Day 9

 From a Super Bowl Quarterback to the  former Mayor of New York and from a 17  year old girl who wouldn’t be silenced to an  author whose blog I read daily,  this year’s  lineup of inspirational speakers at Leadercast  2015 did not disappoint.

The theme of Friday’s Live Simulcast from Atlanta, Georgia was “The Brave Ones” and each speaker wove examples of bravery into their thought provoking, heartfelt and at times humourous stories. Social media was abuzz with Facebook posts and threads of Twitter feeds throughout the day and into the evening as audience members around the world shared quotes and connections which resonated with them both personally or professionally.

There was such depth and personal connection to each speaker’s presentation that I didn’t feel that I could do them justice by combining them all into one post. So I’ve decided to dedicate the next few posts, with each one focusing on one of the speakers, to my Leadercast experience.

Speaker One

This was my first experience hearing Andy Stanley, a pastor and author from Atlanta, and I was immediately drawn into his world of analogies. His first connection of a leader as a conductor of an orchestra is one that I’ve read before. I believe that Fullan uses something similar in The Principal ~ Three Keys to Maximizing Impact. In my role, working with such talented Coordinators, TOSAs and Coaches, I love his conductor connection to leadership. My team has such passion and depth of knowledge of Literacy, FSL and ESL, that I could never do their job. My role is to ensure that, when we are all doing our jobs in harmony, we are serving the needs of the system as an united front.

As he continued, Stanley posed two questions:

“What do I believe is impossible to do in my field … but if it could be done, would fundamentally change my business?  And “What breaks your heart?” It’s almost as if he knew me ~ challenge my head and then hit me hard in the heart. When I think of our work in the world of system Language leadership, I know exactly what breaks my heart ~ children leaving our educational system without functional literacy skills or not embracing the power of loving to read.  What seems impossible, but would be a game changer? If we could empower every teacher to see themselves as readers and writers and to love reading and writing and to share that love with their students, that would certainly change my world ~ and for the better.

 Listening to Stanley and thinking about being  braver than I’ve been, I have a renewed sense  of mission and passion for our work.

How would you answer those questions?

Come write with me….