Going Slow to Go Fast in School Safety Leadership

Welcome to Principles of Change, a podcast from Raptor Technologies where we sit down with principals and assistant principals to explore the daily work of creating safer, more supportive school communities. I'm your host, Doctor. Amy Grosso, and today I'm joined by Tim Dykes, the assistant principal for culture and climate at York High School at Elmhurst Community Unit School District two zero five in Illinois. Welcome, Tim. Hi, thanks for having me. Can you walk us through a little bit of your career journey and how it ultimately led to where you are today in your current role? Sure, so it goes back to high school. I was fortunate, really fortunate as a kid. I had some outstanding teachers and coaches. And it was about my junior in high school that I realized that was the route I wanted to go. So I didn't have to do the whole changing majors and all that stuff in college. Knew I to coach. Social studies is a passion of mine. So I went to school to get my history degree and my secondary education certificate. Got out of college and I was in middle school, social studies teachers for four years. Then I moved on to a high school where I was a social studies teacher. Both of those places were close to O'Hare Airport here in the Chicago area. I was there for nine. And during that time I also coached high school baseball. So I was a high school baseball coach for thirteen years. And while I was at Leiden, the high school, there was an opportunity to be what's called a Dean's assistant. So essentially like dipping your toes into the water of administration and Dean work, but not having to leave and take another job somewhere else. So I did that for six years. And that's where I really, I saw the opportunity to have an impact on kids who really needed somebody to have a profound impact on them to kind of get them back on course. So I then left there and took a full time Dean's role at Niles West High School in Skokie, which is a Northern suburb of Chicago. I was there for nine years and then the opportunity presented itself to come here to York, which is in Elmhurst, which is a near Western suburb of the city. To take this position of assistant principal for culture and climate. I think my career path, never really had like a direct path planned out. I'm not somebody who says like in five years, I need to be here in ten years, I need to be here. I enjoy education because I really like working with kids and the ability to have a positive impact on them. So as I've gone along, there's been other jobs that have kind of touched the job that I was currently doing where I'm like, you know, I think I might be pretty good at that. And so if you would have, gosh, it would be, it's over thirty years ago now that I graduated high school, but if you would have told me I would be an assistant principal thirty years later, I don't know if I would have believed that, but if you would have told me I'd still be in education, absolutely. So that's kind of my path in a nutshell. And this is my third year here in this position of assistant principal at York. You know, I love as you were talking about it, when you very first started dipping your toe in more administration of realizing I can have a profound impact in this role of helping students who really need it the most. And I like that because so often I hear other educators afraid to go into administration because of a further disconnect with students, but you really saw it as I can have a very positive impact on students who need it the most. Yeah, I think the dean's role especially is really unique. And obviously that role is different and has different titles in different places around the country. But most of the Chicago suburban high school districts, a dean is an administrator who oversees student attendance and student behavior concerns. And so it's unique in that you're working directly with students, but you're also in a leadership role in terms of, you know, just systems in the building and working with staff. And so it's a nice way to get your start in administration. And I would argue that any administrator can have a lot of connection with students. It's just, you have to figure out a way to carve that time out of your day and make it a priority, right? Like we all, every educator is busy. Every educator has a million things to do, but you have to kind of prioritize like what's important to you. And for me, I wouldn't want to do this job if I didn't have the opportunity to have interactions with students because that's why we do it. Well, I'm wondering then, can you talk a little bit, I love that your title is Assistant Principal of Climate and Culture. And so can you talk a little bit about this role and what you do and what it entails? Yeah, so I kind of had that same question when I first started, to be honest with you. Ironically, the school that I was at prior to here, principal at the time was trying to create a job with that title and had me in mind for the job. She was unable to get that through with the board, but I kind of already had an inkling just because of those conversations. And so essentially, you know, it's a lot of, it's very macro. It's kind of like I have to make sure the place runs and that it's a place that people want to be. That's the way that I kind of put it. And that sounds simple, but it's very, very intricate. And there's a lot that plays into that. A lot of it is relationship centered, you know, building positive relationships with all the different stakeholders that