Transformative Principal: Jethro Jones
Jethro Jones inspires me. After listening to a mentor speak about the importance of building strong communities, Jethro devoted his life to education. He now serves as a principal of a junior school in Kodiak, Alaska.
Jethro and I connected when he invited me to participate on his podcast, the Transformative Principal.
He has produced more than 70 episodes in an effort to rejuvenate the passion of other educators. Jethro mostly interviews other principals or educators. They share experiences about making a difference in the lives of students. When Jethro and I spoke, we ventured into the challenges teachers face when working with young people who are at-risk of exposure to the criminal justice system. Since I know that many people in prison want to redeem their own past bad decisions by working to contribute to schools, I asked Jethro how school administrators would respond to such offers.
I appreciated Jethro’s guidance. He pointed that school districts would have reservations about bringing people with felony backgrounds onto the grounds. Each individual who works with children will need to undergo a background check. A felony conviction would raise flags. Jethro advised our audience about alternatives. He suggested that people who were serious about wanting to contribute to schools could take some action steps such using the new media. People with felony backgrounds could offer real value to teachers if they could deliver a message of personal transformation through mediums that might include podcasts, webinars, or written material.
In light of Jethro’s guidance, I’m going to create a series of podcasts on the Earning Freedom network specifically for educators.
- I will interview young people who share stories about the bad decisions they faced.
- I will ask those people to describe the consequences that followed their bad decisions.
- I will ask what they would have done differently.
I will ask what motivated them to transform their life.
After I record a sufficient number of those interviews, I’ll create lesson plans around the content. I’ll make the lesson plans available on a Google doc, and I’ll write them at an age-appropriate level. Then I will offer the lessons to schools, in a downloadable format. That way, teachers could offer the lessons without having the complication of having to bring people with felony backgrounds onto the school grounds.
For those who would like to learn more about Jethro Jones and his leadership programs, please visit the following links:
Website
http://www.jethrojones.com/home/
Itunes:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/transformative-principal/id770942472?mt=2
https://twitter.com/jethrojones
https://www.linkedin.com/pub/jethro-jones/6/ba/b03
https://www.facebook.com/jethrojones
“I wanted to be a leader in schools…I wanted to help people.”
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