Drake University

Masters of Science in Education

EDL 281 Clinical Experience II
Professional Notes

Scott Belger
Student ID: 000191087
Cohort: #13
7/1/2016

In my second clinical learning experience, my goal was to execute my plan and reach my goal
of becoming an educational leader who possesses a deeper understanding of leadership and the
skills necessary to be a building leader. Without a doubt, I feel I have reached my goal during
my second clinical learning experience.
My first goal was to become skilled and knowledgeable on the topic of improving academic
achievement for all students. As an active member of the Building Leadership Team, I was able
to see things through the lens of a principal in the areas of professional development,
incorporating a new teaching schedule, and helping incorporate a growth mindset to a staff with
little or no experience with a growth mindset. As a member of the building leadership team and
future building leader, I learned the importance of leaning on and seeking advice from respected
faculty. I also learned the importance of hearing other peoples perspectives when making
building decisions that affect a large number of faculty and staff. I was able to gain valuable
experience initiating and introducing a new K-8 bullying prevention program called the Olweus
Bullying Prevention Program. As a part of the PBIS committee, we adopted the bullying
prevention program to combat some of the roadblocks to student achievement. I believe this
experience will help make me a stronger leader as our duties included earning staff buy-in and
laying out a thirty six week implementation plan. As a future building leader, I know I will need
to use both of these skills to become an effective administrator.
My second goal was to become skilled and knowledgeable on the topic of meaningful
professional development. On two different occasions, I was the key presenter at building level
staff development. I feel this experience was valuable in the sense that I planned for and
executed a forty five minute professional development session on a building initiative. Growth

mindset was a building initiative for the 2015-2016 school year at Southeast Polk High School
and I feel like I gave the faculty valuable insight as how to promote the growth mindset in high
school students.
My third clinical goal was to become skilled and knowledgeable in the area of compliance,
mandates, and school/district policies. As the Southeast Polks Interim Activities Director for
five months, I gained valuable and genuine experience in the areas of compliance, mandates, and
district policies. As Activities Director, the decisions I made and the things I acted on affected
hundreds of students and families. Its one thing to shadow a building administrator for a period
of time, but to actually be a building administrator for five months helped prepare me more than
anything else I could have done. To put everything I did in the areas of compliance, mandates,
and policies as Activities Director would be very time consuming. I now have gained the
confidence in an interview and/or a new administrative position and this experience will prove
powerful for me.
My fourth clinical goal was to improve my skills as an effective evaluator. As Interim
Activities Director, I activated my evaluator license and evaluated coaches and directors. Once
again, actually performing the evaluations, doing the walk throughs, and having the
conversations with coaches and directors only helped make me a stronger leader and a better
candidate for a future administrative position. I gained experience in executing a good
evaluation with good conversations and good feedback and I also gained experience in
terminating the director of an extracurricular activity. Although one was fun and rewarding and
the other was difficult, both gave me experience in doing what is best for the students we serve
as administrators.

My fifth clinical goal was to become skilled and knowledgeable in the area of school climate
and culture. The one thing that was re-emphasized for me during my time as an interim
administrator was the importance of having a good climate and culture. As Interim Activities
Director, I initiated an Activities PLC. The PLC team was comprised of head coaches and head
directors in the Southeast Polk School District. I first did a needs assessment before starting
the Activities PLC. After feedback from coaches, sponsors, and directors, it was very evident
that we needed to unify the activities department. Other ingredients during the construction
phase involved identifying our core values, common beliefs, and direction for the group. The
process involved in constructing our activities PLC was actually more valuable to me that the
actual execution of the PLC. This process made me a stronger leader and gave me the needed
experience in making positive change for a large group and in gaining buy-in from coaches,
sponsors, and directors. I feel this experience gave me the confidence I needed to step into an
administrative position tomorrow and begin to make positive change.
I have now completed my second learning experience and I feel one hundred percent
confident that I have exceeded my own expectations I set for myself in my clinical learning plan.
After completing two clinical experiences and serving as a school administrator for five months,
I feel I am well equipped with the skills to be an effective administrator.

RUBRIC

Proficient

Emerging

Not there

The
Learning

..chronicles her/his
learning with sufficient
detail and explicates
the significance of the
learning (why this is
important)

Lists more what

the student did as
opposed to what the
student learned.
OR

Fails to list
new learning
or big ideas.

Lists more
the journal connects surface-level
the students learning learning such as I
to the goals of the CLP. learned that is
important to have a
good understanding
of Special
many sentences
Education. Without
begin with I
paying attention to
learned
the WHY question
The
Application

The Writing

articulates HOW the

big ideas can be
applied when the
student assumes a
leadership position.

on a limited basis
articulate how new
learning can applied
to future leadership
positions.

demonstrates and
understanding of the
role of differing
contexts plays in
transferring
knowledge from
clinical moving
forward

limited
understanding of
contextual issues
surrounding school
leadership

The writing is of

the writing is of

Does not
apply new
ideas to future
contexts.

Many errors

graduate
school/professional
quality. Strong topic
sentences with 2-4

good quality
Rambling and
unfocussed
paragraphs need a
bit

Journal and professional notes

supporting sentences.
Sentence structure.

Few, if any, grammar

and technical writing
errors.

Uses the language of

the ISSL standards
Comments

of development
(topic and
supporting
sentences)

errors in grammar
and technical writing

ideas.