Due: 24th March
“He waka eke noa”
We are all in this together.
Module Objectives:
Upon completion of this module, participants will be able to:
- Articulate their personal leadership philosophy and goals.
- Develop a compelling vision for student success that is inclusive and equitable.
- Align their personal goals and vision with the school’s mission and strategic plan.
- Identify and utilise relevant resources to support their leadership development.
Task 1: Defining Your Leadership Philosophy
Reflect on your values. What are the core values that guide your personal and professional life? How do these values influence your approach to leadership?
Consider your beliefs about learning. What are your beliefs about how students learn best? What are your beliefs about the role of the teacher in the learning process?
Define your leadership aspirations. What impact do you want to have as a leader? What are your long-term goals for your leadership journey?
Explore different leadership styles (e.g., transformational, servant, instructional). See below for resources to explore. Which styles resonate most with you? Why?
Briefly journal your reflections and insights from this activity. You might like to prepare to share your thoughts with your learning partner(s), as a way to introduce yourself at a deeper level than you might do ordinarily. You will meet your learning partner at PLG 1 (21st March).
Task 2: Defining Student Success
Explore diverse perspectives on student success. Consider the following questions:
- What does it mean for students to be successful academically? Socially? Emotionally? Culturally?
- How can we ensure all students, regardless of their background or learning needs, experience success?
Develop an inclusive definition of student success that applies to all learners in your school.
Discuss your definition of student success with colleagues and seek their feedback.
Task 3: Aligning with the School’s Mission
Carefully review the school’s mission statement, values, and strategic goals.
Analyse how your personal leadership goals and vision for student success align with the school’s overall direction.
Identify any areas where your personal leadership goals and vision may need to be adjusted to better support the school’s priorities.
Share your reflections on the forum in 150 words or less.
Resource Bank:
Explore the resources most relevant to you and your personal reflections:
- The New Zealand Curriculum – https://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/
- Tātaiako: Cultural Competencies for Teachers– https://teachingcouncil.nz/assets/Files/Code-and-Standards/Tataiako-cultural-competencies-for-teachers-of-Maori-learners.pdf
- Leading Learning: A Professional Standards for Principals and Senior Leaders– https://teachingcouncil.nz/professional-practice/our-code-our-standards/
- Leadership Styles – https://hbr.org/2024/04/6-common-leadership-styles-and-how-to-decide-which-to-use-when
- Transformational Leadership –https://www.forbes.com/councils/forbescoachescouncil/2024/08/13/transformational-leadership-the-how-and-why/
- Servant Leadership – https://positivepsychology.com/servant-leadership/
- Instructional Leadership – https://schoolreviews.education.qld.gov.au/res/Documents/spotlight-paper-instructional-leadership.pdf
- Seven Strong Claims About Successful School Leadership Revisited – https://www.profdavidhopkins.com/assets/docs/Seven%20strong%20claims%20about%20successful%20school%20leadership%20revisited.pdf
Assessment:
- Self-reflection throughout the module.
- Completion of all activities – journaling for Task 1, conversation with colleague for Task 2 and post on forum for Task 3.
- Peer feedback and discussion within the online forum.
13 Responses
My personal leadership goals strongly align with our schoosl mission. I try to emphasise on developing resilient students which directly supports the school’s aim to cultivate resilient members of the global community. I believe and am commitmeted to fostering well-rounded individuals is aligned with the mission’s focus on developing compassionate students. My aspiration to instill a strong disposition for learning and growth aligns with the provision of a rigorous and enriching education addressing their academic needs. Ultimately, my goal of nurturing problem-solving and critical thinking skills contributes to the school’s broader aim of offering an enriching educational experience, ensuring students are well-prepared for the future.
My leadership style within my community currently would be a mixture between participative and transformational. The culture within my community has not been up to standard over the past couple of years so we have had a heavy focus on its values and standards. My school’s vision is for our students to be able to; challenge, excel and belong. The program that I’ve put together so far has been solely for the people within its community to belong. I believe that once they feel like they belong then the step to challenging and excelling is small.
As a coaching team there are three of us. We have shared ideas about what we want to do as a team but ultimately I have made the final decision in pretty much everything. After reading and listening to the resources I am keen to switch up my leadership style within the coaching group to a more servant leadership role. I want to give this a try as I believe it will allow me the freedom to switch up my leadership styles within the playing community. Moving between authoritative, transformational, participative and instructional depending on what is needed at any specific time.
My leadership philosophy centres on the question: How do students learn best? I believe they thrive in environments where they feel safe to take risks, where mistakes are seen as part of the learning process, and where their progress is visible. Above all, they learn best when they feel genuinely cared for and understood.
As a leader, I aim to foster a shared vision where everyone feels valued and empowered to contribute. I hope to continue growing in leadership, with aspirations toward a Deputy Principal role focused on pastoral care and mentoring.
My leadership style blends authoritative and instructional approaches. The school’s mission—to support students to reach their full potential within a caring, disciplined, and equitable environment—strongly aligns with my values. I believe in holding high expectations, building strong relationships, and creating opportunities that develop both students and staff into capable, confident contributors to our school community.
Mā tō rourou, mā tōku rourou, ka ora ai te iwi” Together as learners, we are inspired to grow is a whakatauki that our kura holds dear. This aligns with my beliefs as a leader in education as I believe that we are at our best when we learn from each other, with each other and for each other. Our school values are Mana and Aroha. I believe that integrity and care are extremely important values as people, as learners and as team members.
