4 | Owning It Pareto Principle, 20 percent of our collective students often seem to provide 80 percent of our classroom challenges (“Guru: Joseph Juran,” 2009). They are the students who are most challenging to connect with, to keep on task, and to help perform academically. They are the students who frustrate us, often to the point of exasperation. They are also the students who need us the most. They are the students whose parents may not seem deeply committed to their education or were, themselves, unsuccessful in school. They are the students who fall into the so-called “achievement gap,” and often are lost in there (Auguste, Hancock, & Laboissiere, 2009). That’s why I devote these chapters specifically to the ever-important role we play as teachers of students who are struggling or are at risk of dropping out of school. In this part, I offer strategies on topics such as connecting with students at risk, negotiating with them, honoring their cultural backgrounds, involving their parents, and empowering them to have a stake in their own education.
Part 3: Owning It at Your School and District I devote part 3 (chapters 15–19) to the role we play as colleagues—both in our schools and within our districts or organizations. The days of the one-room schoolhouse are long gone, and working with a group of colleagues is an essential part of being a teacher. Just as we teach a group of students with a wide range of abilities and experiences, the teachers and administrators we work with are vastly different in their experiences, knowledge, and philosophies. We’re not all teachers for the same reason, yet we’re all expected to do the same job. With over 17 percent of our colleagues leaving this job within the first five years (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2015), it’s time for all of us to own the fact that, as educators, we are truly dependent on each other. That’s why the chapters in part 3 provide practical and real strategies you can use to incorporate, not eliminate our differences, and draw upon each other’s strengths. It may seem, at times, that the issues and challenges I call out in these chapters have traditionally been the responsibility of principals and district administrators to address. However, owning it as teachers means stepping forward and utilizing creative, collaborative solutions that are practical and effective for the work that we do each day. Offering strategies ranging from coming up with creative ideas for staff meetings, to addressing the generation gaps (yes, gaps!) between teachers, to strategizing for how to approach a colleague to have a difficult conversation, I based this part on the