School Story
Principal Johnson:
Feeling Unsupported
Principal Johnson walked the hallways of Maplewood Elementary with a heavy heart. She recently noticed that the two new special educators in her school felt overwhelmed and unprepared in the initial weeks of their first year of teaching.
Despite being passionate and eager to make a difference, these teachers are struggling with developing IEPs and collaborating with their general education colleagues and families to meet the needs of students with disabilities. Principal Johnson attempts to provide guidance and support in response to her new teachers’ requests, but she soon realizes that she needs to proactively identify the teachers’ needs rather than wait for them to articulate those needs themselves.
She wants to first identify where gaps exist in IDEA knowledge, and then pinpoint which school systems and processes she can focus on to better support her new teachers. Her goal is to identify and address those needs, which she hopes will improve her teachers’ confidence and strengthen their practices, ensuring that they remain in the profession for years to come.
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Principal Actions
Committed to improving the experience of her new special educators, Principal Johnson takes steps to provide more immediate and targeted support. She regularly meets with the district special education director and joins a professional learning community offered by her principal association to deepen her own IDEA expertise and understanding of her role and responsibilities as a district representative on the IEP team. She also focuses on developing a better understanding of how to elevate the role of general and special educators in developing and implementing IEPs.
To build trust and stay informed about the challenges that special educators face, she conducts needs-sensing conversations, schedules classroom visits, and collects feedback on IDEA implementation in her building.
Principal Johnson also works with her district’s special education director to partner with a local university to discuss the gaps and needs of new teachers. The university provides her staff with access to continuing education opportunities and resources that deepen their understanding and implementation of IDEA, as well evidence-based and high-leverage practices (HLPs). To strategically align expectations from preservice to inservice, she begins embedding HLPs within her school's mentoring programs, ensuring that new special educators receive the support and resources they need to use the HLPs to support evidence-based instruction.
To set her new teachers up for success, and avoid burnout, Principal Johnson uses a pulse check tool to survey all of her staff regularly and schedules follow-up meetings to address any issues, paying particularly close attention to new teachers. She opens lines of communication, establishes meaningful interactions with new special educators and the families of students with disabilities, and assigns experienced mentors to support the new teachers.
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Toolkit
Supporting and Empowering Novice Teachers
Explore strategies that research and best practices highlight, along with short, medium, and long-term solutions, as crucial for supporting and boosting the confidence and skills of new or novice educators.