How To Build A Clearer System in Your School (Educational Leader Guide) ft. Dr. Melissa Sadorf | Transformational Educators Ep. 25

What really transforms a school, better people, or better systems? In this episode of Transformational Educators, Dr. Matthew Flippen sits down with Dr. Melissa Sadorf, Executive Director of the National Rural Education Association, author, professor, and longtime rural education leader, to explore how servant leadership, adult clarity, and schoolwide systems can move a campus from struggle to sustained growth. For school leaders seeking practical school transformation strategies, this conversation offers a clear look at what it takes to improve culture, strengthen staff support, and create better outcomes for students.

Drawing from her leadership experience in Stanfield, Arizona, Dr. Sadorf shares how her district faced declining enrollment, limited rural resources, inconsistent classroom expectations, and rising behavior referrals, yet still built stronger culture, improved attendance, increased family engagement, expanded student opportunities, and moved from a low C to a high B, with the campus later earning an A. She explains why many schools misdiagnose systems problems as people problems, how leaders can build buy-in without blame, and why consistency, collaboration, and shared expectations matter so much in school improvement.

In this episode, you’ll hear about:

•  Why “people problems” are often systems problems 
•  How rural school leaders can respond to declining enrollment 
•  What it takes to move teachers from isolation to collaboration 
•  Why culture building must come before major change efforts 
•  How consistent behavior expectations improve fairness for students 
•  The role of family feedback, student voice, and community trust 
•  Leading change with authenticity, visibility, and servant leadership 
•  How adult clarity creates better outcomes for children 

Guest links:
LinkedIn
YouTube
NREA Leadership
More about Dr. Melissa Sadorf

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Transcript

Coming up...

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 0:00

The misdiagnosis was that they were people problems, when in reality they were systems problems. So it's not teachers being resistant. They didn't understand the expectations.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 0:10

That is Dr. Melissa Saydorf, Executive Director of the National Rural Education Association, author, professor, and longtime rural education leader. She believes one of the biggest mistakes in school improvement is blaming people when the real work is building clearer systems, stronger support, and shared expectations.

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 0:29

If staff are drowning, it's not inspiration for being better. It's time, it's tools, it's prioritization, it's making sure that we're protecting the collaboration time that we're giving them.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 0:40

By the end of this conversation, you will learn how leaders can move beyond blame, strengthen adult practices, and build the kind of systems that create better outcomes for students and schools. I'm Dr. Matthew Flippin, and this is Transformational Educators. When

How one rural school started its transformation

Dr. Matthew Flippen 0:55

you arrived at Stanfield, tell us a little about the strengths that were there and some of the challenges that you saw.

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 1:00

Stanfield is a rural community. It's a single-site LEA, which means that there's just one school in the district and pretty geographically large, 600 square miles. About 25% of the population lives on a Native American Indian reservation just south of the district office. Long bus rides up to an hour for some of those students. And there's not a lot of resources within the community. It is the school, is the hub. And so that's both a challenge and a celebration that we were able to serve as the anchor for the community. A lot of poverty.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 2:14

Yes. I love to hear that. So were there some concerns or how was it how was the district performing before you arrived?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 2:25

We sat at around, we had a letter grade system for the state of Arizona, and we were at about a C, a low C. So average, we were performing uh at that average level. Um obviously we're not satisfied with average ever, I think, as educators. So we wanted to make sure that we were uh upping our game, so to speak. Um of the things that we faced as a district was declining enrollment. Uh when I was hired, the student count was just around 900. And when I retired 12 years later, we were at 450. So rapid uh decline enrollment, um, which does have an impact on the programs uh because it impacts your budget, which means it impacts your people, um, and it impacts the programs that we were able to provide. But even with that change in what the school looked like, um, we we were able to do some tier two and tier three intervention work. We were able to set up an after-school tutoring program. We bolstered our um extracurricular activities because those are one of the things that keeps students engaged and wanting to come to school. Um, so we were able to do some great things even with some of those challenges.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 3:48

You may know the statistics better than I do, but there is a large number of school systems that are facing declining enrollment. And so uh so managing, navigating that, and still maintaining or even improving uh outcomes for the children that continue to participate uh is top of mind for a lot of educators right now. Yeah, absolutely.

Were the real problems people, or systems?

