How to Finance a Vision: Setting Direction and Managing Change within Financial Limitations

How to Finance a Vision is a course for new and aspiring principals and leadership teams. The course provides frameworks and tools for leadership in making the connections between the vision of a school, the budgeting process, and fundraising.

The course starts with an introduction to Henri Nouwen’s spirituality of fundraising. It continues with an introduction to the basic financial documents that a principal should be able to read. It explores the art of communicating the story told by school budgets as a necessary element of fundraising. It concludes with the processes necessary to gain competency in working with both school boards and staffs (with an emphasis on financial and advancement staff) on the financial aspects of school management.

How to Finance a Vision is a remote learning course consisting of three synchronous discussions and three virtual school visits using online video and thirteen weeks of asynchronous online interaction.

Dr. Gideon Strauss
260007 W27
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register January 4, 2027. Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

The Craft of Reflective Practice

We humans make sense of things by telling stories. In this course we will learn how to do critical reflective practice, primarily by telling stories about our everyday professional lives. We will zoom in on the story of an ordinary day at work, and then zoom out to the story of our career to date, zoom out further to the story of our work community, and zoom out even further to the overarching story of God’s world. In the process we will learn qualitative research skills, receive an introduction to phenomenology (the philosophical study of lived experience), develop our own approach to praxis (that is, the craft of morally-oriented, theoretically-informed, and theory-generating critically reflective practice), and, most significantly, come to terms with who we are in what we do.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

132501 / 232501 F26*
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL)

Syllabus

Required Books:

Britzman, D. P. (2003). Practice makes practice: A critical study of learning to teach

Amazon CA (print), Thriftbooks, Abebooks

*students should order a copy as soon as possible, because this book is only available in used format, and shipping may take a long time, so they'll need to make sure they have the book arrive in time before the course starts in the second week of September.* 

Enrolment Notes:
To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register is September 8 (Note that the first session for this course takes place on September 10). Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.


*Approved for Area 2 of the CSTC

Lead From Where You Are: Making a Difference in the Face of Tough Problems, Big Questions, and Organizational Politics

Leadership is not about personality, authority, position, influence, or power as such. Leadership is an art, a craft, a practice, to which everyone is called sometime or other, in widely different situations. Leadership can be practiced with varying degrees of authority, from any position, at varying scales of influence, and with varying access to different sources of power. Leadership is the work of motivating a group of people to act in certain ways as they shape what they share. 

In this course we will explore how to contribute leadership when we have a particular, recognized position of authority in a group, and also regardless of our position in a group. We will learn how to contribute leadership when our group has clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals, and when there are not (or not yet) clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals (so that we must practice imaginative discernment). We will learn how to contribute leadership both to make beneficial change happen and to ensure needed maintenance.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

132504 / 260003 S26*

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MWS, MA-EL)

Dates/Time

Thursday, April 23, 2026, 6:30 - 9:30 pm ET

Thursday, May 7, 2026, 6:30 - 9:30 pm ET

Thursday, May 21, 2026, 6:30 - 9:30 pm ET

Tuesday, August 11, 2026, 1 - 4 pm ET

Wednesday, August 12, 2026, 1 - 4 pm ET

Thursday, August 13, 2026, 1 - 4 pm ET

Syllabus

Required Books

1. Crouch, A. Strong and Weak: Embracing a Life of Love, Risk & True Flourishing.

2. Heifetz, R.A., Grashow, A. & Linsky, M. The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World. 

3. Lencioni, P. The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else in Business. 

4. Williams, D. Real Leadership: Helping People and Organizations Face Their Toughest Challenges.

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register April 17, 2026. Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*NOTE: Approved for Area 2 or 4 of the CSTC

How to Coach A Strong Team: Leading People, Building Institutional Capacity, and Securing Accountability

How to Coach A Strong Team is a course for current and aspiring school administrators who want to cultivate their people skills. The course will focus on the competencies involved in having crucial conversations and coaching colleagues for professional development purposes, while also providing opportunities for learning about the competencies relevant to talent acquisition and employment termination. The backbone of the course will be a series of meditations (in the Reformational philosophical tradition) on being human: imaging God in the world.

