When nothing is the same …

 Continuing the "change" theme 

While this writer cannot speak for any industry besides education, I have to believe that the way we spend our time "at work" or "from home" has dramatically changed, beginning in March. It is not an exaggeration to say that we get update, change, or stop style emails nearly every day. Well, okay, we never get anything that says "stop" in education. In meetings we also talk about "whatever the new normal might be." None of us knows. 

Technology Integration

We have to learn from the technology integration we have been suddenly forced to learn. We have an opportunity to dramatically change instruction and learning with the sudden use of devices and sharing of Internet options with families. Also, teachers have learned skills and apps they never thought about before — not to mention the chance to pilot many tools and techniques. We can learn from this. 

Family engagement

We are now communicating with families in new and adventurous ways. It's engagement time, and we are finding creative ways to contact families. We use Zooms, Google Meets, Google Voice phone calls, home visits, etc. We are getting closer to having families understanding what goes into education, and it's a great thing. We have to continue the engagement when we get back to … "normal?" 

Board/administrative Relationships 

We are in an era when we are all vulnerable and sharing "real time" data that impacts where we go immediately. Principals are having more interaction with Boards than ever before because they are sharing information about daily logins, weekly performance, two–way communications and other things we never have had to think about before. And all of this information drives decisions on a monthly basis when we "reconfirm" our plans. 

Relationships. Period. 

Suddenly, we have confirmation that education revolves around relationships. Community partnerships; third-party contracts; team building activities; principal/staff relationships (virtually!); virtual board meetings (!); etc. These truly are crazy times, but we will find the value in what we have learned and change the way we do education. Now, we know we can … so we must! 

Keep the faith!