Dr. Matthew Flippen 4:09

Do you see challenges with like misdiagnosing what the root problems are?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 4:14

One of the things that I found when I came into Stanfield is that obviously there were people that had some concerns about the the things that were happening or not happening within the system. Um, but but the misdiagnosis was that they were people problems when in reality they were systems problems. So it's not, you know, teachers being resistant. It was they didn't understand the expectations. Or there was professional development that was needed because they just didn't have the capacity to do what we were asking them to do. Or uh, especially in a rural community, um, capacity is an issue. So if staff are drowning, you know, it's it's not inspiration for being better, it's time, it's tools, it's prioritization, it's making sure that we're protecting the collaboration time that we're giving them. Um, so really it it's it's making sure that we understand that um we have to look at the systems that are in place and support what we are asking our educators to do. Um, and and so we picked a we picked a few things that were solutions and then we started backfilling. And one of the first things that we uh approached was some culture building and making sure that we were creating relationships with each other and with our students and their families, as well as the community at large. Uh and we also uh then made sure that we were providing some high-quality professional development. Um, and that can be challenging in a rural community, but but we had some great partners that we were able to pull in uh so that we were able to give them some skills that pedagogy buildup was really important. Um, so that's where we started.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 6:00

That's great. Yeah, I love that. You know, I I uh, you know, one of the reasons we are doing this Transformational Educators podcast is to highlight the fact that it's that you can transform schools without replacing all your staff, without replacing all your children, without replacing all your parents. Right. That you can take what you're given and that it and that through culture and and addressing systems and processes. Um, but you know, the the team that you have, they really have got to feel known and loved and and inspired by a common purpose or mission. Um and then from that foundation you can move forward. Yeah, I love that. And it probably is true. The most common misdiagnosis is uh it's a people issue. Was there something specific in the culture that you felt like needed to be addressed before you could move forward?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 6:55

Really, what it came down to was

What happened when teachers stopped working in isolation

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 6:58

we had uh teachers that were uh operating in isolation, they didn't talk to each other. Um there was not time dedicated toward encouraging, giving them a platform to do that. So we looked at the schedule to make sure that our grade levels could plan together. I mean, it was just that simple. Um and and so creating again those spaces for professional learning communities, which are, you know, at the time it was somewhat innovative. It's not anymore. It's almost an expectation that you have a learning community of some kind set up in your school. Um, but but allowing for that. And then just really um ensuring that we focused very laser-like on how do you interact with kids? How do you talk to kids? What are the expectations for behavior in your classroom? And is there consistency from location to location on what we are all saying and doing and how we are interacting with our children? Um, and and just even that, uh, again, very simple, um, but so hard in practice to make sure that there's consistency and then fidelity to what we're we were um committing to as a staff, uh, that we were going to uh do certain things with our with our students and with our with our um structures within our classrooms. Um it it did make a difference, but it was just getting everybody on board once um things were rolling.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 8:29

Well, I mean, I I can only imagine. So tell me what that looked like practically. I mean, as from the superintendency, how did you laser focus, get behavior and these and these skills aligned?

Why data had to come before buy-in

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 8:42

The first thing obviously was the why. You know, people have to know why. Why is this important? Why are you asking me to think differently about what I'm doing? Um, and so we looked at data. Um, we had conversations with our families, with our staff, with our students, uh, just so that we had that anecdotal information as well. And um from understanding the why we need to do something different, we then started talking about, well, how? What is it going to look like if we do something different? And, you know, standing at the door and greeting uh children as they came into the room, or ensuring that all of our rules were consistent. Um, we, you know, a traditional, is it safe, is it responsible, is it respectful, uh, was about as deep as we got with that. But it made a difference because everybody now is speaking the same language and has the same expectations, no matter where they are or where the students are. Um, and and having some consistent expectations across all grade levels was also important because we kept our families year over year. And when you have families that have multiple students, then they understand what the expectations are. You start to build this community and this positive culture toward we want students to be successful. This is how we're going to help to do that.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 10:01

But when you said connecting our why to and using data to drive that, my first thought was oh, how does data support your why? So when you dove into that, uh, you started to see the why with some children are not being successful. And we can see that in the data. And then the consistency that we need across the system. Is that is that the approach that you took? Absolutely it. With the expectation that that educators want great teachers, right? Great staff, they want the children to be successful. And it doesn't sound like you're asking them to add more reports or paperwork, right? This is the line of practice.

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 10:41

That's right. And it's and it's it's not defaulting to blame. It's making sure that you know we that we are examining adult practices and structures rather than you know blaming kids or blaming parents or blaming the community. It it's making sure that we're really focused on um the right work rather than blame.

How do you lead change when tradition pushes back?

Dr. Matthew Flippen 11:05

So I assume you face some resistance to that alignment. How did you address that? What's that look like in a way that still maintains the culture? Because you're trying to improve culture, but also move, you know, implement change.

