Greetings, Dragon Nation!

Once again, it is a pleasure to have the opportunity to share a few thoughts with you as we start the final push to the finish line!

Last month, I shared how we create and pass the budget for the school. This time around, I thought it might be of interest as to how we go about staffing our school. In my opinion, the most important component to student learning and achievement is what takes place in the classroom between the teachers and the students. Everything else should support that interaction, so recruiting the absolute best and brightest teachers is arguably the most important function of my job.

Generally, we hire for two reasons. Either a staff member is leaving/retiring, or we have a need for an additional position due to growth. Once we have confirmed the need for a new staff member, and verify that we have sustainable funding, we post the opening on the MLWGS.com site as well as several other online platforms. For specialized positions, we will even post on that subject’s professional organizations page, such as the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. Once we have received a good number of applications, a hiring committee is formed with the subject area’s department chair, an administrator, several of that department’s teachers, and our Coordinator for Strategic Engagement. This committee looks at the applications and resumes and invites between four and six candidates for an interview.

At the interview, the candidates are asked a series of questions that include topics such as their education and experience, teaching style, reason for applying to MLWGS, their educational philosophy, and teaching goals. Recently, we have begun the practice of inviting the top two or three candidates to come back to campus and teach a lesson with our students. Finally, the committee will submit the name of the candidate that they want to invite to join our community to me. I will then check references and contact their current principal. If they are good to go, we will then look at their experience and make an offer of employment. If they accept, they will then complete all of the onboarding paperwork and attend an orientation in August. If they don’t accept, we will usually look at the second-place candidate and repeat the offer process. If we don’t have a good back up candidate, we will reopen the application process and start over. We will never hire someone that we knowingly feel would not be a good fit for our team. Sometime the process takes a while, but going back to what I said about student achievement, we can’t take any shortcuts.

I hope that this gives you a better idea about how we bring on new teachers and staff to our school. MLWGS is a very special place and those of us who have been elsewhere know that we must protect what we have. That starts with recruiting and hiring the best!

Thanks again to Jabberwock for giving me another forum to stay connected with you. Until next time, stay safe, stay strong, and Go Dragons!