Iowans’ Ideas: A willingness to learn

Iowans' Ideas are guest columns featuring the views of different Iowans.

I am a 'school” person. I was very fortunate in high school to know that I wanted to be in a career that served other people. I was called to teach, just knew that was where I wanted to serve others - especially youth. School has been a part of my entire life, and I am very proud to be an educator.

I have worked with an amazing crop of fellow educators throughout my career, and I truly believe that my relationships with them, students, families and communities have driven me to always strive to do better - to serve them better. The calling to serve as well as my calling to continuously improve have been my anchors throughout this pandemic. As a superintendent, leading others through this experience has required me to keep my anchors solid - not only to drive myself but also for all of those whom I serve.

Something that I have come to learn as a school leader is that building a culture that creates a safe, supportive, collaborative environment produces greater results for everyone than a culture that does not create those factors.

Values inform strategies

As 'school people,” we are very experienced in producing plans, scopes and sequences of curriculum and schedules, and can organize a group of hundreds of children in seconds - all of those factors are evidence of strategies.

Strategies are crucial for every part of our system, and I have found during the pandemic, it is what everyone is craving to know - how do we intend to accomplish academics, sports, transportation, etc.?

What most have not been asking during the pandemic is how do we intend to create and foster a safe, supportive, collaborative culture?

They may be asking about personal protective equipment in the realm of safety, but they are not asking about our beliefs, values and the essence of our vision: Every Learner: Future Ready.

Therefore, although the strategies and plans to accomplish our return-to-learn planning have been critical, I have found that now - more than ever - I have had to be clear in my pronouncements about what we believe as a school district, what our vision and mission is and how important each and every person in our community is.

The unknown causes great uncertainty and unrest.

But when people know what we value and what we believe as a school district - our culture - they can rest a little easier and know that the strategies will come. Culture has remained our priority and a constant, even through our strategies have had to change.

Laptops and virtual meetings

As I have listened to students, staff, families and our community, the losses during this pandemic have been significant. Kids lost rites of passage, staff lost access to how they work, parents lost jobs and home life, and our community lost economically. It is challenging to find the silver lining in any of that.

However, I have found there have been some gains during this time. The crisis caused us not to just consider doing 'school” differently but required us to develop multiple ways to approach the school year.

Every child in Cedar Rapids Community School District will now have access to a laptop or device is one example of instructional shifts.

I have personally found that virtual meetings can be efficient and effective; not all meetings have to be in person (although, admittedly, I prefer them in most circumstances). The increased collaboration among our metro, Corridor and statewide school districts has increased tremendously during this time.

In addition, learning from CEOs and other leaders in our community has provided our school district a lens beyond school - we have learned so much from others and can do things differently.

Listen, collaborate, learn

Perhaps what I personally have gained the most as a leader during this entire pandemic is an even deeper appreciation of maintaining a willingness to learn and foster a growth mind-set every day.

I know that we made plans based on information we had on a Monday morning and had to change those plans because of the information we would receive from public health, the governor or the Department of Education by the afternoon. We have to remain flexible and adaptable.

Growth mind-set, flexible, adaptable

I think we all will remember what this pandemic brought to our lives. As we get on the other side of it, I am confident that our systems will look and/or feel different - but better.

I also am confident that our vision, mission and culture will remain constant: keeping our priorities focused on serving kids will continue to be our priority. Every Learner: Future Ready.

Noreen Bush is superintendent of the Cedar Rapids Community School District