On today’s episode, I interview Scott Mitchell, who has been principal at Brock’s Gap Intermediate School in Hoover, Alabama since its inception in 2011. When the school opened, it was a 5th-6th grade configuration, and in 2018 it was re-established 3rd-5th grade intermediate school. He has over 25 years of teaching and administrative experience, all of which have been in Hoover City Schools. Scott has multiple degrees in education and leadership, and over 25 years of teaching and administrative experience.

Scott’s school is only in their 3rd year of being intentional about building a culture of character, and I think you’re going to learn a lot Scott as he shares a ton of ideas on how they’ve made their core values central to all that they do at their school, from rethinking how they use their time in their faculty settings to how they amplify their students’ voices.

In this episode, you'll learn:

     -The transition that Scott’s school went through pre- and post-pandemic, and why he made the decision to attend the Hope Leadership Academy and intentionally focus on school culture

     -The process that Scott’s school used in the selection of its core values

     -How Scott and his staff made the core values central to every decision and action so that they are strongly embedded into the school’s culture

     -How Scott helped his teachers and staff understand that they weren’t “adding one more thing to their plates”

     -How they flipped their faculty meetings to use the time for culture-focused work

     -How the students defined core values in kid-friendly language and shared it

     -How all stakeholders were involved in selecting core values

     -Scott’s biggest “aha” moment since joining the Hope Leadership Academy and applying the work of character.org at his school

     -How Scott defines students as more than a “brain on a stick” 

     -How the motto “Head, Heart, and Hands” was a light-bulb moment for Scott

     -Advice that Scott would you give someone who wanted to focus on building a culture of character at their school

Resources from the episode:

Brock’s Gap Intermediate School https://www.hoovercityschools.net/brocksgap

Hope Institute https://www.hopeinstitute.org/

Character.org https://character.org/

Clifton Taulbert - Entrepreneur. Businessman. Author.

PRIMED by Dr. Marvin Berkowitz

Ron Clark Academy

Connect with us!

     On Twitter:

Jennifer Hogan - @jennifer_hogan

Communities of Character - @Samford_CCC

Scott Mitchell - @smitchell0464

Brock's Gap Intermediate School - @BrocksGapBucs

     On Instagram:

Communities of Character - @Samford_CCC

Scott Mitchell - @ mrmitch0464

     On Facebook:

Scott Mitchell  https://www.facebook.com/scott.mitchell.3939

Brock’s Gap Intermediate School  https://www.facebook.com/BrocksGapBucs

Email:

Smitchell@hoover(dot)k12(dot)al(dot)us