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 11:18

Well, again, it goes back to that, to that why. Um, but the we've always done it this way is is something that I heard. And um it it can be very strong, especially in a world community where that identity is built on tradition. And um, servant leadership really means honoring that identity while still insisting on we've got to change and grow for kids. Um, and and and really that became the, okay, we've done it this way, but but where are we now? And where would we rather be? And how can we get there? And uh including them in the process.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 11:55

Yeah, I typically find that resistance is in pockets, right? That there's uh there's a leader of resistance. Did you make any special effort to win over those leaders of resistance? What did that look like?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 12:07

Oh, absolutely. Um visibility, uh, you know, um, especially in tight-knit communities, it it's risky to tell hard truths because you you see these people out at the grocery store or ball games or, you know, in in places other than the school. And so um making sure that uh there was that visibility was very important because it gave them an opportunity to communicate with you if they had a question, uh, to see that you were engaged and involved, that you were really invested in what was going on with both their education as well as you know, the overall well-being of their students and and wanted success, wanted success, however, that that was going to show up.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 12:53

Now you mentioned you were there for an extended period of time

When did the culture actually begin to shift?

Dr. Matthew Flippen 12:56

in this in this role. Where did you start to really see the culture and these outcomes start to shift the direction you wanted them to go?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 13:04

It took a couple of years. Actually, the first year that I was there, I did a lot of listening and uh navigating to systems and and figuring out where are we really and where are the gaps and learning, you know, and and making sure that that they knew who I was, um, showing up so that they knew who I was and what I was all about. After that first year, we started talking about things that we could be doing differently and some expectations that I had as a result of we wanna, we wanna do better. And this is this is how we're gonna do that. And those conversations with again making sure that we talked to people, we collected data, we talked about the why. Um, there were some people that left that first after that first year. I was not surprised uh because that why didn't align with theirs. And that's okay. Um, it's there are there are people that just uh needed something different. And so they were going to find it somewhere else. And that was fine. It was not easy for everyone to make that adjustment to doing something different. Some left. And then others, it it was it was just again being very um consistent from from my expectations and from what I was saying and doing and how I was showing up, and then providing support. Uh, you know, I can't I can't expect that they're gonna do something different if they don't have the tools to do something different. And so, again, professional development or uh time with uh experts at um a particular content area or, you know, whatever that whatever it was that they needed and being able to provide that. I wanted them to be successful. The board wanted them to be successful, the community needed them to be successful. And so we were going to support them in growing and and and becoming um all that they could be.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 14:53

What was the key couple key things you wanted them to know about you?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 14:57

I wanted them to know who I was as an educator. And so being very vocal about um my experiences, um, being very authentic, showing up with vulnerability was was important, um, being willing to take criticism also important uh as feedback and uh honoring that they had an opinion. Um and you know, just being noble. And I had an open door. And so anybody in the district could come through and and have a conversation if there was a concern, if they just wanted to chat, if they were celebrating something. Um, but but being uh out there in classrooms, being out there in the hallways, and then also um being willing to take those confidential conversations and say, how can I help you? How can I support you? What is it that you need? So being authentic and and and holding true to what my values were and what my expectations were uh for for the benefit of students and ensuring that they knew I I'm not here to uh upturn the apple cart. I do really want to make sure that we're doing this together and how can I support you in in making sure that that happens.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 16:16

Yeah, and it does take time for people to believe, right? It's not like you can walk in day one, week one, month one, and everyone just becomes your best best friend and we're collaborating all with the team, right? It takes it takes time. Now, hopefully there's a few that jump on board right away, uh, but uh but it does it does take time. And I and I love that you invested the first year of listening and learning, uh sharing ideas, but not driving for change. But it was clear enough that some people said, you know, this isn't the right path for me. Uh and so, and though so that the second year, yeah, you began to implement more aggressively. So so what ended up being a couple of years down the road, how did the how did the performance of the school, and I know it's not just the grade from Arizona, I mean, there's culture and there's you know community involvement, but from your perspective, how you measured it, did it move the direction you hoped?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 17:12

Yes, it did.