play into that, whether it be students or staff members or our building and grounds team, our deans, our security team, our parents. It's a lot of that. But yeah, in a nutshell, it's making sure the place is up and running is a safe place for people to come and a place that people wanna be. I like that. And I like how you said too that it's, you know, this broad thing, it's very macro, but what it really entails are so many little pieces. I would imagine lots of systems that go along with those relationships to make sure the school's running. And then people are wondering, can you give us a little background on York Community High School, if they're not familiar with the school, like how many students? Sure. So it's really a unique and pretty awesome place. Elmhurst is again a near Western suburb of Chicago. I think we're probably fifteen miles west of the city limits. Population between forty five and fifty thousand. And so the Chicago suburban area, the sprawl is huge, right? Like they're different from many other cities. Like you don't drive twenty five miles out of the city and all of a sudden you're in farmland. The sprawl goes pretty far. But what's unique about Elmhurst is that it's a community unit school district. We are a K through twelve plus a transition center district, actually EC, early childhood through twelve district. And York is the only high school in the district and it is essentially the only high school, the only public high school that residents of Elmhurst go to. You don't get that in the Chicago area very often. And so because of that, it's really kind of a small town feel here. It's also a place where people will go off to college, get married, come back, buy a house here. There are a lot of second, third, fourth, fifth generation York students whose families have all gone here. There are a ton of people who work in the building who either graduated from York, live in Elmhurst or both. It is a great place to live. I live here. I send my own kids to school in this district. So it's a big suburb, but it's a small town feel in that. There is a lot of cyclical, like people coming back and wanting to be a part of the York community for sure. About how many students? Two thousand six hundred students, or take. And again, other thing that's important to note is that if the building was built originally in nineteen eighteen, so it's over a hundred years old. There have been many additions that have taken place over the years. So from like a building and grounds and maintenance standpoint, that creates its own challenges and all that. But yeah, about two thousand six hundred students. So it's one of the bigger high schools in terms of athletics, like our football, state football is divided into classes 1A through 8A. We're an 8A school. So we're one of the bigger, biggest schools. So it's a big place about seven hundred and fifty thousand square feet. So I tell people all the time, like it's like a small city under a roof every day. It's the largest organization in Elmhurst. And so I think sometimes people need to realize like that this is a really, really big place. There's a lot of people here and a lot of people that go into making it happen and making it operate every day. Well, then I'm wondering, from your history from starting out as a teacher and coach and all your different experiences, and now specifically in this role, how do you define school safety then? Because I, you know, I always say it's something we talk about, but very few times do we sit down and say, what does that really mean for us? Yeah, and it's interesting because if you look at like survey data and whether it be community members or students or staff members are kind of questioned about safety. I can't remember where I heard this. It was a couple of weeks ago, but really there's your physical safety that everybody focuses on and as well they should, right? Whether it be having a security staff or making sure that you have secure vestibules for visitors or systems in place to monitor all your doors and parking and working with law enforcement and all that. But I would argue that especially for a school where you're asking people to come in and be vulnerable and to listen and to learn and to take risks, whether that's students or staff members, emotional safety is really, really important and a sense of belonging, right? So like, that's kind of how I view. And I think some people think I'm a little pie in the sky with this, but my goal is to make this a place where every single human being that walks in the door feels like they have some peace in the fabric of the community. And it's a place that they want to be, right? And there's going to be varying degrees of that, right? Not every kid loves coming to a traditional high school. Like it doesn't always fit for everybody. And everybody's got stuff going on in their own personal lives that they carry in with them every day. So we can't be perfect all the time, but that's my goal is to make it a place because we spend so much time here. You know, I used to tell students all the time when I was teaching, like you spend more time with your teachers than you do with your own family during the school year. If you just look at the sheer math and knowing that what can we do to make it a place where people wanna be. So that's kind of the way I look at it. Well, you know, and for me hearing you say that it comes back to even your title, that you're the assistant principal of climate and culture, which that's what you're talking about is the essence of