Rabbi Jeffrey Schrager is a middle school Judaic studies teacher at the Akiba Academy of Dallas, Texas.
In this Dallas school, a 21st century educational thinker is paired with an early 20th century mussar master to create a transformational vision of professional development.
Many ascribe the survival and success of the Jewish people to its focus on constant learning. As a result, interest in learning may be seen as the ultimate prerequisite to entering the field of Jewish education. In our busy lives, we frequently face demands on our time and energies that can hold individuals and institutions back from reaching their potential by missing opportunities to further their knowledge.
The role an administrator can play in negotiating this dilemma cannot be overstated. The role of a principal ideally encompasses many facets, educational and otherwise. Our school, Akiba Academy of Dallas, has undergone a transformation in culture over the last five years due largely to the educational agenda of our head of school, Rabbi Zev Silver. Through identification of themes on which to focus, and constantly promoting the expansion of our community’s breadth and depth of knowledge, Rabbi Silver has targeted specific areas of interest and as a result our school has flourished.
I. Rafe
The first, and probably most impactful, focus introduced to our school was the writings and methodology of Rafe Esquith. Rafe, as even his students call him, in his books There Are No Shortcuts and Teach Like Your Hair’s On Fire, outlines an educational philosophy based on character development and hard work. Through determination rather than flashy programs, Rafe accomplishes extraordinary feats with low-income students in his Los Angeles public school. He also teaches his students Lawrence Kohlberg’s six levels of moral development and helps his fifth graders understand how those levels relate to their real world interactions and decisions.
Rafe’s books profoundly impacted on our school. For more than a year, Rabbi Silver handed out copies of Rafe’s books to anyone and everyone who showed even a hint of interest, and even to many who showed no interest at all. Teachers were not coerced into reading Rafe’s writings, but many of us were taken by his thought and installed his “Be Nice, Work Hard” mantra as a core of our daily lessons. We taught our students Kohlberg’s stages of moral development, and we emphasized the importance of not taking shortcuts along the paths of life.
Rabbi Silver enhanced our application of Rafe by teaching Rav Eliyahu Dessler’s discussion of Givers and Takers. Rav Dessler suggests the division of any group of people into those that give and those that take. He argues that functional societies, explicitly including schools, rely on Givers. Additionally, a Giver forms bonds with the recipients of their generosity, developing an unparalleled closeness. Rafe’s approach fit perfectly into Rav Dessler’s teachings. Students were soon asked whether their actions were those of a giver or a taker, with the emphasis firmly on the former. Every teacher, Judaic and General studies, studied texts of Rav Dessler’s writings at our opening staff meetings.
The most important aspect of our teachers’ guided learning was the commonality of language we developed as a staff. Students from Kindergarten through eighth grade heard the same types of phrases and similar terminology. Students were asked in many different settings to consider the motives behind their actions. In fact, a few eighth graders began a running count of how many times they heard certain phrases like “level six” or “are you being a giver or a taker?” For example, rather than disciplining a student for talking during tefillah, we engaged in conversation with them about the effect their talking has on others. The example of morning prayers may be the best example of the effectiveness of this approach. In the span of one year, we saw a minyan that was notable only for its lack of davening become a place of serious tefillah betzibur. Even that year’s graduation showed the impact of our common terminology as several students included our buzzwords in their graduation speeches.
Much of the progress we made that first year and subsequently has been due to the shared learning experience initiated by our administrators establishing a model of growing ourselves individually and collectively. Learning with teachers across conventional educational boundaries, such as age groups and subjects taught, allowed for greater discussion around the school in general, and also encouraged us to feel more bought in to the process of cultural change.
II. Communication
As an area of our teaching rooted in our core personalities, our interaction with others demands thorough examination. As such, Rabbi Silver spent several months researching and collecting material focused on effective communication. In presenting material to teachers, we broke down the subject into three divisions: effective communication with students, parents, and colleagues. Importantly, students were involved as we often discussed strategies for effective communication with peers and adults.
Our learning was framed by the verse “the words of the wise are heard softly,” (Eccl. 9:17), and for teachers one of our main discussions centered on the tone of voice when addressing students. Study after study highlighted the ways in which yelling can “flip” a student who was otherwise engaged to shut down intellectually and emotionally. We spend much time on lesson planning, grading, and other important aspects of teaching. We look for new ways to teach and reach our students always. But all too often, any innovation or progress meets its doom at the hands of one moment of passion in which a student recoils at the tone of voice in which their teacher speaks to them.
Greatest evidence of transformation in this particular area could be seen in our focus on communication between colleagues. We discussed the culture of the teacher’s lounge extensively and focused on research regarding how administrator-teacher and teacher-teacher communications could impact a student’s view of effective communication. While, obviously, we can’t claim that our school is now free of ineffective communication, the result of our studying the subject as a whole was at the very least a heightened awareness that has shaped the culture at the school for teachers and students.