How to Coach A Strong Team is a remote learning course consisting of six synchronous sessions including three school visits and a debriefing session with an expert practitioner, thirteen weeks of asynchronous online interaction, and the writing of a playbook by each student taking the course for credit. All of the synchronous sessions will be by means of online video, with the possible exception of one of the school visits. The exception may include an on-site, in-person option as part of a hybrid package, depending on circumstances. Team auditors will have access to five of the six synchronous sessions (including the school visits and the expert practitioner debriefing) and a team audit study guide for reading and talking through the course materials in their team contexts.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICSD 260005 W26

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

Thursdays

(MA-EL)

Syllabus

Required Books

Kaye, B., & Giulioni, J. W. (2019). Help Them Grow Or Watch Them Go: Career Conversations Organizations Need and Employees Want (2nd ed.). Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

Grenny, J., Patterson, K., McMillan, R., Switzler, A., & Gregory, E. (2022). Crucial conversations (3rd ed.). McGraw Hill.

Levy, S., & Cook, J. (2021). Beautiful Work notecatcher [Unpublished manuscript].

Stanier, M. B. (2016). The coaching habit: Say less, ask more & change the way you lead forever. Box of Crayons Press.

*One further required book (Seerveld, C. (1988). On Being Human: Imaging God in a Modern World. Welch Publishing Co.) will be mailed from the ICS library due to limited availability*

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register January 2, 2026. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

The Craft of Reflective Practice

We humans make sense of things by telling stories. In this course we will learn how to do critical reflective practice, primarily by telling stories about our everyday professional lives. We will zoom in on the story of an ordinary day at work, and then zoom out to the story of our career to date, zoom out further to the story of our work community, and zoom out even further to the overarching story of God’s world. In the process we will learn qualitative research skills, receive an introduction to phenomenology (the philosophical study of lived experience), develop our own approach to praxis (that is, the craft of morally-oriented, theoretically-informed, and theory-generating critically reflective practice), and, most significantly, come to terms with who we are in what we do.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICS 132501 / 232501 F25*
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL)

Syllabus

Required Books:

Britzman, D. P. (2003). Practice makes practice: A critical study of learning to teach

Amazon CA (print), Thriftbooks, Abebooks

*students should order a copy as soon as possible, because this book is only available in used format, and shipping may take a long time, so they'll need to make sure they have the book arrive in time before the course starts in the second week of September.* 

Enrolment Notes:
To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register is September 5 (Note that the first session for this course takes place on September 11). Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.


*Approved for Area 2 of the CSTC

Lead From Where You Are: Making a Difference in the Face of Tough Problems, Big Questions, and Organizational Politics

Leadership is not about personality, authority, position, influence, or power as such. Leadership is an art, a craft, a practice, to which everyone is called sometime or other, in widely different situations. Leadership can be practiced with varying degrees of authority, from any position, at varying scales of influence, and with varying access to different sources of power. Leadership is the work of motivating a group of people to act in certain ways as they shape what they share. 

In this course we will explore how to contribute leadership when we have a particular, recognized position of authority in a group, and also regardless of our position in a group. We will learn how to contribute leadership when our group has clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals, and when there are not (or not yet) clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals (so that we must practice imaginative discernment). We will learn how to contribute leadership both to make beneficial change happen and to ensure needed maintenance.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICSD 132504 / 260003 S25*

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MWS, MA-EL)

Syllabus

Required Books

1. Crouch, A. Strong and Weak: Embracing a Life of Love, Risk & True Flourishing.

2. Heifetz, R.A., Grashow, A. & Linsky, M. The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World. 

3. Lencioni, P. The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else in Business. 

4. Williams, D. Real Leadership: Helping People and Organizations Face Their Toughest Challenges.

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register April 18, 2025. Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*NOTE: Approved for Area 2 or 4 of the CSTC

How to Govern a School

This is a course for new and aspiring principals, school leadership teams, and school boards. The course provides frameworks and tools for leadership in educational governance. The course introduces participants to the work of nurturing the relationships among the school’s stakeholders, with a focus on the pivotal relationship between the board and the executive leadership team (or, in smaller schools, the principal). Different approaches to the work of the board are considered, with particular attention to the stewardship of the school’s vision, mission, and values, to the strategic formulation of policy and the monitoring of executive performance, and to accountability to the school’s parents and supporting community.


Dr. Gideon Strauss
ICS 260002 W25
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL)


Syllabus


Required Books:

1. Blanchard, D., Crouch, A., Kauffmann, S., Nardella, J.L., Greer, P. (2019). The redemptive nonprofit: A playbook for leaders. Praxis.

2. Brown, J. (2010). The imperfect board member: Discovering the seven disciplines of governance excellence. John Wiley & Sons.

3. Carver, J. (2011). Boards that make a difference: A new design for leadership in nonprofit and public organizations. Third Edition. John Wiley & Sons.

