About My Candidacy

Educating our children is, without doubt, the greatest thing that we as parents and community members can do to build, strengthen and enhance our communities. Informed, strong, principled young men and women are the best hope to improve our neighborhoods, and strengthen our communities. When neighborhoods and communities are strengthened, we all benefit from the effort: we prosper both socially and financially. However, achieving this prosperity requires vision and strength of leadership. I believe that leadership should arise from within the local educational community, and be informed by diverse educational experience and practice.

Many folks whom I have met since I declared my candidacy have asked me what has prompted my seeking office.

•  While the state has labeled Clay County an “A” district, I believe that there is more to the quality of education than just a letter grade.   

• I believe that I can restore as sense of unity to the Clay County School District, and provide an atmosphere that fosters genuine leadership at the county, school-level, and classroom levels to extend to student leadership and academic excellence.

Experience:

• Educator in Clay County District Schools since 2005.
•  Reading Coach—analyzing data, improving student literacy
• Reading and Language Arts instructor—proven instructional methods
•  Media Specialist—research and data analysis.

Levels of Instruction

•  Experience in private, public and overseas schools
•  Teaching experience at elementary, secondary and post-secondary levels.
•  Teacher Educator: Teaching for the College of Education at the University of North Florida

Observation and Research

·          I have observed an increase in testing and the emphasis on testing—almost to the exclusion of student development and authentic teaching practices.

·         Within the past couple of years, there have been with practice tests in all four of the core subjects, as well as the required tests, as much as 16 weeks spent out of a 36 week school year testing students.

·         Accountability is important, as are high performance standards; however education should be about educating the whole child not just raising their test scores. I believe the emphasis has been incorrectly placed on the test scores because of the fear of evaluation based on these test scores.

Vision For the Future

·         Teachers should be evaluated on how well they can communicate their subject matter to their students, as evidenced by multiple means of observation, student response, student performance, collegial collaboration and professional development.

·         Teachers should be most concerned with how to communicate subject material and critical thinking skills to the student—not fretting about how many of their students will score X on a given test.

·         Fear cripples performance and must be removed. This can only be done by the support of strong administrative leadership willing to allow educators to practice their art.

·         Removing this fear begins at the district levels; by supporting school based administration through education, and ongoing leadership training to find creative and diverse ways to support teacher leaders.  

·         Strong building administration should support the teachers and staff to facilitate their work in providing a well-rounded educational experience for each student. This includes consistent disciplinary support, adequate facilities, and providing opportunities for teachers to mentor and collaborate as well as team-building.

·         Teachers are the last line of implementation for any initiative. They are the ones who must “make it work” for the student. However, giving unsupported mandates and never incorporating feedback from teachers creates stagnation.

·         There must be a real and appreciated teacher feedback to inform leadership of what is working and what is not, and what is working with adjustments. This is the only way to ensure continuous improvement. It is the way policy is designed to work. To think that teachers are not educational leaders and they cannot inform policy is arrogant on behalf of leadership and insulting to teachers and to the parents and students they are charged with serving.

·          Also of paramount importance is the inclusion of this feedback for continuous improvement to the support systems that provide vital services to our faculty and students. Therefore, feedback from the various support positions throughout the county is also vital. Everyone has areas of expertise, areas in which they are leaders in the truest sense of the word. It is time for the elitist and arrogant attitudes that have prevailed in our county to be replaced with an attitude of shared leadership.

·         Shared leadership provides the platform for those with specialized information or knowledge to be consulted and their wealth of knowledge utilized to maximize our impact in our schools and in our community.

·         With this recognition of the leadership qualities in our school based administration, our classroom teachers, and our support personnel, comes a particular responsibility to provide just compensation for their services.

·         A close examination of not only how finances have been distributed, but a critical eye for ways we can put more into the hands of those who actually serve at the point of contact with our students.

·         It is the responsibility of District administration to provide a full and transparent accounting of funds, to seek all avenues of revenue, and to disseminate those funds to service students and those who provide services to students.

·         Transparency and feedback into decision making create an atmosphere in which we can maximize the tremendous amount of experience and talent we possess within our county.

We are Clay, and together we can become better.

If you agree that it is time a professional educator from within Clay County work to unite Clay County, I ask you to download the petition ballot, print it out, fill in your information and send to me. I am also collecting these by hand. This is not the promise of a vote. This is merely to allow my name to be added to the election ballot. I must collect 1361 of these by June. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me through my Facebook Campaign Page.

You may send ballots to:

Dr. Rebekah Shively
3197 Fireside Drive
Middleburg, Florida 32068