Summary

Do you believe that students learn more from what we as adults do than from what we say? If so, do you struggle to align day-to-day educational practices with your community's stated goals for learning? You may be surprised at how many successful programs and services already exist in your school district just waiting to be identified. Our democracy depends on strong public schools that produce successful lifelong learners. And strong public schools depend on strong partnerships between schools and communities. This guide describes how these partnerships can be created and sustained from the classroom to the boardroom by following these five steps: 1. Understanding and aligning the personality of your school district with the overall personality of your community. 2. Asking quality questions that promote a commitment to a common purpose. 3. Making quality a habit by creating organizational structures that celebrate differences within acceptable community standards. 4. Focusing on success as a means of renewing schools from within rather than imposing solutions from the outside. 5. Managing tasks so that your stakeholders learn to appreciate different personalities as a necessary part of your problem-solving process. Central office administrators, school board members, principals, and teacher leaders will find these five practical steps useful in creating and sustaining quality schools.