III. Progressive education
In perhaps the most ambitious period in our school’s collective learning, we focused next on themes in progressive education. Reading the works of authors like Alfie Kohn and Madeline Levine was, at times, painful. Our first meeting on the subject, during which we discussed an article by Kohn outlining his views on homework was intense. He argues in the article we read and in his book The Homework Myth that many use homework ineffectively, and that students are overwhelmed with what essentially amounts to busy work. Many teachers objected strongly to his somewhat radical ideology and solutions. They argued that high school, college, and the real world require individuals equipped with strategies to approach large amounts of work effectively.
Subsequently, our school community held a screening of The Race to Nowhere, a documentary that discusses the workload our students face and its effects on the child’s overall mental health and productivity in school and life. The most successful segment of the evening, however, was our panel discussion following the film. Supporting our strong culture of learning together, teachers and parents engaged in a unique dialogue clarifying themes in the movie and possible actions moving forward. This parent-teacher interaction was one example of the ways the school endeavored to include parents in our learning community. Moving forward, engagement of parents through shared continuing education constitutes a wonderful next step in our school’s growth.
In many ways, we were encouraged to push the envelope in developing our educational philosophy. Ideas we discussed fly in the face of conventional and some contemporary educational theory. We did not all agree as to how we could pursue change or whether change was even necessary. Some excellent teachers rejected change after careful consideration. Similarly, many parents articulated their support for metric based assessment as opposed to some of the more radical suggestions we discussed. But we were clearly given license to pursue bold ideas and challenged to leave our comfort zones.
IV. Technology
Most recently, our focus centered on arguably the hottest subject in education: the positives and negatives of technology in the classroom and in our lives. Our school, like many across the country, received a grant to install Smartboards in several classrooms and later acquired several iPads, compelling us to consider our use of technology more seriously. As they contain many of the central questions facing the future of education, discussions concerning technology frequently elicit passionate emotions, as well they should.
Rabbi Silver pushed us to understand the positives and negatives of technology in our student’s lives. Several teachers received subscriptions to the Marshall Memo, a weekly digest of thirty-nine educational periodicals. This resulted in increased interaction amongst teachers discussing topics raised in the Marshall Memo. Since educational publications increasingly cover issues inherent to technological developments, our conversations followed suit. Sometimes discussions were as simple as sharing an interesting website that had possibility for use in our school. Concerns regarding technology also led us to further discussion. As with every area of concentration, Rabbi Silver purchased several copies of books covering our subject matter and they were circulated amongst the staff. Almost every teacher ended up reading The Shallows by Nicholas Carr and many read Larry Rosen’s iDisorder.
In both books, technology’s impact on its consumers is discussed at length, and both preach caution in consuming electronic media. Some teachers, as a response to the growth of e-books and magazines, increased the number of paper and ink readings they gave their students. Others, embracing the reality that their students were using cell phones and computers more often than not, built lessons around those technologies in creative and inspiring ways.
One of the critical factors in the success of the school’s transformation into a learning community was Rabbi Silver’s commitment that this course of study and discussion would not involve indoctrination or creating a monolithic approach to issues like technology. No teacher was told they had to use a certain technology a certain number of times or, alternatively, to reduce their practices and we have seen gains in many areas as a result, but those changes were not mandated by administrators. As a group, we endeavored to articulate our rationale both to ourselves and our students. Learning as a group strengthened us as a group. Our strength developed not despite our diversity, but because of it.
Obviously, we must face the critical question of whether or not our students learn better as a result of our learning community. Happily, test scores have increased and we hear reports that our students are better prepared for high school now than they were several years ago. But we have also seen a remarkable transformation in our students’ approach to learning. Students are simply more interested in exploring their areas of interest than they were prior to beginning this journey. Five years ago, if the response to a student’s question was “you should really look that up,” little came of the conversation. Now, it is not uncommon for a student to come in the next day armed with a page of information that they’d like to present to the class. A clear trend exists in the school: the administration inspired the teachers who, in turn, demonstrated for their students the importance of learning as a core value.
Of course, a culture does not change overnight. But when a head of school drives the learning of the entire school community, they enable that learning to avoid the pitfalls of short term solutions or quick fix programs. Focusing on the process, the topics we discussed were not for staff meetings or teacher in-service days only, but the attitude of administrators encouraged a constant, directed emphasis on growth that has transformed the culture and quality of education in our school. We don’t always see the dividends of our efforts immediately, and it took several years to cultivate the environment at our school, but, as Rafe says, there are no shortcuts.