- I believe in student engagement, exploration, empowerment, equipping, and encouragement to be baseline elements in the educational environment; without these, grades may be given, but learning is unlikely.
- I believe that the role of a teacher is best executed when a thoughtful, deliberate, and insightful educator chooses to set aside position and put on the role of co-learner, guide, and fellow-explorer.
- I believe that learning is a process, not a destination; that the teacher has a sacred responsibility to his pupils, and that status is not necessarily determined by enrollment in a class or deliberate selection, but by proximity, opportunity, visibility, and transparency.
- I believe in action research as a way of being; that teachers have an obligation to themselves, their colleagues, and their profession to be in the pursuit of continual improvement and investigation that informs understanding and constructively critiques their own educational practice.
- I believe that effective clinical supervision requires a willing educator with a learner's heart and mind to repeatedly make himself painfully vulnerable, as a tangible expression of his commitment to personal and professional excellence. Within the environment of a committed teaching team, I believe clinical supervision brings to bear the opportunity to act on the insights and creativity of other professionals whose exhortations are delivered in the light of accurately understanding the real context of the local situation.
- I believe that a curriculum must include and clearly communicate its primary learning outcomes so its instructor can be constantly reminded of and guided by the course objectives. I believe that learning should always be assessed, but that the goal setting activities in classrooms should be a collaborative effort, with buy-in and socialization of the expected norms and articulated classroom mores for student (and instructor) behavior.
- I believe in multiple intelligences and that all students have a fundamental need for stimulation and challenge in each of these areas.
- I believe in active learning, including collaborative work, provided that thoughtful and perceptive controls are put in place to ensure that strengths-based student contributions remain in healthy balance with (appropriate) challenges that invite students beyond their own horizons of perceived ability.
- I believe that achievement is a factor of motivation and opportunity, and is most ready to be realized at the intersection of communication and a teacher's leadership by example.
- I believe in scaffolding as a powerful approach to teaching. I believe in and strongly support constructivist understanding of student learning. In this, I believe it is imperative that each learner be appropriately supported at all points in the educational environment, including the deliberate withdrawal of supports to prompt student growth and self-sufficiency.
- I believe that educators have the responsibility for inviting students into an understanding of the content's global and specific relevance. This is most readily facilitated as students engage problem-based learning scenarios and reflective self-assessment activities in which they personally apply the concepts, (pseudo-)tangibly experience the benefits and challenges of their actions, then think critically and evaluate honestly about their own performance.
- I believe that expectations of assessment should always be made clear so students understand where they stand in their own journey toward learning, and that assessments should be objective, clear and formalized (rubric, scorecard, etc.) to improve consistency in grading, challenge and correct where necessary, and to reinforce and prompt further growth, especially self-directed learning.
- I believe in the responsibility of teachers as civic leaders and character educators by virtue of their prominence and proximity to students' own identification, prioritization, and articulation of personal values. As teachers "at the will of the state," I believe we are responsible to personify the highest standards of ethics, character, appreciation of diversity, commitment, excellence, and personal integrity.
- I believe in the importance of balancing carefully between accommodating student weaknesses or leading them to actively engage their areas of weakness, disability, and struggle.
- I believe in the inherent worth and dignity of every person, and assert that there is no place for harassment, discrimination, derision, disdain, and condescension. This is not to say, however, that I believe teachers can abdicate their responsibility to be honest and forthcoming with students; rather, I assert that honesty is best communicated within the context of a healthy instructor-pupil relationship.
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