emotional safety, right? You have that culture and climate that makes people feel emotionally safe, which I like you using those words. Physical safety is one thing, but emotional safety is something completely different. Right, and I would argue sometimes, if there is no attention paid to emotional safety, no matter how many safeguards you try to put in place for physical safety, you're fighting an uphill battle, right? Like if you think about your own home and your own family, why do you go out and pull weeds in your yard? Not because you enjoy it, but because you have pride in your home. Why do you clean up after yourself? Because you don't wanna have a pig sty in your kitchen or your dining room. Like, and that's kind of what we wanna try to create here is a place where everybody's kind of doing their part because they feel like it's their community and not just a place as a student that they're stopping for four years on the way to something else. You know, and as you're talking, I can only imagine that doing some of these things can take a lot of time too, right? Like, when we do physical safety, right? Like if we put a fence up, it's something we can say we put a fence up, here we go. But really helping students have this sense of belonging. That's very long term. And so how do you navigate that balance between like urgency stuff we can check off a list versus this long term impact that sometimes we don't see results for a while? Yeah, so I think my first year here, especially the first semester was a lot of just taking things in. I knew that I had a certain amount of time left before retirement and my boss, the principal here, Doctor. Hurt, I think she really put it well. She basically asked all of us to make three buckets of goals long term. So like five year goals, short term, something you want to accomplish by the end of this school year and then short, like real short term, like immediate. And that was really helpful for me. I'm a very kind of systems and like I'm a checklist kind of guy. So that was really helpful. And then, so a lot of it was just, all right, what are things that without me even knowing a lot of the people or a lot of this building, like what are the things that I'm observing that need to be addressed right away and can be addressed right away, right? Like you have to take into consideration financial implications and staffing and all that. So there are certain things you just can't do, but, and then I had some long term goals. And I think really at the, it was the summer after my first year that I was really excited to have the opportunity to sit and plan some things for the coming year and for years moving forward and to kind of create a long term plan. It's funny, this was my first job as a twelve month employee and people were like, oh, you're gonna hate it. And you don't have summers off anymore. And I loved it. Like it was just, it was really like all these ideas that have been swimming in my head all year long, all of a sudden felt like I was able to calmly put a lot of them into place. So yeah, it's a balance and things change, right? Like there are factors that are out of my control that we then have to shift priorities to or financial allocation to. But I think for the staff here, what I hope they feel is that no one will outwork me. No one will put in more time. No one will care more than I do. Not to say that, you know, I'm not trying to float my own boat or anything like that, but I just, I wanna be known as somebody who is going to put time and effort in to making this the best place that it can be. You know, and that clearly comes across. And I love you say putting time and effort, but you keep mentioning like this aspect of relationships and caring that as much as you're a checklist person and have all these systems to run, that it's clear that for you, most important part is the relationships you have with anybody involved within the school. Yeah, I mean, again, if you're working in schools and you don't like getting to know people and interacting with people, you're probably in the wrong business. And it's hard when you come into a new place and I know, you know, foreshadowing, you had a question that maybe you might want to ask about new assistant principals. And I would say like the hardest part coming into a new building where you know nobody and you have a title of principal or assistant principal is people want immediate results. And that first year for me was really hard because there were things, again, I saw that I wanted change, but I also understand the importance of there are people that have been here for twenty, twenty five, thirty years and the importance of hearing from them and what historically, why is this the way that it is? Because there's gotta be a reason. And then also giving stakeholders the opportunity to have fair process and at least have a say in decisions. It's not necessarily not a democracy, like ultimately somebody's got to make the call. And that's where I think over time I've been able to build some capital with people is, I don't know, I'm not able to always do everything that you want. But again, like if we're taking the time to have those conversations and ask for genuine, honest feedback, I think that goes a long way. And the feedback we do we do an end of the semester feedback survey to our staff at the end of every semester and it's anonymous. And so I'll never forget the end of that first semester I got my feedback and I was like, oh man, I don't even know if I ever want to go back to It was