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register is January 6 (Note that the first class for this course takes place on January 9). Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

NOTE: A Team Audit option is available for school board members and executive leadership teams who wish to take this course together. Please email our Registrar directly at academic-registrar@icscanada.edu for more details.

The Craft of Reflective Practice

We humans make sense of things by telling stories. In this course we will learn how to do critical reflective practice, primarily by telling stories about our everyday professional lives. We will zoom in on the story of an ordinary day at work, and then zoom out to the story of our career to date, zoom out further to the story of our work community, and zoom out even further to the overarching story of God’s world. In the process we will learn qualitative research skills, receive an introduction to phenomenology (the philosophical study of lived experience), develop our own approach to praxis (that is, the craft of morally-oriented, theoretically-informed, and theory-generating critically reflective practice), and, most significantly, come to terms with who we are in what we do.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICSD 132501 / 232501 F24*
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL, MWS)


Syllabus


Enrolment Notes:
To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register is September 6 (Note that the first session for this course takes place on September 12). Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.


*Approved for Area 2 of the CSTC

Lead From Where You Are: Making a Difference in the Face of Tough Problems, Big Questions, and Organizational Politics

Leadership is not about personality, authority, position, influence, or power as such. Leadership is an art, a craft, a practice, to which everyone is called sometime or other, in widely different situations. Leadership can be practiced with varying degrees of authority, from any position, at varying scales of influence, and with varying access to different sources of power. Leadership is the work of motivating a group of people to act in certain ways as they shape what they share. 

In this course we will explore how to contribute leadership when we have a particular, recognized position of authority in a group, and also regardless of our position in a group. We will learn how to contribute leadership when our group has clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals, and when there are not (or not yet) clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals (so that we must practice imaginative discernment). We will learn how to contribute leadership both to make beneficial change happen and to ensure needed maintenance.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICSD 132504 / 260003 S24*

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MWS, MA-EL)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register April 19, 2024. Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*NOTE: Approved for Area 2 or 4 of the CSTC

Philosophical Inquiry and the Practices of Everyday Life: An Interdisciplinary Seminar on Philosophizing in a Time of Crisis (IDS)

In the first chapter of his little book Edith Stein: A Philosophical Prologue 1913-1922 (2006), Alasdair MacIntyre asks, “What would it have been in that period of German history in which Heidegger grew up, served his philosophical apprenticeship, and became the most influential of twentieth century German philosophers to have lived quite otherwise as a philosopher, to have consistently taken seriously both the implications for one’s life outside philosophy of one’s philosophical enquiries and the implications for one’s philosophy of one’s other activities?”

In this seminar we will explore the implications of philosophical inquiry for the everyday practices of philosophers as well as the implications of our everyday concerns for our philosophical practices, with particular attention to the relevance of our political circumstances for this exploration. We will do so with particular attention to the diverse examples offered by the early careers of three philosophers living through what Husserl called the ‘crisis’ of European thought and culture in the 1920s and 30s: Edith Stein, Martin Heidegger, and Herman Dooyeweerd. Both in our seminar conversations and in our written papers for this seminar we will consider what we may learn for our own practices from comparing these examples.

Dr. Neal DeRoo, Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICS 2400AC W24

Remote (Online Synchronous)

Tuesdays, 2pm - 5pm ET

(MA, PhD)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register January 12, 2024. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*Attention TST students: if you are interested in taking this course for credit, you must petition your college of registration to count the course credit toward your degree program. 

How to Finance a Vision: Setting Direction and Managing Change within Financial Limitations

How to Finance a Vision is a course for new and aspiring principals and leadership teams. The course provides frameworks and tools for leadership in making the connections between the vision of a school, the budgeting process, and fundraising.

The course starts with an introduction to Henri Nouwen’s spirituality of fundraising. It continues with an introduction to the basic financial documents that a principal should be able to read. It explores the art of communicating the story told by school budgets as a necessary element of fundraising. It concludes with the processes necessary to gain competency in working with both school boards and staffs (with an emphasis on financial and advancement staff) on the financial aspects of school management.

How to Finance a Vision is a remote learning course consisting of three synchronous discussions and three virtual school visits using online video and thirteen weeks of asynchronous online interaction.

