Building a school culture around core values is an ongoing story we write with many forks in the road. Those decision points sometimes take us deeper into the work, at other times come to a resting point or double back to find the main track. During our four year partnership with IGE, the Catherine Cook School in Chicago has built a vehicle with endurance that is always taking us someplace new. Trace our journey, explore some of the byways and plan your own new paths. This interactive session will include a look at structures we repeat from year to year that keep us heading in the right direction, even if we don't always know where we'll end up.

1. Ethics and School Culture:
Choose Your Own Adventure
Cory Stutts, Head of Middle School
Ethical Literacy Conference
Middletown RI
June 2012

2. Welcome to Our Adventure

3. About CCS
• Located in heart of Old Town, just north of downtown
Chicago
• Founded as parent cooperative 1975
• Urban school
– started in Jewish Community Center
– moved to Catholic School basement
– moved to current loft building, former B&B Shoe Company in
1992

4. Our Namesake, Catherine Cook
• Purchased building from Alex
Anagnost 1990
• Renamed (formerly Melrose
School) after his mother,
Catherine Cook
• Attorney, Philanthropist
• Dedicated to causes
affecting children

5. Recent Milestones and Challenges
• Reorganized as independent school in 1997
• Transition from parent cooperative to professional
administrative structure uneven
– 4 heads of school in 5 years
• Current head of school, Michael Roberts, came 2005
– Had worked with Rush Kidder at previous school
– Suggested IGE as resource for building school culture

6. Creating our history
• Not fighting a long history—creating it right now
• Redefining identity from ―little school that could‖ to
top tier innovative urban junior school
• Ethics and character development essential
components

7. Who we are now
• Three divisions: Early Childhood (PS-K), Lower
School (1st-4th), Middle School (5th-8th)
• 500+ students ages 3-14
• Growing from 2 to 3 sections at each grade level
• Introduction to Catherine Cook School

8. Where we are today
Over the past four years, our Ethics and Culture team
has evolved into a powerful tool for:
• shaping school culture
• driving professional development
• fostering teacher leadership
• partnering for parent education
But it hasn’t been a straight line…

9. First steps…marching forward
August 2008
• Team of Middle
School teachers
and school
administrators
train with IGE
August 2008
• Teachers and
staff develop core
values during
back-to-school
meetings
Sept-Oct 2008
• Middle School
students develop
core values in
advisories
October 2008
• Staff and
students meet to
agree on final five
core values

10. CCS Core Values agreed upon between staff
and Middle School students-Fall 2008
Respect Responsibility Compassion
Integrity Diversity

11. Onward and upward…
October 2008
Present final Core
Values to entire
staff and Middle
School students
October 2008
Develop CCS
Shared Ethical
Norms for healthy
collegial relations
2008-09
Explore what core
values look like in
action with staff
and Middle
School students
2008-09
Explore decision-
making
frameworks with
staff and Middle
School students

12. Everything is good, right?
• Not exactly…
• Growing pains?
• Middle School pushes ahead with stops and starts
• Challenge keeping Early Childhood and Lower
School engaged

13. Crossroads…
• Is this just a Middle School thing?

14. Choose Our First Adventure
Sooo…do we choose to keep the focus on Middle
School and push forward with our Action Plans?
Or…do we regroup and choose to broaden the
initiative to include all our students?

15. CHOICE 1: Keep the focus on Middle School
• Keep working the Middle School Action Plan
• Build a sturdy Middle School EL curriculum
• Let EC and LS go their own way with Responsive
Classroom, Love and Logic

16. • But…we chose the other path

17. CHOICE 2: Include all our students
• How to do it? No road map…
• Energy beginning to fray and lose focus

18. We need a new plan
Step 1: Persuade Division Heads to attend 2010
Ethical Literacy Conference with me in Memphis

19. Step 2: Come with a dilemma: Can we include
young children in the work of Ethical Literacy?
– Aren’t they still learning right from wrong?
– Can they understand right v. right dilemmas?
– Isn’t this too complex and abstract?
– How will they remember the values?