The results, from school grades to family engagement

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 17:14

Actually, while I was there, we got up to a high B, which is great. Um, I I will tell you that the the superintendent that's there now, since I've retired, was the principal. Uh, she and I worked together and they just got an A this past year. So they are definitely on the right trajectory. Another thing that was really um successful was our Indian education, our parent groups. Um, when I first got there, there were one or two people that would show up to those meetings. And by the time I left, uh, they were they were much larger. Um, 10, 12, 15 people, which out in that community where transportation is an issue and uh their work schedules don't always align to the meetings that we were holding. Um we had people that were interested and engaged and wanting to to uh to be more involved with what their students were doing, which was great. Um, that was one of our focuses. Um, the other things that that we noted were um absenteeism. Um we focused a lot on, and I know that that's a chronic problem right now across the country. Um, but even in COVID, we had pretty high attendance. Um and a lot of that I attribute to the relationships that teachers built with their students and those families that that that was a place that they wanted to be because they loved their teachers, they loved the school, they wanted to be involved and engaged. Um so we were able to see growth in those um attendance numbers. I think another thing was we had more and more students that signed up to get involved in other things outside of the classroom, um, not just athletics, but we had a Lego robotics team and we had a um a 21st century program that was very successful. And so those kinds of metrics were things that we looked at as well. Are we, are we reaching students, not just during the classroom time that we have them from, you know, eight to three, but are we also engaging them in more holistic opportunities to grow as a person? And the answer was yes. Um, and then of course, we always, you know, we we look to the community and to the parents. Are we meeting your needs? Are there things that that we should be doing that we're missing the mark on? Um, and our approval ratings um from our parents and from the community uh grew as well. And so that was a metric that we really leaned into because if our parents weren't happy, if our community wasn't satisfied, then we were missing something. And that was a gap that we would then need to figure out how to fill. So um, those were another set of metrics that we looked at. And then finally, we talked to students, which is probably the most important part of that whole equation. Are students satisfied with what we're doing? Are they feeling safe at school? Are they feeling like they're they're uh progressing? Do they feel supported? Um, are there things that engage them while they're they're there during the school day? Um do they feel like their teacher is um supportive of them and their growth as a person? And so, you know, same thing. We saw growth in those metrics as well.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 20:35

Did you do that through a structured survey?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 20:38

We sure did. And we also had focus groups. Fantastic.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 20:41

Yeah, I think that is a piece that I hear missing frequently of uh getting feedback from your customers. You know, some of those are predictors, right? I mean, that that grade at the end of the year when you know the state comes out, that is a lagging indicator, right? Those leading indicators, attendance, engagement, the survey feedback, uh, parental involvement, all of those are predictors of um, you know, what where things are gonna ungo. So those are that's a great, that's a great list, Melissa. Thank you for for sharing that. When we think about schools, uh school leadership teams jumping in to make change.

The school improvement mistake leaders keep making

Dr. Matthew Flippen 21:23

Um do you think there is a kind of a common misstep that happens? I'm asking you to back up and look at your work overall as you work with leaders really across the country now, and you're in this new additional role uh that you're that you're playing.

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 21:41

Honestly, I I think that one of the missed opportunities is really ensuring that you are targeting the right things to change. So have you done a comprehensive needs assessment? Have you started with purpose and guardrails and making sure that you outline the expectations for outcomes? What is it that we're going to stop doing so that we can do whatever this is well? And there tends to be the desire when you get excited about, you know, a new program or a new initiative or something that, you know, is is, I want to, you know, bright and flashy, that you're going to just jump into it and you're going to jump to that solution. But taking the time to be very thoughtful and intentional about have you collected your evidence? Have you, have you uh taken a look at your outcome data, your process data, your perception data? Are those things that you are taking a look at? Is this the right change that we need to be focused on? And and really listening to people, you know, taking the time to get the feedback to help you define if there's a problem that needs change, are you defining it correctly and with precision? Um, and and ensuring that you are involving all of the stakeholders that that touch that. Um we we did that every year as a Title I school. You had to as part of the expectation, right? Where um we would have our five whys uh or a fishbone, uh, making sure that we got down to the why, you know, the and and requiring evidence. Is this really the right change? And here's why we think it is. Um and then making sure that that we were realistic about, okay, is this if this is the change that we're gonna see, let's map it out. What is it gonna look like? How are we going to monitor? What are the indicators that we're going to be relying on? And and how are we going to implement and check that we're implementing with fidelity or what have you. So, you know, I would say that that thing that um comes across most often, it's not change for change's sake. I mean, it's not, you know, old line and new bottles. It's we're making sure that we are really thoughtful and intentional that we are getting the right work targeted.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 23:55

Yes. Which I think is hard when you're a new leader coming into a new new campus and you see things maybe immediately that you're like, wow, we need to change this. And uh and you're even excited and and and motivated, right, to do that. But if you step too soon towards that, before you've laid the foundation of trust and culture, collaboration, um, you you really have probably hurt yourself um by trying to implement something new without a process to get everyone on board and agree and taking the time to do that. We've also heard from leaders that, you know, in the process of their building culture and really asking about what's what's great about this school, what would you improve if you could, and just gathering feedback, I'll call it some low-hanging fruit, kind of emerges that the staff, the team is already identified as things they'd like to improve. And by taking their feedback and then adjusting what they've recommended, you add to your credibility and trust um in the in the system. So I I does that that mirror what you're what you've seen.

