If we try to make schools in the US more like schools in other countries, will that result in more effective practices?

Why do policies work in some districts, but not others?

Many ideas sound good on paper; but the people working with students or leading schools are telling a different story.

That’s why I invited reading specialist Jalita Johnson to episode 151 to share her expertise on these topics.

Jalita Johnson is a reading specialist in the Northern Virginia area and is also a veteran, wife and mom of 4. She completed her undergrad studies at Fayetteville State University, an HBCU near Ft. Liberty (formerly Ft. Bragg) North Carolina. She holds a Master's Degree in Elementary Reading.

​​She is currently enrolled in a Doctoral bridge program at George Mason for Educational Leadership. Over the years, she has come to realize that she committed to being a lead learner.

In this conversation, she shares:

✅Being an agent for change: Why her military background gave her the skills and experience to lead reform initiatives in education 

✅Syntactic complexity, and the disconnect between decoding/encoding and language comprehension

✅Professional development and learning communities: Does one size fit all?

✅What challenges come up when federal, state or district-level reform initiatives are modeled off of policies from other countries or states? 

The following resources were mentioned in this episode:

“Hacking School Leadership: What makes Teachers Happy and Why it Matters to Students” by Erika Garcia-Niles (Link here: https://www.amazon.com/Hacking-School-Leadership-principals-happiness/dp/1956512446/ref=sr_1_1?crid=OW0WCCPY7Q3F&keywords=hacking+school+leadership&qid=1699901781&s=books&sprefix=hacking+school+leadership%2Cstripbooks%2C87&sr=1-1)

Stacy Roberts, M.Ed, CCC-SLP, from Explore to Express (Link here: https://www.exploretoexpress.com/)

In this episode, I mention Language Therapy Advance Foundations, my program that helps SLPs create a system for language therapy. You can learn more about Language Therapy Advance Foundations here: https://drkarenspeech.com/languagetherapy/

I also mentioned The School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers guide their teams to support students’ executive functioning across the day. This program will help you plan direct therapy, but will also help you lead change management on your team, no matter your job title. You can learn more about the School of Clinical Leadership here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

We’re thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.