Randy Weiner and James Bailey on The Daily SEL Leader

On this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast Rebecca Midles is talking with Randy Weiner and James Bailey about their new book The Daily SEL Leader: A Guided Journal.

Aside from being an author, Randy Weiner co-founded and served as the first Chairman of the Board at Urban Montessori Charter School (UMCS) in Oakland, CA—the nation’s first public Montessori, Arts Integration and Design Thinking school. He is also a co-founder and the CEO at BrainQuake, a two-time U.S. Department of Education Small Business Innovation Award winner.

James Bailey’s career has encompassed teacher, principal, school turnaround, principal consultant, and superintendent roles spanning Texas, Colorado, and Wyoming. As Superintendent in Wyoming,  his district was the first member in the state to join the League of Innovative Schools after reform efforts around personalized learning and social-emotional development.

Let’s listen in as they discuss the impetus for a daily SEL practice and the importance of educator self-care and self-efficacy.

The book focuses on providing daily SEL reflection and practice for leaders, it also serves as a guide for how school leaders can lead their community in its SEL journey. “We wish more research would be able to penetrate the school day. We know there isn’t enough time for school leaders to digest […] anything more than 400 words/day, you’re asking too much,” said Randy.

The book shows six different paths through the content, but you are also able to design your own path: “We want you to take agency of this journey.”

The authors expressed that it can be very easy to lose sight of what you’re trying to accomplish when it comes to SEL. That’s they believe it’s so important to have a daily practice.

“Adults who are not supported to develop these skills are somehow supposed to be able to develop these skills in young people. People are expected to teach these skills without having learned them themselves.”

Part of the problem is that adults get much better at covering their weaknesses than children are. This can result in poor performance, self-doubt, and more. “If a teacher believes that he/she can be good as a teacher they usually have much more job satisfaction […] Goal setting is an SEL skill, but it’s really just a learning skill — that is one of the easiest to teach, as opposed to self-awareness or things that are a bit messier.”

They also ask this profound question with regards to DEI and self-efficacy: “How conscious are you of the impact from when you’re wielding power — whether you know you are or not?”

“I think we may have missed the boat by putting so much pressure and accountability on our teachers. How do we make the workplace so inviting to people that they want to stay there?”

Go to DailySEL.com to check out courses and news related to the book and SEL.

Links:

Corwin
The Daily SEL Leader: A Guided Journal
Twitter: Corwin Press
Twitter: James Bailey
Twitter: Randy Weiner
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