rough. Right? But again, was, where's the results, man? And, you know, just end of year three here now, I think people are seeing, all right, we're seeing some results and there's a method to the madness. Well, and I think that's great advice for anybody in a new position, especially in a new community that you said that as much as there's this pressure for immediate results, if you don't take the time to listen and understand, it's not really gonna matter. Correct. Yeah, absolutely. And then it's hard, right? Like, and I think I'm a little bit, I'm more on like whole fourteen of my career and this being my first time as an assistant principal, I think nowadays administrators are getting younger and younger. And I do think I had the benefit of working in multiple different buildings with multiple different staff members, different communities, and all that that entails. So understanding that the idea of going slow to go fast is really important. Used to, when I was at the district, I had that quote above my computer all the time. You have to go slow to go fast. And a lot of times people don't understand that, But I love hearing you say by your theory, people are starting to understand why you've done the things the way you've done them. And I think the other thing I think that's important too is trust, like especially in Illinois and in the Chicago area, I get teachers tend to stay in the same district and building for a long time. Administrators not as much. So if you're somebody who's worked in a building for twenty five years and you've had, you know, seven different principals, right? Like there's that tendency to be like, all right, who's this person, what's their agenda and what's their next step. And I was really upfront with staff here on day one and told them like, I'm a community member. My oldest was in eighth grade at the time. I said, I have eleven years left until I retire. And nine of those eleven, I'll have a kid here. So I have no desire to go anywhere else. This is what I wanna do. This is where I wanna be. And I'm committed to seeing it through. So not everybody has obviously that good fortune of being able to say that and stand behind it. But I think staff just want to know, like, you know, is this somebody who's in it for the right reasons? And is it somebody that's in it for a longer period of time? Which makes so much sense, right? Because in the same way students want that, but staff want it too, right? Somebody who's gonna impact the work I do daily, are they just here for a short amount of time to go to the next thing? Or are they really digging in with me too, to make the best we can? With that too, I'm wondering if you can talk about how do you and what are some ways you've actively involved students in creating and sustaining the climate and culture that you're talking about? So one of the first things I wanted to do here was to create a, I needed to hear from students, right? And again, in an administrative role, you don't have the opportunity like built in, you kind of have to create it to interact with students. So we created a committee here called the York Culture Committee. And it's, I tell them all the time, we're like a rogue group, right? Like we're not a club, we're not a class, But we intentionally reached out to specifically members of our student services team, our counselors and social workers and said, we're looking for a cut of our population that truly represents our population. So we're not looking for all the high flyers academically. We're not looking for all athletes. We want to be demographically representative too. And we meet once a month and kind of take their take on things from the student perspective and see if there's things that we can attack as a group. So the first thing we did first year and going into second year was we created a set of universal expectations of what it means to be a Duke. And we kind of narrowed everything down to like, what do we want to stand for? What do we want to be about? And then we turn that into an acronym of We Are Dukes. And so Duke stands for Dependable, Unified, Kind, Engage, Strong. We then delineate that into here's what a Duke looks like in the classroom. Here's what it looks like in the common area. And we branded that, put it up all over the place. I know this is audio only, but I have the little patch here. We have done some throughout year two. We then said, okay, how can we like celebrate this? How can we, you know, beginning of the year, great. Teachers are going through our expectations in the classroom and they're really using this to couch it, right? But how do we sustain it throughout the year? So then we created what's called Duke Olympics, which is a, it's an eleven week thing that starts right when we get back from winter break and actually ends not next week, next week we're on spring break, but the week after is our culminating week. But we have all kinds of opportunities for students to earn points. It's very PBIS kind of idea. And we know that PBIS sometimes tend to struggle in high schools, especially as big as ours, but we just don't tell anybody it's PBIS. But students can earn points by attending different after school events. So we encourage them to support each other. Students can nominate staff members for a grateful Duke. Staff can nominate students as deserving Duke. Staff can nominate other students as a devoted Duke. And we kind of do that throughout the ten weeks. And then the last week, which will be the week after spring break, we have a bunch of different just kind of