The Greater Dayton School with AJ Stich Transformative Principal 391

Transformative Principal

Adam J. Stich (A.J.) is the founding principal of The Greater Dayton School. Prior to starting in this role, he spent nearly seven years as a principal in Chicago Public Schools, where he drove strong outcomes for students and teachers. Under A.J.’s leadership, Rufus M. Hitch Elementary achieved the district’s highest school quality rating for five consecutive years (2014–19).

Ultimately, A.J. is motivated by the opportunity to impact kids and change the trajectory of their academic careers. He believes his leadership should be grounded in decency, humility, and high standards, and he strives to achieve this when serving his students, school and community. AJ and his wife Kendra (also a TFA alum) have three kids and a rescue dog. In his free time, he enjoys spending time with family, running, reading, and cheering on the Green Bay Packers.

• How are they going to spend $30,000 per kid per year?
• Over $250,000 per student invested in the students’ k–8 career.
• Larry Connor - the founder
• Holistic focus on education.
• What must be essential if we are going to really change kids’ lives
• Age 27 goals:
• Successful by their own definition
• Physically and mentally healthy
• Living lives of character and integrity
• Financially independent
• Established in a career
• Wrap-around services
• Clinic embedded in the school.
• Backward map these goals.
• Financially independent what does it look like when they are 23, 18, 12, 6?
• What kind of teachers are you looking for?
• Having a research partner really helps.
• Great advisors in the education space and business space.
• If this school looks like this in one year, we have a problem!
• Change has to be a part of our DNA.
• I came in thinking this is going to be simple.
• Are you just trying to recreate what has been done?
• Going to the status quo just isn’t going to cut it.
• Hired first cohort of teachers - It starts and ends with teacher!
• They need to have flexibility of mind. Traditional school model just isn’t what we are doing.
• How do you capture a student’s thought process?
• Competency-based - jumpstart
• How to be a transformative principal? Start with strategic planning - Don’t get too technical. Start mapping out what you can do down to the day!
• if you don’t do the strategic mapping, you find yourself responding and reacting to everything.

Sponsors TeachFX

Innovative school leaders across the country have started tracking online student participation using TeachFX because it’s one of the most powerful ways to improve student outcomes during COVID — especially for English Learners and students of color. Learn more about TeachFX and get a special offer at TeachFX.com

John Catt

Today’s Transformative Principal sponsor, John Catt Educational, amplifies world-class voices on timeless topics, with a list of authors recognized globally for their fresh perspectives and proven strategies to drive success in modern schools and classrooms.

John Catt’s mission is to support high-quality teaching and learning by ensuring every educator has access to professional development materials that are research-based, practical, and focused on the key topics proven essential in today’s and tomorrow’s schools.

Learn more about professional development publications that are easy to implement for your entire faculty, and are both quickly digestible and rigorous, by visiting https://us.johncattbookshop.com/. Learn more about some of the newest titles:

• Michaela: The Power of Culture by Katharine Birbalsingh
• Teaching WalkThrus: Visual Step-by-Step Guides to Essential Teaching Techniques by Tom Sherrington and Oliver Caviglioli
• Putting Staff First: A blueprint for revitalising our schools by John Tomsett and Jonny Uttley
• The Teaching Delusion: Why Teaching In Our Schools Isn’t Good Enough (And How We Can Make It Better) by Bruce Robertson
• Stop Talking About Wellbeing: A pragmatic approach to teacher workload by Kat Howard

John Catt is also proud publisher of the new book from Transformative Principal host Jethro Jones: SchoolX: How principals can design a transformative school experience for students, teachers, parents – and themselves Visit this page to learn more about bulk orders and how to bring John Catt’s research-based materials to your school: https://us.johncattbookshop.com/pages/agents-and-distributors

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.