy out of us. Positive self talk and clear boundaries of what we give our energy to will help. Young leaders as well as seasoned leaders often wrestle with thoughts and self talk. Keep it positive and Have a great year and

Interesting this popped up on my feed today. I just gave that advice to a friend and have said it to colleagues for years. Sometimes folks just gotta have someone or something to criticize. It is hard being in a leadership role. I said what I said.

As we begin this new school year these are great reminders for the whole team!

No matter if you are returning to teaching or live, our kid go’s are going to need special attention this year. Many have been isolated, disconnected from learning and from friends. Some of our more vulnerable kiddo’s have been hungry or abused. Covid has hurt more than our children’s health it has impacted their bows as well as their futures. Our precious children need more than a teacher this year. They are counting on you.

For all of you overseas educators out there here is an articel written by one of our MS Counselors, Amanda Abel about TCK's (Third Culture Kids).

“Be a Global Citizen, as you travel over CNY”
If you’ve ever traveled, you can probably relate to the excitement one feels when stepping off a plane into a new cultural landscape. Looking around, senses on high alert, adrenaline rising, we feel alive in the moment as we face the unknown. Some of my most unusual and beautiful experiences have come from my travels. Whether it was spending the night in a mud hut in the bush in Zimbabwe; watching the sun set as cowboys round up cattle on a ranch in Cuba; or bedding down in a Mongolian yurt, sipping warm yak milk; I’ve learned and grown from every place I’ve lived and every location I’ve visited. But even after 30+ years of expat life and extensive travel, I still experience a certain level of culture shock when traveling. It’s normal. And it’s to be expected.

When traveling with students on long educational trips, one way I have found to mitigate the ill effects of culture shock is to encourage them to approach the situation from a mindful perspective. I remind them that new experiences can be framed positively or negatively—either with wonder and delight or with fear and disgust—and it’s up to them how they choose to look at it. Throughout the trip, I intentionally look for opportunities to frame and reframe our shared experiences toward the positive.

Educational travel at Concordia often involves service-oriented activities, which come with some discomfort and hardship that many students are not accustomed to. In these situations, I strive to make the experience a lesson in empathy (compassion in action). I model empathy by getting involved, starting conversations and demonstrating to students ways that we can help those in need. For me it is important to inspire students to seek out social opportunities to serve or be kind to the people they encounter on these types of trips.
We are raising global citizens in our homes and in our schools; the next generation will be the stewards of our planet and the peace makers of the future. As educators and parents, we should equip international students for the ups and downs and invite them to approach new cultural experiences from a growth mindset so they are better able to delight in the wonders of this amazing planet.

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Transitioning as a “Happy Lame Duck” in International Education

As a principal at a top tier international school I find myself in that awkward space between school assignments, some label this space as a time of being a “lame duck.” In international education it is the practice to let your school know you are leaving in the fall of your last year to allow them to recruit the best and brightest to replace you. So, after six wonderful years I am living into the role as a “Happy Lame Duck.”

So this year I have found myself thinking more and more about that long, long, interim between signing a contract for a job at a new school and finishing work at my old one. In international education it is not uncommon for the transition period to be one school year.

In my case, I am aging out and we knew early on that the school year would be my last. I accepted a position at another international school in late December. My final commitments for the spring semester will end in mid-June.

Depending on how you look at it that's a full school year knowing I was leaving and almost half a year in transition to a new position.

Associated with all of this I have navigated my way through packing and sending my household goods back to California. I visited my new school for a transition week. During that time I began making connections with my new colleagues in Kuwait. This has been a period so lengthy that it prompts laughter and astonishment from folks outside of international education. They just don’t understand the long transition period.

The lame-duck session for an academic moving from one position to another is not as simple as you might think. It can be a time of strained emotions, strange musings, hectic schedules, and dangerous temptations.

So far, I am getting by without catastrophe. With the help of friends and colleagues who have successfully, or traumatically, moved on, I have learned a few basic lessons about achieving a satisfying transition. It is natural for your school to begin moving on without you, you may be left out of critical conversations, decisions may be made without your input and there is a natural tendency for folks to separate from you, and you too to separate from them.

As the leaver you begin to start making connections with your new school community. Your tendency is to start a mental shift to that new assignment and in the case of international educators, that move to another country and all that it entails. Because of this tendency to separate if you think you are not paying enough attention to an advisee, you probably are not.

For many international educators, there is the reassurance that academe is a small world and that conferences and e-mail always allow personal friendships and professional relationships to continue. I have told my collogues and friends that I will be just an e-mail away if they need letters of recommendation or career advice. Your basic message to collogues should be: Departure is not abandonment.

Don't burn bridges ... in most cases leaving without recrimination or score settling soothes your own soul and allows for more pleasant months before the final exit.

Don't disappear. It is important to say goodbye to collogues and friends and to allow them closure but to provide that for yourself. Trust me you will be grateful that you took the time to leave well. It is just as important for your collogues to say goodbye to you as it is for you. In our school we actually have a class for leavers and stayers to navigate the ever changing lineup of faculty and staff. We have a similar program for parents and students leaving and staying.

No one should pretend that the transition period from one job to the next does not entail some compromises. Often when accepting a new position, we promised that we will not slack off my current duties. Most schools understand that transitioning faculty would have a lot of new things to pay attention to. They are right.

Even though I have been asked to undertake very little work by my future employers, the sheer weight of the distractions of finding housing, leasing a car, understanding medical care in a new country, getting onboard with the new school culture and the many other details of moving have absorbed a lot of my attention.

In all, there are many questions to answer and issues at hand for the academic who, unlike other occupations, essentially is offering a six-month notice rather than a two-week one. Planning ahead is good practical advice; it can also keep you sane during a hectic time.