games and activities and competitions and lunch periods. And then we have a big assembly at the end on Friday where classes are competing against each other. And it's just a lot of fun and kind of a nice way to, we know that that time period coming back from winter break tends to be a low point emotionally for a lot of people. So just something that kind of bring the interest up, keep the interest up and to kind of ride us through spring break. And then you come back from spring break and you're AP testing and graduation and all that. So that's the work that that group does. And I tell them all the time, like, it's my favorite day of the month when I get to meet with them because they're great kids and they're honest and sometimes they have ideas that are off the wall, but it's just really fun for me to interact with them. And then the other thing that we are putting into place next year, we just literally messaged this out this week is we're going have a Link Crew here, which I'm sure some of the listeners are probably familiar with, but it's a research based ninth grade orientation program. And so we're currently in the process of kind of going out and trying to get kids to apply to be Link Crew leaders. And so it's eleventh and twelfth graders that are developing their leadership capacity and making intentional connections with incoming ninth grade students to further create that sense of community, trying to make a really big place feel a lot smaller. I love so many of this of really engaging students in meaningful ways, not just like a checkbox kind of thing, because even that group of students the first year, having them help you come up with what are those expectations? Because in reality, you could have come up with those expectations by yourself, but you wouldn't have had the buy in and then you wouldn't have had buy in for the Olympics and all of those fun activities that actually are building that culture and climate that you've talked about. Yeah, yeah. And we had staff as a part of those conversations too. Again, just trying to, I've been in places where I've been in schools where you're walking around and there's like signs up with acronyms. I'm like, where did that come from? And like, what does that even mean? Whereas we flipped it, we really worked backwards of like, what do we want to be about? Okay, what are character traits that define that? All right, now how can we fit that into an acronym as opposed to just creating the acronym first? Mind's going back to our last podcast with a principal of a middle school, the whole town had twelve hundred people. So quite the opposite of what you're talking about where you are. But the themes I've talked about, about relationships, getting in students engaged, wanting to make sure every student feels like they belong and they're safe there. That it doesn't matter what size school, doesn't matter if it's elementary, middle or high school, those are critical for education success. Absolutely. I mean, you know, your goal is to reach everybody, right? One hundred percent. And I think part of it again, if I'm speaking to, like newer leaders is not not getting too high and not getting too low, right? Things are never as good as you think they are, and they're never as bad as you think they are, right? So you could have this idea in your mind that you think is the greatest idea ever and it falls flat and not letting that keep you down. And also if you have something that goes well, not getting too caught up in not thinking about, okay, what's next? What's next? What do we gotta do next? So yeah, it's very much emotionally just kind of staying steady is really important. Well, steady, then listening to all your stakeholders, because that nearly has just been a highlight of everything you're saying, like community members, families, parents, staff, and especially students, which I think a lot of times we're good at listening to all of those others, but do we really give students a voice in a meaningful way, which it's clear that you're doing that. Thank you. We're almost out of time now, but is there anything else you wanna add before we wrap up? Not that I can think of. If anybody's listening to this, I definitely don't have all the answers. This is, you know, there are plenty of mistakes that I make on it. I tell kids this all the time, like I make dozens of mistakes a day, right? Like I'm always just trying to learn. I think collaboration is really important too, when it comes to leadership, like having the opportunity to interact with leaders in other buildings, to see how they're doing things, to see how they're reacting to different challenges that come up in the course of a school year, think is really important for the mental health of a leader to know like, okay, they're having the same problems. It's not just here or all right, that didn't work for them or this did work for them. I think that's really important for future leaders. One hundred percent and that you're not always gonna get it right, just like you said, but it's how you move forward. Well, I've really appreciated our conversation today and thank you for taking time to just share the amazing things y'all are doing at your campus. And I'm sure others are gonna learn great ideas from it. I'm very flattered that I was asked. So thank you for taking the time. Thank you for joining us for another episode of Principles of Change. Be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform so you never miss an upcoming conversation. Until next time, stay safe and take care.