A major focus at our kura is around developing culturally responsive pedagogy across all curriculum areas. In pursuit of this we have developed a resource called “Te Tauranga Mataurana”. This resource is a guide to what culturally responsive pedagogy looks like and sounds like in a learning environment. In short, I believe that my own leadership aspirations align with the school direction. I am still discovering who I am and want to be as a leader, but I know that regardless, people will always be at the core of my focus and values.
Aroha mai for the late reply whānau…
“Mā tō rourou, mā tōku rourou, ka ora ai te iwi” — Together as learners, we are inspired to grow.
My leadership vision is built on strong, respectful relationships, high expectations, and meaningful learning contexts. Success, to me, includes academic achievement and emotional, social, cultural, and spiritual wellbeing. This aligns with our school vision and touchstones of mana and aroha—upholding dignity, connection, and care.
I support robust junior assessment to meet individual needs early, and value curriculum pathways that foster lifelong engagement. Under Ako and Hauora, I fully endorse the emphasis on inclusive teaching and student well-being, recognising that learners thrive when they feel safe, valued, and empowered.
I aim to strengthen my leadership by deepening my use of data to track intervention effectiveness across diverse groups. I am committed to ongoing growth, ensuring my leadership reflects culturally responsive practice, clear learning progressions, and our collective aspiration to nurture confident, connected learners.
Our school reviewed our strategic plan last year, as a middle manager we were consulted on the rewrite of the plan. These were streamlines to focus on four overarching goals:
1. Quality learning and high performing team
2. Physically, culturally and emotionally safe for all
3. Clear pathways for all
4. Bicultural capable
When reflecting on the strategic plan as a teacher, HoD and a leader, the goals are those that I have embedded into all three aspects of my work. They are goals that I strive to incorporate in all areas of my teaching. As a department we have them at the forefront of our planning and teaching. The area of development of me personally is the bicultural capable, as an overseas trained teacher, this is one aspect of the goals that I need to work harder as I have not grown up here and only have an outsider perspective. I seek out others who have the knowledge that I need to become better at this aspect.
Our schools values and mission statement fully align with my own values. Rotorua Intermediate uses the 3R’s- Respect for self, Respect for others and Responsibility for all your actions. These were created before my time starting at the school, but sit with me well. Like Wessel, the closeness to by own values, makes it easy for me to uphold and embody.
I find myself in all areas of my life professionally and personally using these to highlight or use as a discussion point to assess/highlight/bring forth, if something is right or wrong. I think it also calls on my cultural discourse of being Māori. Respect is a core fundamental, a pillar so to speak or being Māori. We were brought up to show respect for ourselves and our elders on the marae. It was evident and important when attending family gatherings, as well as when given a responsibility when there was tangi, a wedding or celebration. This would be with preparing or gathering kai, helping out in the kitchen or cleaning up after our elders. I attempt to instil these values into my own children and discuss this with them on a daily basis. I think they are imperative and necessary in our ever changing world.
This also is embodied within my leadership by the way I conduct myself with my team at school. These values work towards “earning the currency or marbles” to develop and foster trust within the team and with me as a leader. This might be through covering a duty when someone is busy, helping take their class when one of their kids is sick, having a courageous conversation and upholding the mana of the individual and what they bring, as well as role modelling when others are discussing other staff members and not engaging or leaving the conversation.
In regards to where my personal leadership goals and vision for student success align with the school’s overall direction, our vision as a school is to create adaptable, resilient, innovative, curious and collaborative students that are able empowered to thrive and develop in our ever changing world. My personal leadership goals support this by wanting to establish and grow an environment where my team is able to collaborate effectively with one another to “grow the good” and create learning spaces that support the schools vision. This is done by promoting the team to be brave with new ideas and stepping outside their comfort zone, by co-constructing learning and assessment with the students and by reminding our team to demonstrate resilience and remaining regulated when in challenging circumstances. I am constantly reflecting and running with new ideas that present themselves within my programme and with new initiatives around the school. I am hopeful that by role modelling this to others, they too can be brave.
Kia ora Mark, he tino pai o whakaaro! love the concept of “growing the good”. Earning the currency resonated with me – this is something I am working on.
Aē bro. Such a cool concept hey?
Task 3: Aligning with the School’s Mission
Core values that guide my professional life is authenticity, aroha and growth. Our school vision is to develop students to their full potential in God.
School Motto: Know God, Grow Character, Achieve Potential, Make a Difference. I strive to teach academic disciplines through curriculum while encouraging the development of Christian character along with a passion for Jesus. The journey is authentic, done with aroha and provides opportunities for educational and personal growth. As a leader I have an interactive approach to support and facilitate discussions and PD with colleagues. Throughout my educational career I have been proactive in promoting pedagogical change that is authentic, sustainable and supports the school motto.
Our school is currently in transition with a new board and principal. As such, the strategic plan has quite a different look than in previous years, which is to be expected. While students are still at the centre, most of the goals refer to other areas of school management.
My personal goals align with wanting to support all students to achieve as well as they possibly can and this is where I can make a difference through curriculum design. Some of the other strategic goals are outside of my sphere of influence.
Our school’s values were revised last year, and I was fortunate to be part of the team involved in the process. These values closely align with my own, making it easy for me to uphold and embody them in my work.
When reflecting on the school’s strategic goals, I find them to be well-structured and in line with my aspirations as both a teacher and a leader. This led me to consider a different perspective—if I had been responsible for setting these goals, what would they have looked like? The honest answer is that my version likely wouldn’t have been as comprehensive or well-balanced as the one we have now. The depth and thoughtfulness behind our current strategic goals reinforce my confidence in the direction our school is taking.