Dr. Gideon Strauss
ICSD 260007 W24
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register January 5, 2024. Maximum enrolment of twelve (12) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

The Craft of Reflective Practice

We humans make sense of things by telling stories. In this course we will learn how to do critical reflective practice, primarily by telling stories about our everyday professional lives. We will zoom in on the story of an ordinary day at work, and then zoom out to the story of our career to date, zoom out further to the story of our work community, and zoom out even further to the overarching story of God’s world. In the process we will learn qualitative research skills, receive an introduction to phenomenology (the philosophical study of lived experience), develop our own approach to praxis (that is, the craft of morally-oriented, theoretically-informed, and theory-generating critically reflective practice), and, most significantly, come to terms with who we are in what we do.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICSD 132501 / 232501 F23*
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL, MWS)


Syllabus


Enrolment Notes:
To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register is September 14 (Note that the first session for this course takes place on September 14). Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.


*Approved for Area 2 of the CSTC

Lead From Where You Are: Making a Difference in the Face of Tough Problems, Big Questions, and Organizational Politics

Leadership is not about personality, authority, position, influence, or power as such. Leadership is an art, a craft, a practice, to which everyone is called sometime or other, in widely different situations. Leadership can be practiced with varying degrees of authority, from any position, at varying scales of influence, and with varying access to different sources of power. Leadership is the work of motivating a group of people to act in certain ways as they shape what they share.

In this course we will explore two kinds of leadership, positional leadership and contributory leadership, and two kinds of leadership practices, algorithmic leadership practices and heuristic leadership practices. Positional leadership is the kind of leadership that comes with a particular, recognized position in a group, and contributory leadership is the kind of leadership that you can contribute regardless of your position in a group. Algorithmic leadership practices are those leadership practices for which there are clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals, and heuristic leadership practices are those leadership practices for which there are not (or not yet) clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals and that demand imaginative discernment. We will attend to leadership with regard to both making beneficial change happen and ensuring needed maintenance.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICSD 132504 / 260003 S23*

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MWS, MA-EL)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register April 21, 2023. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*NOTE: Approved for Area 2 or 4 of the CSTC

Faith, Freedom, and the Meaning of Politics: Liberalism and Its Discontents (IDS)

The political liberalism that has shaped the constitutional arrangements of many nations and that has been hegemonic in international relations since 1989 is currently facing the most serious challenges of recent decades. In international relations the liberal world order is facing challenges from autocratic states like China and Russia and from movements like political Islam. In the North American context liberal democracy is facing serious challenges from a new nationalism and from Christian integralism. In this interdisciplinary seminar we will focus on reading key texts in the current debate conducted in the English language between contemporary proponents of liberalism, nationalism, and integralism, engaging these texts with help from the work of the critical theorist Raymond Geuss and two pluralist philosophers in the Reformational tradition, Jonathan Chaplin and Lambert Zuidervaart, and with contextualizing reference to the work of one Canadian political philosopher, James Tully.

Drs. Ron Kuipers, Gideon Strauss

ICS 2400AC W23

Remote (Online Synchronous)

Tuesdays, 6pm - 9pm ET

(MA, PhD)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register January 13, 2023. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

How to Coach A Strong Team: Leading People, Building Institutional Capacity, and Securing Accountability

How to Coach A Strong Team is a course for current and aspiring school administrators who want to cultivate their people skills. The course will focus on the competencies involved in having crucial conversations and coaching colleagues for professional development purposes, while also providing opportunities for learning about the competencies relevant to talent acquisition and employment termination. The backbone of the course will be a series of meditations (in the Reformational philosophical tradition) on being human: imaging God in the world.

How to Coach A Strong Team is a remote learning course consisting of six synchronous sessions including three school visits and a debriefing session with an expert practitioner, thirteen weeks of asynchronous online interaction, and the writing of a playbook by each student taking the course for credit. All of the synchronous sessions will be by means of online video, with the possible exception of one of the school visits. The exception may include an on-site, in-person option as part of a hybrid package, depending on circumstances. Team auditors will have access to five of the six synchronous sessions (including the school visits and the expert practitioner debriefing) and a team audit study guide for reading and talking through the course materials in their team contexts.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICSD 260005 W23

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

Dates TBA

(MA-EL)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register January 13, 2023. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

The Craft of Reflective Practice

We humans make sense of things by telling stories. In this course we will learn how to do critical reflective practice, primarily by telling stories about our everyday professional lives. We will zoom in on the story of an ordinary day at work, and then zoom out to the story of our career to date, zoom out further to the story of our work community, and zoom out even further to the overarching story of God’s world. In the process we will learn qualitative research skills, receive an introduction to phenomenology (the philosophical study of lived experience), develop our own approach to praxis (that is, the craft of morally-oriented, theoretically-informed, and theory-generating critically reflective practice), and, most significantly, come to terms with who we are in what we do.

