I’m Drawing a Blank

My school district, Chimacum School District (CSD), has been experiencing an unprecedented decline in enrollment for the past bunch of years. When I started teaching at Chimacum Middle School (CMS) in 1997 there were about 370 students in grades 6 through 8. We had four classes at each grade level with approximately 120 students at each grade level. Fast forward to the 2018-19 school year and we have less than 150 students! Our 8th grade class has 42 students! From 120 to 42 is an extreme drop. I went from teaching four 6th grade Science classes to teaching two 6th grade and two 8th grade Science. On the bright side, class sizes are wonderful and I get to work with my kids as they enter AND exit middle school!

The reasons why families are leaving our district are varied and include the fact that our community is secluded enough that there just aren’t enough jobs here to keep growing families. So big changes are coming. Now I’m no stranger to change, CSD and CMS have gone through many changes in the 22 years I’ve been working there as is evidenced in so many of my older blog posts! But next year promises to have the biggest change I have seen our district undergo.

Ever since our last surge in enrollment the district built a new building a few miles away from the main campus to house our pre-K to 2nd grade students. You see, before that, all pre-K through grade 12 students were housed in the one campus pictured above. Since that time when our district had over 1,400 students we had our grades 3 through 5 elementary, grades 6 through 9 middle school, and grades 9 through 12 high school on the main campus. And even though we were all very close to each other spatially, we really were three completely separate identities.

With so few students our district is closing down the oldest building on the main campus and restructuring our three schools into two schools! We are going from being a 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12 campus to a 3-6 and 7-12 campus. The middle school, my school, is the identity that will be no more. That is more than a mere restructuring of grade levels, it’s the loss of who we’ve been since our district had a team recommend that we develop a true middle school model. And for me personally, it puts me in the awkward place of having to choose whether to go 3-6 or 7-12 because I teach 6th grade Science, 8th grade Science and a 7/8 Robotics course. In a perfect world, I would teach exactly what I’m teaching this year (since I’m having one of the best year’s of my career – go figure!), which will depend largely on the way the two buildings schedule their day.

Taking into account the programs I teach and the fact that with regards to curriculum, the 8th grade Science curriculum is an established curriculum so any Science teacher can take it and make it his or her own. My 6th grade curriculum has more that was developed by me mostly through many grants. That is more difficult for another teacher to pick up so I chose to make a case that the admin team considers keeping me in 6th grade in the 3-6 building.

Because of my recommendation the principal who is currently the elementary principal, who will be the 3-6 principal, asked to meet with me to find out what the Science program is and to let me know what is happening at the elementary. As hard as change like this can be, we are looking at the restructuring as an opportunity to see what we can make better for our students. The 3-6 principal listened to my 6th grade program and filled me in on some of the elementary’s programs and how they are forming a team to look at ways they can make a great 3-6 program for all our students. I of course volunteered to be on that team!

I was asked to share any innovative ideas for what we can do differently next year. I was excited and wanted to start sharing some of the ideas I’ve had throughout the years I’ve been active on Twitter and learning from so many amazing teachers on my PLN but I drew a blank. I was just like, “okay,” and left the meeting thinking of what I could bring to the team that would inspire some innovative ideas for next year.

I’m still drawing a blank! We’re going to start meeting next week Thursday and I can’t think of anything having to do with innovating scheduling, innovative team teaching, innovating combos, or anything like that! I’ve been so focused on innovating my classroom that I don’t have any ideas for a whole building!

I have a lot to offer! I am a teacher trainer in understanding the NGSS, I’m a teacher trainer in Gamification and Game-Based Learning, I even co-teach a workshop on Innovating your teaching, I am very adept at integrating technology to make my classroom a 21st Century experience (that’s my main role on the Innovation Workshop Team), I have experience going grade-less and using Standards-Based Grading, I make sure to get my students outdoors doing real Science, I write grants like a beast and get materials for my students that the school cannot provide, and I am an integrationist who understands that STEM is more than just the S, T, E, and M (it includes so much more)! Is that enough? I feel like I should have ideas for team teaching? I feel like there are things I should know and share regarding teaching kids according to choice and not just by grade level or something like that. I feel like I should have more ideas but I don’t!!

Help! If you had an open-minded principal who put a team together to redesign their elementary school to include a new grade level and offer amazing experiences for the students what would you suggest? What am I missing?? I sure do feel like I’m forgetting something BIG.

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