A school campus’ mood and success are derived from the connection between culture and climate. The educational product will be better for a campus whose culture and climate are positive versus negative. The school campus culture and climate can be reformed but in order to do so, the distinctions between culture and climate need to be understood and significant changes are needed starting with climate first as it is climate that influences culture.
In the article School Climate, Gruenert (2008) uses the analogy of the Principal providing donuts as an attempt to create a positive climate. This activity is based off the assumption that providing teachers with donuts in the morning will make teachers happy and the outcome of happy teachers …show more content…
57) One can see changes quite quickly with climate, but it really takes time to affect change when it deals with culture. Therefore, in order to affect change, principals need to plan activities or professional staff development that focus and target long-range effects of the proposed action. Taking into account the donut analogy, can that action be continued on a weekly basis all year long and every year? Probably not, so when the staff becomes dependent on the expectation of getting donuts, they will be upset if it is not there. Thus, the act of a short-term uplift in climate may produce a long term problem with culture. The key to create a positive balance between climate and culture is to randomly provide a treat as a token of appreciation when least expected. At my campus, we never know if there will be breakfast tacos or sweat bread during morning staff meetings. Nevertheless, walking in to a table full of delicious tacos is what staff does not expect and is what creates a joyful boost to climate and changes the way we feel throughout the day. The result on culture is that the staff at my campus sees how our principal takes care of the teachers. We do not know when we will get treats but we know we get them. Having unannounced treats during random meetings is what needs to be practiced in order to break away from becoming dependent on what is expected. This takes the short term positive effect on the school climate and incorporates it into the schools
In the article School Climate, Gruenert (2008) uses the analogy of the Principal providing donuts as an attempt to create a positive climate. This activity is based off the assumption that providing teachers with donuts in the morning will make teachers happy and the outcome of happy teachers …show more content…
57) One can see changes quite quickly with climate, but it really takes time to affect change when it deals with culture. Therefore, in order to affect change, principals need to plan activities or professional staff development that focus and target long-range effects of the proposed action. Taking into account the donut analogy, can that action be continued on a weekly basis all year long and every year? Probably not, so when the staff becomes dependent on the expectation of getting donuts, they will be upset if it is not there. Thus, the act of a short-term uplift in climate may produce a long term problem with culture. The key to create a positive balance between climate and culture is to randomly provide a treat as a token of appreciation when least expected. At my campus, we never know if there will be breakfast tacos or sweat bread during morning staff meetings. Nevertheless, walking in to a table full of delicious tacos is what staff does not expect and is what creates a joyful boost to climate and changes the way we feel throughout the day. The result on culture is that the staff at my campus sees how our principal takes care of the teachers. We do not know when we will get treats but we know we get them. Having unannounced treats during random meetings is what needs to be practiced in order to break away from becoming dependent on what is expected. This takes the short term positive effect on the school climate and incorporates it into the schools