November 2019 Prairie Update

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Thoughts from Gayle....

Prayers Requested

Over the last week, Jeremy Horlings (PCCE Associate Executive Director) had been in the hospital with extreme vertigo. The doctors are still trying to determine the cause, and Jeremy is experiencing very slow improvement. He will be taking some time to continue his recovery at home. His requested prayer is for complete healing and for this to be a one-time event rather than a chronic condition.

CONVENTION REFLECTIONS

“In my years with PCCE he would rate in the bottom two or three keynote speakers.” AND “I loved it and all of the time to reflect and interact.

Best speaker ever!”

Some of you love workshops that are practical (“something to use in my classroom on Monday”) & some of you love to be challenged on a more “philosophical” level.

Some of you appreciate singing new songs & others prefer all the music to be familiar.

Some of you are happy when there are sweet treats at the break and some call for more veggies.

Such diverse opinions, all expressed on the evaluation form! I guess when you get 400+ educators together, the diversity shouldn’t be surprising. So just one encouragement for us all: graciously remember that this diversity exists and that what you are loving, the person sitting beside you may not be and vise versa.

That being said, the overall reflections on Convention were very positive. For every question asked (keynote, workshops, food, facility, registration, worship etc), the overall scores ranged from 4.14-4.93/5.0, with a score of 4.56 for the overall extent to which convention met expectations. We haven’t yet compiled the final report, so to the 300 of you who didn’t yet respond, you can still complete the Convention EVALUATION.

A special thanks to the PCCE staff and Ruth, in particular, for their exceptional commitment to organizing a top quality learning event each year. Next year in Calgary: October 22-23.

Lost and Found Item from the Convention

Northeast Christian School found a XXL Cleo Black Pleather Blazer after this year's convention. If it is yours, please email Lisa to make arrangements to retrieve it.

Teachers

Book Club

The kick-off event for you and 100 of your closest
colleagues is next Thursday Nov 14, 2019 at 4:00 pm (MST).
We will be meeting via ZOOM with author David Smith. You do not need to read the book prior to this event. We’ll be sending the ZOOM information to the participants next week.

GRADES VS COMMENTS

There has been lots of discussion over the years on this topic. This ARTICLE presents a researched and nuanced view of what is often talked about in more simplistic ways.

Administrators

Executive Coaching

We’re excited to kick off our “Executive Coaching Leadership Cohort.”
We have 8 leaders ready to go:

Jay Visser (Immanuel Christian Elementary School)

Donavin Simmons (Covenant Christian School)

Terri-Lynn Emms (Drayton Christian School)

Angela Feyter (Providence Christian School)

Matthew Bekkering (Immanuel Christian Secondary School)

Carolyn Stolte (Gateway Christian School)

Michelle Duimel (Trinity Christian School)

We look forward to hearing about their experience.

PS: we still have room for 2 more if you contact GAYLE immediately.

Spring Conference

Your Leadership Cohort Executive is beginning to plan for our spring gathering and expect that we’ll have some details for you in December.
In the meantime, mark off May 7-8, 2020 on your calendar.

No CC=Good Leadership

Watch this short VIDEO by Simon Sinek to learn what your email habits tell about your leadership.

New-ish Administrators

If you have less than 10 years of experience, think about APPLYING for the Principal Development Institute.

Deadline is November 15, 2019.

(Your school needs to be a CSI member)

School Boards

Compensation Report

We will be publishing our first Report in early December. For this first report, our focus will be on independent school teaching staff. In future years, we may add other elements based on requests.

School & Leadership Reviews

As you look at your priorities for the year, remember that providing feedback to your school leader is an important part of your task, as is having some way to assess how you are doing in meeting the promises outlined in your vision/mission statement. PCCE can help you with both of these essential tasks! Contact GAYLE for more information.

Christian Stewardship Services

Included in your PCCE membership is membership in
Christian Stewardship Services.
Among other services, CSS will work with you to set up a will clinic in your community and in this clinic, they encourage people to include charitable giving in their estate planning. Your school could then be the recipient of the estate gifts. Within PCCE, over 4.2 million dollars is bequeathed to 12 member schools through Christian Stewardship Services! Contact CHRISTIAN STEWARDSHIP SERVICES for more information and to set up a clinic for your community.

Everyone

AGM

At our Annual General Meeting last spring, we included workshops relevant to school leaders (boards, administrators, teachers) and this year will also include something similar. In some ways, we want this event to be more a one-day conference for school leaders, than just a meeting. In particular, we encourage schools to bring several board members
(or even your whole board!) to this event on April 25, 2020 in Calgary.

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Important Dates

November 14, 2019

Zoom Book Club meeting with David Smith

January 18, 2020

PCCE Board Meeting in Calgary

april 25, 2020

PCCE AGM in Calgary

May 7 & 8, 2020

Leadership Cohort spring conference

October 22 & 23, 2020

Teachers’ Convention