By Douglas R. Wermedal, PhD

Executive Director

He had a tough slot. His program was at 8:30 a.m. on the last day of a national conference. Is there enough coffee in the world to effectively tackle this time slot? He had a tough location. This year’s National School Board Association conference was held in New Orleans. You know the “Big Easy," “NOLA”, “Nawlins,” a city where there may be one or two social entertainment options for conference goers to engage the night before an 8:30 a.m. program session. He had a tough assignment: talking serious education issues with experienced educators who have been-there-done-that careers and were looking for solutions to move the needle on student achievement. Yet his session was packed—some attendees were second-timers having seen him at other conferences and wanting to see him again, like Springsteen groupies catching a matinee in Vegas.

His message benefited from the fact that he, Sean Buchanan is funny. In fact, he was non-stop, stand-up comedian, Netflix special funny and his authentic educational insights were all the more memorable because of how he deftly blended these insight with unique humor.

To give you just a taste of Buchanan’s humor here are some selected quotes from the slides which were scrolling just before his program started:

• “Please don’t text me while I’m in the middle of texting you. Now I have to change my whole text.”
• "I walk around like everything is fine but deep down. . .inside. . .my shoe. . .my sock is coming off.”
• "Silence is golden unless you’re a teacher. . .then it’s just suspicious.”

Perhaps most important is that his professional credentials do not arise from a cushy job in a well-funded district which is generously staffed, with high enrollment and classrooms populated exclusively with shiny, happy scholars. Buchanan is superintendent of Geary Public Schools of Geary, Oklahoma. Buchanan’s district has many parallels with South Dakota schools, located in a small rural town of less than 2,000, district enrollment is about 300 in just two buildings a junior/senior high building and an elementary school with a substantially mixed demographic. As a superintendent Buchanan is navigating many of the same circumstances you encounter in your school.

From Buchanan’s speaker bio we learn additional detail: “Sean Buchanan is an author, international speaker, consultant, and public school superintendent. He has become a leading expert in forming connections with and motivating educators through leveraging the power of human connection. His student-first philosophies have been presented to, and implemented by, thousands of educators both nationally and internationally. Mr. Buchanan was born and raised in Oklahoma and has dedicated his life to inspiring educators and driving student achievement.”

So catch Sean while he plays a one-day only engagement on Friday, August 9th in Sioux Falls at our annual conference. You can register online by clicking here.

For a sneak peak you can check out his website at www.seanbuchanansolutions.com.

Save me a seat and some coffee!

Tyler Pickner

Director of Communications

A package of rules affecting CTE instructor permits will head to a legislative body following a hearing by the South Dakota State Board of Education Standards.

The State Board of Education passed the rules at their meeting on Monday (5/20) and the package, which includes updates to international teacher reciprocity among many other changes, now awaits a hearing before the legislature’s Interim Rules Review Committee.

House Bill 1187, which allows schools to hire a CTE instructor on a one-year permit, is the impetus for a portion of the proposed rules. ASBSD supported the bill on its run through legislative session where it did not receive a no vote.

The bill requires a prospective CTE instructor to, in addition to having a high school diploma or the equivalent, meet one of three requirements to obtain a one-year permit

• An associate of applied science degree or higher; or
• At least two thousand hours of work experience in a related CTE field; or
• A national or state certification in a related CTE field.

View the proposed rules here (pages 25-30).

ASBSD Director of Policy & Legal Services Jessica Filler noted in testimony the list of certifications the South Dakota Department of Education would accept for eligibility would put “a limitation on who would qualify” for the CTE one-year permit.

DOE Division of Accreditation and Certification Director Kathryn Blaha reiterated to the board the “these are the endorsements that we have recognized.”

Filler said flexibility in the certificate categories would align with the bill.

“We would really appreciate a change to make the categories more broad,” Filler told board members. “That change would really match the intent of the legislation.

HB 1187 also included a renewal component to the one year permit and granted rule making authority to the State Board of Education to include a continuing education requirement for the one-year permit renewal.

The proposed rules cited another administrative rule, which Blaha said was “not something that’s part of your packet,” that requires 0.5 education-related credits required for the renewal requirement for the one-year CTE permit.

Filler requested “clarification” of the renewal requirement in the CTE one-year permit rule because otherwise “it’s vague if undefined.”

Rep. Stephanie Sauder, the prime sponsor of HB 1187, shared her thoughts with the board on the renewal requirement.

“It’s a local decision whether they (CTE instructor) should be going through additional professional development,” Rep. Sauder.

Secretary of Education Joe Graves said not having the continuing education requirement in rule would “create a loophole” and “nobody at the DOE has discretion” on the permit renewal process.

“If you (CTE instructor) meet the qualifications, it’s not as if we can say, ‘yeah, but this really wasn’t what we intended,’” Graves stated.

“You meet the qualifications, you get the permit, period. I do not want to create that loophole.”

Rep. Sauder shared with the board “the purpose of this bill was to make it an easier way to get our children educated and connect our community.”

Another portion of the proposed rules package discussed was the inclusion of a work experience recency requirement in order to obtain a CTE instructor permit. This is a separate permit from the one-year CTE instructor permit.

View the proposed rules here (page 21).

