The podcast by education leaders for education leaders

How to Lead a Culture of Learning and Vulnerability

Guest(s): Elisa B. MacDonald
Date: 05/06/2024
Run time: 42:42
Season 7, Episode 4

In this episode, Peter DeWitt, co-host Mike Nelson and guest Elisa MacDonald tackle the challenging, yet rewarding task of discussing the importance of vulnerability within the educational community. Not only does MacDonald urge educators to be open about their struggles with their students, but she also emphasizes the need for this transparency amongst professional peers. She believes that by allowing students and colleagues to witness our challenges and the process of turning them into triumphant victories, we forge a potent precedent. This approach aids in constructing a culture that values perpetual learning and growth. In an interesting twist, MacDonald points out an intriguing paradox: the power in leading with intent and purpose while simultaneously staying open and receptive to the learning process. Join Peter, Mike, and Elisa for a deep dive into the nuanced art of teaching, leading, and learning, painting a picture where vulnerability is reframed from weakness to strength.

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Elisa B. MacDonald

An educator for 30 years, Elisa B. MacDonald is the author of the best-selling book, The Skillful Team Leader: A Resource for Overcoming Hurdles to Professional Learning for Student Achievement. Her broad-ranging experience includes roles such as teacher, literacy coach, and assistant principal of instruction in the Boston Public Schools and adjunct professor for teacher action research at Boston College. As national director at Teach Plus, Elisa built up and led a program in six cities in which teams of teachers in chronically underperforming schools achieved rapid gains for students. Currently, Elisa consults with school districts and organizations, training and coaching team leaders and helping to transform teacher, school, and district-level leadership teams.

When Elisa isn’t championing students and teachers, she is on stage acting, driving her twins to soccer and theater, or experimenting in the kitchen, pretending she’s on the Food Network. Contact Elisa if you want to learn more about skillful intentional team leadership, or if you just want a delicious fudge recipe.

www.elisamacdonald.com
skillfulteamleader@gmail.com
(Twitter) @elisaBmacdonald
(LinkedIn) Elisa B. MacDonald

Peter M. DeWitt

Peter DeWitt (Ed.D) is the founder and CEO of the Instructional Leadership Collective. He was a K-5 teacher for 11 years and a principal for 8 years. For the last 10 years, he has been facilitating professional learning nationally, and internationally, based on the content of many of his best-selling educational books.

DeWitt's professional learning relationships are a monthly hybrid approach that includes both coaching and the facilitating workshops on instructional leadership and collective efficacy.

Additionally, in the Summer of 2021, DeWitt created a year long on-demand, asynchronous coaching course through Thinkific where he has created a community of learners that include k-12 educators in leadership positions.

DeWitt's work has been adopted at the state level, university level, and he works with numerous school districts, school boards, regional networks, ministries of education around North America, Australia, Europe, Asia, the Middle East and the U.K.

Peter writes the Finding Common Ground column for Education Week, which has been in circulation since 2011. In 2020 DeWitt co-created Education Week's A Seat At the Table where he moderates conversations with experts around the topics of race, gender, sexual orientation, research, trauma and many other educational topics.

Additionally, DeWitt is the Series Editor for the Connected Educator Series (Corwin Press) and the Impact Series (Corwin Press) that include books by Viviane Robinson, Andy Hargreaves, Pasi Sahlberg, Yong Zhao and Michael Fullan.

He is the 2013 School Administrators Association of New York State's (SAANYS) Outstanding Educator of the Year, and the 2015 Education Blogger of the Year (Academy of Education Arts & Sciences), and sits on numerous advisory boards.

Peter is the author, co-author or contributor of numerous books. Click on title to purchase. They include:
Dignity for All: Safeguarding LGBT Students (Corwin Press. 2012).

Flipping Leadership Doesn't Mean Reinventing the Wheel (Corwin Press. 2014)

Collaborative Leadership: 6 Influences That Matter Most (Corwin Press/Learning Forward).

School Climate: Leading With Collective Teacher Efficacy (Corwin Press/ Ontario Principals Council. 2017).

Coach It Further: Using the Art of Coaching to Improve School Leadership (Corwin Press. 2018).

Instructional Leadership: Creating Practice Out Of Theory (Corwin Press. 2020).

Collective Leader Efficacy: Strengthening the Impact of Instructional Leadership Teams (Corwin Press. Learning Forward. 2021).

De-implementation: Creating the Space to Focus on What Works (Corwin Press. 2022).

Leading with Intention - Developing self-awareness to fostering an unreasonable human interconnectedness to impact the school community (co-authored with Michael Nelson. Corwin Press. 2024).

Peter's articles have appeared in educational research journals at the state, national and international level. His books have been translated into numerous languages.

Some of the organizations Peter has worked with are the American Association of School Administrators (AASA), Learning Forward, National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP), University of Oklahoma, Cognition Education (New Zealand), Australian Council for Educational Leaders (ACEL), Victoria Department of Education (Australia), University of Rotterdam (Netherlands), Washington Association of School Administrators (WASA), Texas Association of School Administrators (TASA), the National Education Association (NEA), New Brunswick Teacher's Association (Canada), the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP), Education Scotland (Scotland), Glasgow City Council (Scotland), Kuwait Technical College (Kuwait) the National Association of School Psychologists, ASCD, l’Association des directions et directions adjointes des écoles franco-ontariennes (ADFO), the Catholic Principals’ Council of Ontario (CPCO), and the Ontario Principals’ Council (OPC), National School Climate Center, GLSEN, PBS, NPR, BAM Radio Network, ABC, and NBC's Education Nation.

Learn more about bringing Peter DeWitt to your school or district at petermdewitt.com