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 25:10

Oh, absolutely. I you know, why why would you collect survey data if you're not gonna do anything with it? And they know. I mean, you know, if if it's performative and nothing changes, even though they're giving you some probably some pretty good insights, um, then why do it? Uh and you start to lose trust. And and uh people will stop engaging with you if if you're not uh really truly in involving them in the process.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 25:38

So true. Yeah, you really that that first time you don't do anything that was given in the survey uh as ideas, then you've you know shut that process down from being helpful for a while to come. Well, when you think back on your time uh there,

The discipline breakthrough that changed everything

Dr. Matthew Flippen 25:54

is there a specific student or a specific teacher or maybe even a parent who just their growth uh during that time just really stands out to you as kind of your highlight of that of that season?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 26:09

It's not necessarily one student, but there were a lot of behavior referrals when I first got to the district. And it and especially, you know, a single site, um, everything was going, and I did have a principal. I was the superintendent, business manager, grants director, HR director, but I did have I did have a principal, which was great. And it it was the number of office referrals, which, you know, the teachers were frustrated. Again, we had some lack of continuity between classrooms and expectations. Um, and and when I asked teachers about that, well, kids are different, or parents aren't supporting us, or, you know, those were the things that was the early narrative. And on looking at and doing a deeper analysis, we started looking at the data. Where are the referrals happening? What time of day? Is it, you know, is there a particular teacher? Is there a particular place? Um, we talked to the students, uh, we did walkthroughs. And what we found was those expectations were inconsistent. We did a root cause analysis. It's not a kid problem, it's a coherence problem. And in the process of really focusing on school-wide routines and language and coaching our teachers to focus on engagement strategies and formative checks and um making sure that they had autonomy to take care of minor behavior problems on their own and retain their power as a teacher in the classroom, the authority in the classroom who um who didn't have to send everything out with relationship repair built in. You know, how do you protect that relationship? Um, what we found was that eventually the number of referrals that we were seeing decreased, especially in those hot spots that we were identifying, and class time on task increased. Teacher stress dropped because the system was clearer and they knew what to do. And students really described that the teachers were um more consistent and they were more fair. You know, that word came up a lot, fair. So, you know, the lesson that I took from that and what I was really proud of, uh, and something that I think um was a um a transformational culture building piece was that when you serve kids well, you have to build adult clarity first. And so, not necessarily a particular student, but it was a system approach that um really did benefit all of the students in the in the school.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 28:43

Yes, for for children to say it's fair, the discipline system is fair, that is quite an accomplishment. So and but yes, it's so it's so so true. So uh I think about my own uh experience through school and the in the variations between um instructors. Uh you know, my youngest uh or twin sons are just finishing high school now, and they're uh they have they comment frequently about the variance uh between um teachers. And it is, you know, I mean it that is hard. It's hard for for children, even especially younger children to navigate, but even for secondary students. And so, yeah, that you smooth that out through, again, consistency, clarity, even the professional development that you did. I mean, all of that alignment um is part of this bigger picture of improving ultimately that you know outcomes. And so that's yeah, fantastic, Melissa. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. This has been super helpful. I can't wait for our audience to hear just all of the very practical strategies that uh that you implemented and and shared. Um,

Where to follow Dr. Melissa Sadorf

Dr. Matthew Flippen 29:55

how can our audience just learn more about your work and follow you?

Dr. Melissa Sadorf 30:00

Sure. Uh so they can uh find me at the NREA website, nrea.net. And my email is Melissa at nrea.net.

Dr. Matthew Flippen 30:12

Okay, fantastic. And then, of course, you help host a podcast as well. So I would definitely encourage uh all of our listeners to tune in there. If you found this episode uh valuable, as I did, please share it with a colleague who could benefit. And if you're not already following Transformational Educators, please do so so you never miss an episode. And then until next time, keep leading with purpose and transforming schools into places where everyone thrives. If today's conversation gave you fresh insight or inspired you to lead with purpose, please follow the show and tell a friend. It helps us reach more educators who want to make a difference. For more stories, resources, and tools to support your leadership journey, visit Graceland.edu. Until next time, keep leading with courage and care.