The proposed rule would require a CTE instructor to – in addition to holding an Associate Degree or higher in a related CTE field – have 4,000 hours of validated work experience in a CTE field earned within the previous five calendar years.

“There’s really a high need for CTE instructors,” Filler testified, adding the within five years work experience requirement “makes it more difficult” for schools “to fill those CTE slots.”

Filler noted the rule change is in the area of educational requirements for teaching permit seekers and state law requires “at least two years notice” before that rule would into effect “and that’s important for people who are looking to apply for a permit.”

ASBSD will provide additional updates on the rules package when it is presented to the legislature’s Interim Rules Review Committee.

By Holly Nagel

Chief Financial Officer and Director of Protective Trust Services

"It must be nice to have your summers off!?!?"

The comment that makes the hair on the back of the neck stand-up for many school district employees. Summer off? Have you ever been in a school during the summer? Administrators are deep into ending one fiscal year while starting the next, food service staff are doing the jobs they had no time to do during the school year and teachers are instructing summer school and preparing classrooms. And let’s not forget the custodians, they are doing, well, everything.

All of this activity makes for a successful, fresh start to the next school year. Who doesn’t love the shiny, freshly waxed floors, new carpet, refreshed paint, updated equipment, and of course, the new budget year? All of the staff should be refreshed and ready for the new school year, right?

As the current school year comes to a close, it is important to remember employee burnout can happen throughout the year, even in the summer. Work burnout is defined as chronic workplace stress that is not successfully managed, 75 percent of employees say they have this experience.

Are you worried that you or a staff member may be experiencing burnout but are unsure of the symptoms?

Burnout does not happen all at once. Symptoms include one or more of the following:

• Critical or cynical outlook
• Lack of motivation at work, or trouble getting started
• Irritable or inpatient with coworkers
• Energy depletion or exhaustion
• Difficulty concentrating
• Reduction in efficiency
• Unexplained headaches, stomach aches, or other physical aliments
• Lack of satisfaction from achievements

Exercise, eating a balanced diet, and good sleep habits can all help battle burnout, but most importantly, ask for help. It can be from a coworker, friend, family or your health care provider.

Burnout can be avoided by making self-care part of your daily routine. Even if you’re working long hours, juggling summer schedules, or taking care of young children, remember to sprinkle some joy into each day.

Try going for a walk, talking to a friend, or watching an enjoyable program on television. Small self-care gestures like these can stop stress from turning into something more serious, like burnout.

Additional information can found on Wellmark Blue.

By Douglas R. Wermedal, PhD

Executive Director

At high school gymnasiums across South Dakota our state is about to (or already has) broken out in caps, gowns, tassels, and teary mothers. The strains of Edward Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance will echo from within the same rafters that heard the graduate’s earliest kindergarten giggles. Proud parents, disinterested siblings, and grateful grandparents will crowd into uncomfortable chairs and hope for short speeches and a clear line of sight to their kid when their name is called.

I have participated in more than my share of graduations. My graduation ceremony count easily tops 75 between my own, my career, my kids, nieces, nephews, cousin, and a couple of abductions. The major memory I have of my own high school graduation was the rehearsal. School administration brought all the seniors in to show us how/where/when to walk and once we had that down, our principal read all 443 names of the 1981 graduating class. He told us this was done to hold down disruptive giggling from students hearing the middle names of our classmates -- many of them for the first time.

Good thing too, because I found out that one of my close friend’s middle name was Sylvester and if I had that precious knowledge earlier I would have spent most of high school greeting him every darn day with a hearty “hello puddy tat” just like Tweety Bird in the cartoons.

Having been on stage at so many graduations you do need to come up with something to occupy your mind. I have taken to looking at decorated mortar boards at the schools that permit this expression. There are always lots of “Thanks Mom and Dad” designs. I remember an FFA kid who put a toy cow and a single kernel of corn for it to dine upon on his hat, but my favorite was a tassel which had a plain red and white bobber on the tassel. Guess that graduate liked to spend time a little time on the water.

Graduation is a natural time for school board members to reflect on the impact of their efforts. Here in each graduate, and in each celebrating family, is tangible evidence that you have helped bring another student, another class, to the very threshold of their future. Sometime the success of your efforts will not be immediately discernable because you can only equip students for the future; they must go get it.

I had this opportunity to contemplate this thought during last year’s SDSU graduation. I was on stage and able to participate in my son’s college graduation ceremony. I could see my-soon-to-be-a-college graduate son from my seat on stage and for most of the ceremony he looked deeply detached from all that was going on around him. I had seen this look before. I could tell his mind was on food. A father knows these things about his son.

While he was contemplating the deliciously sauced wings from B-Dubs which awaited him at his graduation party, I considered the quarter century spent between his arrival on the planet and college graduation. His mother and I had invested heavily in this day. Literally invested in terms of finances and figuratively in terms of effort and emotion.

This kid was not at all focused on his academics during high school (frequently forgetting textbooks, assignments, where the school was located), this same student was now graduating magna cum laude and I felt magna cum lucky for having been a part of it.

We don’t always know the potential we have helped facilitate as school board members, or when it will awaken. But giving students the tools they can one day use, study habits, the spark of intellectual curiosity, the chance to test drive a few career potentials through activities and clubs, that is where the magic is. Now which way does that pesky tassel move, to the left or the right?