How Might We Tend The Fire Together?

Last week Derek Wenmoth and I spent 3 days in Melbourne facilitating a 3 day retreat for 18 Lutheran educators and leaders to kick off the 20 week Refresh Reconnect Refocus (RRR) programme in Australia.

Derek has already published a post about the 3 day retreat which you can read here. He’s also published another post, What’s Lighting Our Fire?, which emerged from his reflections on the RRR retreat. He wonders, in this post, if we aren’t focusing enough on what’s worth fighting for and perhaps focusing too much on issues to fight against. 

I particularly liked his metaphor of us tending the fire together and his posing of the question:

What if choosing to put our energy into visioning, building, and nurturing the kind of system we believe in is the most strategic and courageous thing we can do right now?

This got me thinking about the importance of doing this together with like-motivated people and creating a movement to keep the fires burning and maintaining the momentum towards a transformed system, rather than merely focusing on individual schools.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about the RRR programme Derek and I have been leading over the last 18 months. In that time we have worked with 3 cohorts - 14 primary and secondary school principals from Aotearoa NZ and Rarotonga, 18 primary and secondary assistant and deputy principals from Aotearoa, and 18 principals and senior leaders from New South Wales and Victoria. 

One of the areas we focus on in the programme is on supporting the leaders to dive deeply into their personal why, explore how that can become a moral purpose for them in their work, discover tools to support them in that work and to use a change framework that maintains momentum over a 20 week period.

However, we were determined to support the leaders to realise that they don’t have to be alone in this week, but that it is more important that they see themselves as a network of leaders not only grappling with similar issues but also having similar dreams of how things could be. They each have a buddy with whom they check in with each week, each is teamed up with either Derek or myself for 3 weekly 1-on-1 remote mentoring sessions, we gather together remotely to participate in webinars with international thought leaders and to share our journeys to that point, and then we all come together for a final day of celebration.

We have built these features into our unique programme to emphasise that we’re all in this together. These elements act as accountability mechanisms and have us tending the fire together.

So, what have the participants said about the programme?

“The programme has re-ignited my leadership focus. I feel re-energised, re-focused and ready for action! Not only have I rediscovered my motivation for leadership, but I also gained a support network of like minded people I feel I can call on when needed. I don't particularly have that in my own context, but I've found it here.” 

NZ Principal

“Realistic and relevant, inspiring and helpful, a collaboration that flows and makes sense.”

NZ APDP

“What a terrific opportunity to connect and learn alongside colleagues whilst being led by the very passionate Derek & Maurie. Inspiring, thought provoking and exciting journey to explore over the next 20 weeks and beyond!”

Australian Senior Leader

So, that’s 50 school leaders who’ve delved deeply into their ‘why’, who’ve imagined what might be possible in their schools with the support of those on the programme, who’ve discovered tools that will allow them to maintain momentum, who’ve identified a particular challenge to focus on, who’ve adopted an experimental mindset as they plan next steps within a rigorous change framework and who see themselves as system leaders.

Sounds like the beginnings of a movement to me.

If this is a movement you’d like to be part of send us an email at threersprogramme@gmail.com and we’ll keep you informed about our future programmes.

While I believe our RRR programme is a vital component of any movement, it is part of a wider ecosystem involved in tending the fire. Other key networks include DisruptedNZ and Aotearoa Education Collective (AEC).

There is a real sense of community and momentum developing. AEC is running an impressive UpliftEd conference in October which I highly recommend checking out and the Disrupted Facebook page and X account is a particularly active sharing space.

I challenge education people who want to be part of a movement of school and system transformation to participate in all opportunities such as those above and others still to come. Watch this space.

  

How Might We Maintain Momentum While Leading in Schools?

Derek Wenmoth and I have just reached the half-way point in this year’s Refresh Reconnect Refocus (RRR) programme we have been running with 18 primary and secondary schools Assistant and Deputy Principals.

We began with a 2 day Retreat in Wellington in late January before the start of school where participants were supported through a process of exploring their ‘why’ as leaders, experiencing a range of tools which could be used to bring their ‘why’ to life, imagining what they might be able to achieve and then honing in on an issue to focus on for the following 20 weeks.

Over the next 20 weeks we remain connected in the following ways as a group to foster both a sense of ‘being-in-this-together’ and being accountable so that there is the best chance to maintain momentum:

• Each participant is allocated a buddy from the group and commit to making contact with each other on a weekly basis to check on progress

• Derek and I meet on line with each participant every 3 weeks where we support them to make progress with their focus area, problem-solve together and plan next steps

• Specialist webinars are scheduled with national and global education thinkers to expose participants to up-to-date thinking and trends

• On line whole group hui to share progress

We’re currently at the halfway point and have just had a whole group hui where each participant briefly shared their experience with their focus area. They were all asked to name the dominant emotion they were experiencing at this point in the year, specifically in relation to their particular focus area.

All of the participants are very busy APDPs in schools and are having to manage a range of demanding situations on a day-to-day basis, whether that be an ERO visit, overcrowding, increased pastoral issues, high levels of neuro-diverse students, rapidly changing curriculum and assessment and any number of other issues. Sometimes they have felt overwhelmed.

I was extremely impressed by the momentum they were all able to maintain within that demanding environment. There is no doubt that the accountability measures within our programme have supported that momentum, but most of it has come from within themselves as they set about leading, confident in their ‘why’ and using newly acquired tools.

What blew me away the most was the list of emotions they identified they were experiencing as a result of maintaining momentum within these demanding situations. They were feeling Proud, Inspired, Challenged, Heartened, Productive, Ready, Satisfied, Hopeful, Assured, Motivated, Excited and Humbled.

As we approach the last week of term, what better emotions would we want our school leaders to be experiencing?

Derek and I were able to express our pride in their work and the way in which they were all maintaining momentum. We also felt proud of the programme we were delivering and how it had contributed to those positive emotions revealed above.

In summing up our hui, Derek identified 2 strong themes that were evident from their sharing. The first was that while they were all working on quite different focus areas they were all working on developing coherence, through their focus area, across the school.

The second was that they were all demonstrating leadership in ways that impacted beyond the area they were working on. Several commented that through involvement in the programme and applying new insights they were thinking about their own leadership in different ways.

When asked to sum up, participants spoke of the common thread of perseverance that they were noticing from fellow participants and of the leading through humanity, based on a strong understanding of their ‘why’, that surfaced throughout the sharing.

These participants all displayed a clear moral purpose, that they were open to learning and, above all, that they had the courage to take action.

Feeling proud.