The Assistant Director for Fine Arts in the Office of Teaching and Learning will embody, advocate and operationalize the mission, vision and strategic direction of the Schenectady City School District. Support the Office of Teaching and Learning and District schools to achieve the District’s goals for student and graduate success by ensuring equitable student and school access to all programs, resources, and high quality instruction. Assist the District team in establishing District-wide practices that promote equity attending to the need for an antiracist, culturally responsive curriculum.
Primary responsibilities (provide assistance to the Teaching and Learning team):
- Identify, evaluate, and standardize the Fine Arts curriculum and instructional resources that promote equity, diversity, and inclusions and lead to improved student outcomes;
- Lead the research and development of Fine Arts instructional practices, programs, and policies that maximize educational and co-curricular options and lead to improved academic success for all students;
- Serve as a resource to Principals, teachers, and community partners (universities, colleges, non-profit educational organizations) to provide assistance to adopt culturally responsive curriculum and effective pedagogical practices for the purpose of advancing educational equity;
- Develop fine arts professional development opportunities for teachers to increase educational outcomes.
Specifically:
Identify, evaluate, and standardize curriculum and instructional resources that promote equity and lead to improved student outcomes
- Assists the district in understanding, interpreting, and operationalizing the art, music, theatre, and dance Learning Standards as set forth by New York State Education Department;
- Integral role in assuring that the goals of the Student and Graduate Success Pillar are a central focus in work undertaken, operationalizing the defined pillar strategies to move measures towards successful completion;
- Analyzes and utilizes student data for the purpose of developing or co-developing appropriate curriculum and guiding instructional conversations;
- Promotes the use of the most effective and appropriate technologies to support teaching and learning and ensures that necessary resources are available.
Lead the research and development of instructional practices, programs, and policies that maximize educational options and lead to improved academic success for all students
- Research topics required to maintain the integrity of equity work (e.g. relevant policies, new federal and state statutes, financial resources, etc.) for the purpose of developing new Fine Arts programs, ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements, securing general information and/or responding to requests;
- Assist building administration and faculty in analysis and use of data to reflect on teaching practice, make instructional and programmatic decisions, give feedback on art and music lesson plans to meet the needs of diverse learners;
- Provide support to foster a culture that motivates teachers and administrators to perform at the level of excellence necessary to improve student achievement and close educational opportunity gaps;
- Review and observe current art, music, theater, and dance teaching methods and learning materials as needed for areas of District improvement and to ensure they meet the current local, state and federal requirements.
- Assist in the development and coordination of the sections of the budget that pertain to Fine Arts. ? Plan the schedules of music and art teachers to provide an equitable distribution of their time in each District school.
- Lead the District Arts and Enrichment Committee to develop systems for the equitable distribution of Arts in Education funds.
Serve as a resource to Principals, teachers, and community partners (universities, colleges, non-profit educational organizations) to provide assistance to adopt culturally responsive curriculum and effective pedagogical practices for the purpose of advancing educational equity
- Serve as a collaborative resource within the district for furthering goals of educational equity in developing and implementing effective Fine Arts learning strategies that reflect and support diversity, equity and inclusion for student academic success;
- Establishes strong working relationships with school and district staff;
- Supports a climate where equity is discussed, challenged and used to promote opportunities for staff and student success;
- Serve on cross-functional teams to provide educational and managerial leadership that builds and supports a high performance educational team, inspiring and aligning the academic work of the District;
- Gathers input from staff and surveys from students as well as formal assessment data as part of process to monitor and evaluate the impact of the instructional and co-curricular program;
- Supports the development of the instructional and leadership capacity of staff.
- Supervise the District-wide Fine Arts Resource Teachers.
Develop professional development opportunities for teachers to increase educational outcomes
- Analyzes and utilizes data to identify professional development needs and to evaluate, improve and report on program effectiveness;
- Communicates the goals, plans and progress of the District’s professional learning program;
- Communicates available fine arts professional learning activities to school and district staff;
- Collaborates on the design and implementation of a comprehensive Professional Development Plan of all staff;
- Implements Fine Arts professional learning opportunities through multiple delivery models including, formal structured workshops and digital platforms;
- Organizes, maintains and supports professional learning communities;
- Remains a learner and informed of innovative professional development techniques to provide the district with the highest quality of professional development activities;
- Participates in the development of the district school calendar to ensure adequate professional learning time;
- Assist in the development and onboarding of new staff.
Secondary responsibilities will include:
- Assist building administrations in the recruitment and hiring of staff when hiring is needed across multiple buildings;
- Will conduct teacher evaluations to ensure proper implementation of curriculum;
- Within the framework of the tenets of the APPR process, provide support and/or supervise and coach teachers by adhering to precise instructional systems, visiting classrooms to observe instruction, modeling effective instructional practices, providing support, and giving feedback.