New Orleans

This is the second time that I have seen Spike Lee's documentary on Katrina and the images of so many helpless people during a national crisis still overwhelms me. The anchor women truly showed the insensitivity of the LA organizational structure when she reported a dead body in the same spot a day or two later. Of course this was just one example; to see dead swollen bodies floating in the water and other bodies lying in the streets showed the ugly colors of America once again. Not only were the visual images poignant in this documentary but the auditory images were just as powerful as we heard New Orleaneans crying to the national organization, "Does anyone care?"

The documentary allowed me to see how leadership, culture, and underlying assumptions coexisted on the local, state, and national level. In this instance, it was clear that the organizations were not working as collaborative teams to provide services for the residents. All of these organizations have to work as collaborative teams to serve children and adults in a more effective and humanistic way. Hopefully, this documentary will help America to be better prepared when another disaster hits our country.

Thanks Sheldon for your continued efforts to keep present and future leaders informed of the many sides of leadership. Thanks also to cohort members as you shared your comments.

Carol

Organizational Metaphors

The nature metaphor has a more humanistic approach to the educational organization than the machine metaphor. Just the idea of having students and teachers adapt to their environments seems so simple; however, this may be an illogical assumption when one considers that schools still categorize and pigeon hole students. It would make more sense to give students time to adjust to their environments before we try to fit them into boxes. This seems to be especially true for urban students who may be entering a different environment, one that is so different from their home environment. As educators it is important for us to design our learning environment that would foster a natural concept that adapts to the needs of children. I still believe that Maslow's Needs Hierarchy is essential today. A teacher and a positive school environment can compensate for some of the home deficits; this may be the catalyst that motivates youngsters to become successful. Just think how much more successful urban schools would be if more of this is done.
Carol

Taylorism

I learned that Taylorism is a concept that tryly categorizes workers. From the film I could see where workers had no identity; they were just part of big business' plan for mass production. To see how the American industry took advantage of workers for profit is disturbing. When the worker was unable to conform to the business mindset, he was described as having a nervous breakdown. More importantly, I can see how this concept is still a part of many organizations today. Although the factory concept is not as it was in the film clip, one wonders how other manufacturing organizations such as United Technologies and the banking industries treat their workers today.
As an educational leader I would hope that my role in working with teachers will eliminate Taylorism as children learn the advance stages of working in teams and using their higher order skills to avoid this machine concept in the future.
Carol A. Wright

Tuesday July 1, 2008

Today I had a wonderful new technology experience I learned how to set up a blog.

Today's class in organizational theory was an interesting experience. The lesson began with the cohort viewing the movie Europa Europa. This movie was about a young Jewish man who was passing as a German. He attends this academy and the indoctrination begins. At first sight, the pledge was said by all of the students. It was clear to me that the organization had a mission; obviously this mission was to train these soliders to become faitful followers. Most noteable was the demonstration that the headmaster presented about how to identify a Jewish person. He gave specific examples of the size of their forehead and other deragaory statements.
I immediately equated this experience to how African Americans were treated during slavery and prior to the 1960s's.

This was a powerful learning experience for me.