20. Don’t know what we will find…if anything

21. Happy Surprise
Iona Whishaw
Principal
Sir Charles Tupper
Secondary School
Vancouver BC
ROARS Code of Conduct

22. Sir Charles Tupper Code of Conduct
Sir Charles
Tupper
ROARS
Code of
Conduct
Respect
Ownership
Attitude
Responsibility
Safety

23. Aha! Moment
• Catherine Cook mascot is Cougar…
• A cougar ROARS…
• Concrete enough for young children…
• We can shamelessly borrow this idea!

24. Catherine Cook School Code of Conduct
CCS
ROARS
Code of
Conduct
Respect
Ownership
Appreciation
Responsibility
Safety

25. Rolling it out…
• Share with EL Team in summer meeting
• Concrete way to bring younger students in
• Not abandoning Core Values…

26. Or are we?
• How to make the relationship clear between
original Core Values and ROARS…

27. Core Values
• Respect
• Responsibility
• Compassion
• Integrity
• Diversity
ROARS
• Respect
• Ownership
• Appreciation
• Responsibility
• Safety

28. Choose Our Second Adventure
• Do we choose to put our efforts into ROARS and
younger students and risk losing focus on Middle
School and the original Core Values?
• Do we choose to try to do both at once?

29. CHOICE 1: Put our efforts into ROARS and
broaden to include younger students
• Work with teachers of younger students to
incorporate ROARS along with Responsive
Classroom and other structures
• 8th graders lead Back to School Assembly aimed
at younger children

30. • Middle School students translate ROARS for
younger students
– Make safety posters
– Awards for being caught being ROARSY
• Let original Core Values rest while we focus on
ROARS and unifying the entire school around a
common set of values

31. CHOICE 2: Try to do both at once
• 8th graders introduce ROARS at Back to School
Assembly
• Build and reinforce ethical vocabulary, conduct
with younger students

32. • Keep building ethical literacy in MS advisories
with right v right dilemmas in the news, in the
classroom, and on the playground
• Deepen awareness of ethical issues in different
MS subject areas
• Keep making the connections between original
Core Values and ROARS

33. THIS PROVED HARD TO DO…Still figuring it out

34. Connecting Core Values and ROARS?
• One idea is to create banners in the gym that
showed connections—ROARS as our Core
Values in Action
• Both would be visible and reinforced
• Got as far as location and possible design…

35. • Banners got stuck at funding...need to revisit that
one

36. Review of ROARS after first year…
• Strengths: ROARS was a good idea, started off
with a bang
– Shared with staff at Pre-planning—built energy and
enthusiasm
– 8th graders planned over the summer; introduced to
whole school at first assembly, ending up with a cheer:
• We are the Cougars, coming through the doors,
• We are the Cougars, ROARS, ROARS, ROARS!

37. • Weaknesses: ROARS fizzled in LS and EC
• Ideas for recognizing ROARSY behavior never
got fully implemented
• Teachers lost focus

38. How do we sustain our efforts?
• Identify new EL team members from Early
Childhood and Lower School
• Educate and bring new members up to speed with
Ethical Literacy and ROARS
– Refresher course on the basics?

39. The gist of it
• We need to build a structure that keeps
ROARS and Core Values alive in the school

40. How to do it?
• Plan structures that repeat and can be revisited
from year to year, i.e…
BUILD REPLICABLE STRUCTURES

41. STRATEGY 1
• tie ROARS to existing CCS structures such as…
– Whole Faculty Meetings
– Weekly Division Meetings
– Weekly All School Assemblies
– Middle School Morning Meetings
– Advisory
– Student Leadership Council
– Responsive Classroom, Circle Time, Peace Wheels
– Discipline Process

42. STRATEGY 2
• Expand the original Ethical Literacy team to
include teachers of younger students

43. STRATEGY 3
• Create an Ethical Literacy steering committee
including Division Heads and others
SOMEONE HAS TO HOLD ONTO THE VISION
AND KEEP IT MOVING FORWARD

44. STRATEGY 4
• Create other committees to get work done:
– Division Committees
– Multicultural Committee (outreach to Parent Group?)
– Assemblies Committee
– Sports Committee
– Writing Committee—get statement of purpose and
connection; write about program for website

