School Leader as strategic thinker and innovator in the amidst of pandemic

Leony R. Catchuela

All schools face challenges before and during pandemic. These challenges and trends that affects our school affects the performance and capacity of each stakeholder involved in our school. These challenges are:

•Abrupt changes to the learning delivery mode of the teachers to the learners •Sudden transformation of teachers from traditional teaching to a new normal teaching such as adoption of different learning platforms, engaging into new applications from the internet and the wide used of social media accounts as a mode of communication •Changes of learning environment from a classroom scenario to study at home environment •From face-to-face communication to digital communication

Even pandemic ends, still the teachers and learners may use the different learning resources and even the platforms for the learning delivery mode. Every country has different form of learning continuity plan based on their resources and priorities. These changes and trends affect our school because the school have no choice but to adopt these changes and act to execute the learning continuity plan. Because of the changes, the school need to provide wide range of education and introducing teachers to the different learning modality that school will cater. There is also a need for teachers to provide them more learning resources and facilities. As a school head, it was a big responsibility on how we can embrace those changes in a short period of time and how to help the teachers as well as the learners to cope with the changes. It is also a challenge for the school head to think and decide for an intervention that will answer all the needs of our school.

As a school head, it reflects that strategic thinking ensures the goals, vision, and expectations of teachers as well as learners. Strategy will motivate and will keep the school in line with a strong foundation desiring the success of each learner. It is important that we as leaders are strategic and innovator because whatever may happen, we are ready to face any circumstances that may occur. Strategic thinker means that what is good enough for now will not remain so. Therefore, we should look forward for future used.

Strategic thinking and innovation are related to each other because if we strategized, innovations would follow. But all of us know that being strategic and innovator was not an easy task to do. There are different factors to consider in making strategy and innovations such as: is it attainable? is the strategy applicable to all the persons involved? are the innovations will answer the needs and challenges?

Learning strategic thinking and innovation are great help for us as school head in a way that we are now aware that strategic thinking is important with or without the pandemic. Because of the occurrence of pandemic, we as leaders realized that we should have different strategies on how to cope with different situations that may arise.

Being an innovator was very important characteristic of a leader. Innovations will only show how our school are capable to all situations that may happen

Upon watching and reading different videos and articles online, the best practices of schools that can be adapted to the new normal are: Pramochwittayaramintra School shows how much they value the needs of their students. They provided different activities as well as strategies to motivate the students to learn. They also focus on their culture and arts. Mangaldan Integrated School SPED Center shows the importance of students with special needs. The school also shows the equality of students no matter about their differences. The best practices they both shows that can be adapted to the new normal are the involvement of parents as stakeholders. It is important that the parents are involve into educational process that’s why they achieve their goals. The most important stakeholders are the students, parents, and teachers. The school expect outputs such as more resources for education, support from the outside stakeholders, more sessions for teaching strategies of the teachers’and as an outcome's learnings from the students in their own capacity or way are important, stakeholders support are enough to cater the student’s needs, and trainings for the teachers.

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The author III- Meycauayan National High School is Head Teacher