45. COMMITTEES ARE FLEXIBLE—
CHANGE IN RESPONSE TO WORK TO BE DONE

46. STRATEGY 5
• Create an organizational chart that shows the
parts and how they connect

47. Ethics and
Culture Team
Student-Focused
Ethics Initiatives
Adult-Focused
Ethics Initiatives

48. Student-Focused
Ethics Initiatives
Back to School
ROARS Assembly
Advisory Buddies
MS Advisory
Curriculum
Integrate ethical
dilemmas into subject
areas

49. Adult-Focused Ethics
Initiatives
Back to School
Session for Teachers
Diversity Work
Teachers Leading
Professional Learning

50. STRATEGY 6
• Meet as a whole team once each trimester to
report, review, and plan
SET MEETINGS UP A YEAR IN ADVANCE AND
STICK TO THEM

51. STRATEGY 7
• Have Committees meet monthly and as needed to
do the work

52. STRATEGY 8
• 8th grade students do the Back to School
Assembly each year

53. Back to School ROARS Assembly 2011

54. With some basic structures in place, we see
new possibilities…
• Problem: Lots of good ethical literacy work
happening inside school, need to bring parents
into the process
• Solution: One Book, One Catherine Cook

55. • Choose Good Kids, Tough Choices, Rush’s book
written for parents
• Cross-divisional book discussion groups
• Invite Rush to spend a day at Catherine Cook,
work with students, faculty, parents

56. ROARSY or BOARSY?
• http://www.globalethics.org/newsline/2011/12/05/r
oarsy-boarsy/
• http://www.amazon.com/Meet-Boars-Ribbon-
Picture-
Awards/dp/0805074880#reader_0805074880

57. • Problem: Scattered diversity initiatives need more
intentional direction
– Started Multicultural Parents Reading Group--morphed
– Started Faculty of Color group--stopped
– Started Multicultural Students Club--fizzled
– In-service diversity discussion—controversial
– Outside speaker brought in--controversial
• All testing the waters, no coherence; in need of a
plan
New Directions for Diversity Work

58. Ethical Literacy and Cultural Competence
• Steering Committee kicks off 2011-12 school year
with presentation on Ethical Literacy and Cultural
Competence
• Faculty read and discuss The Spirit Catches You
and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman

59. Developing Teacher Leadership
• 8th grade teachers lead February in-service day
on the genetics of race
– Plan with Steering Committee
– Describe integrated 8th grade science/humanities unit
on identity
– Show clips from Race: The Power of an Illusion
– Include skyped webinar with evolutionary biologist
Joseph Graves
– Intellectually provocative; presenting at PoCC next year

60. Reviewing In-Service with EC Team
• Shared general survey results from wider faculty
• Asked EC team for honest feedback
• Major result: teachers enjoyed theory of race, but
wanted practical resources and strategies to use
with students
• Invited new team members to plan whole faculty
follow up session

61. Annual Learning Cycle
End of Year
Review/Planning
September
Kickoff
October In-
service
Trimester 1
Review
February In-
service
Trimester 2
Review
May Whole
Faculty Meeting

62. Behind the Scenes Work that Admin Does
• Sets a tone of openness, voluntary participation
• Regularly invites new members to join Ethics and
Culture team
• Listens to team ideas
• Shares leadership
• Empowers faculty to have a voice in professional
learning
• Makes time to get the work done
• Sets the calendar
• Gathers feedback on events and activities

63. Behind the Scenes Work that Admin Does
MOST IMPORTANTLY…
• Keeps steering the process and staying on
course, whether highway or byway

64. Reflective, iterative process
This has been a narrative of our journey so far…
Not a straight line, many crossroads

65. • Constantly evolving
• Some next steps for us
– Re-engaging older students
– Recognizing greater ethical complexity as students
mature
– distinguishing Core Values from ROARS appropriately
for MS age students

66. Now Choose Your Next Adventure
• What structures to support ethics in your
school/organization repeat on a regular cycle?
• Where are the tensions/decision points for your
process right now?
• What resources/information do you need?
• What are your next steps?

67. Resources
ROARS Code of Conduct
• http://ethical-literacy.org/annual-conference/2010-
annual-conference/presenters-2/iona-whishaw/