Dr. Gideon Strauss
ICSD 132501 / 232501 F22*
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MWS, MA-EL)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:
To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register September 16, 2022. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*Approved for Area 2 of the CSTC

Lead From Where You Are: Making a Difference in the Face of Tough Problems, Big Questions, and Organizational Politics

Leadership is not about personality, authority, position, influence, or power as such. Leadership is an art, a craft, a practice, to which everyone is called sometime or other, in widely different situations. Leadership can be practiced with varying degrees of authority, from any position, at varying scales of influence, and with varying access to different sources of power. Leadership is the work of motivating a group of people to act in certain ways as they shape what they share.

In this course we will explore two kinds of leadership, positional leadership and contributory leadership, and two kinds of leadership practices, algorithmic leadership practices and heuristic leadership practices. Positional leadership is the kind of leadership that comes with a particular, recognized position in a group, and contributory leadership is the kind of leadership that you can contribute regardless of your position in a group. Algorithmic leadership practices are those leadership practices for which there are clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals, and heuristic leadership practices are those leadership practices for which there are not (or not yet) clear, commonly agreed-upon procedures and goals and that demand imaginative discernment. We will attend to leadership with regard to both making beneficial change happen and ensuring needed maintenance.

Participants in the course will read from a carefully curated selection of texts on the practice of leadership, will engage one another in asynchronous online forum discussions about their own leadership experiences in relation to these readings, will meet in a series of six synchronous online video sessions (starting late in April and concluding in an intensive series of sessions on three consecutive days early in August), and will draft and workshop two papers on topics selected from a set of options but all oriented towards the leadership practice and professional development of the participants. Participants are encouraged to take a complete break from coursework during the month of July. The course will conclude with each participant organizing and reflecting on a celebration of learning done in the company of their own confidantes.

Dr. Gideon Strauss
ICSD 132504/260003 S22*
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MWS, MA-EL)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:
To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register April 19, 2022. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*Approved for Area 2 or 4 of the CSTC

How to Govern a School: Board Governance, Decision-Making, and Community-Engagement

How to Govern a School is a course for new and aspiring principals, school leadership teams, and school boards. The course provides frameworks and tools for leadership in educational governance. 

The course introduces participants to the work of nurturing the relationships among the school’s stakeholders, with a focus on the pivotal relationship between the board and the executive leadership team (or, in smaller schools, the principal). Different approaches to the work of the board are considered, with particular attention to the stewardship of the school’s vision, mission, and values, to the strategic formulation of policy and the monitoring of executive performance, and to accountability to the school’s parents and supporting community.

Dr. Gideon Strauss
ICS 260002 W22
Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL)


Syllabus


Enrolment Notes:
To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register January 14, 2022. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

The Observant Participant: Applying Research Craft to Professional Practice

“Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.” (Simone Weil)

“Attention, taken to its highest degree, is the same thing as prayer. It presupposes faith and love.” (Simone Weil) 

How do I avoid becoming the proverbial practitioner who, instead of earning ten years of experience, repeats one year of experience ten times over? How do I make sense of my own experience as a practitioner and how do I learn from my experience? How do I learn from the experience of other practitioners? How do I give attention to what matters most? 

In this course we will consider these kinds of questions. We will draw on the critical reflective practices of other practitioners, we will equip ourselves with the methodological tools of qualitative researchers, and we will cultivate an attitude of attentiveness informed by the approach to practice taken by phenomenologists—becoming philosophically skilful students of our own lived human experience. Doing this course together, we will become more observant participants in our lifeworlds and strengthen our capacity as reflective practitioners in our professions and in our scholarship. 

While the focus of this course is on applying research craft to professional practice, the course is also an introduction to graduate level qualitative research and to key perspectives from phenomenological philosophy. 

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICS 132501 / 232501 F21

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL, MWS)

Syllabus

Enrolment Notes:

To register for this course, email academic-registrar@icscanada.edu. Last date to register September 17, 2021. Maximum enrolment of nine (9) students. ICS reserves the right to decline registrations.

*NOTE: Approved for Area 2 of the CSTC

How to Coach a Strong Team: Leading People, Building Instructional Capacity, and Securing Accountability

CANCELLED

How to Coach a Strong Team is a course for new and aspiring principals. The course provides frameworks and tools for setting directions, building relationships, developing people, developing a school culture and structures to support desired practices, and securing accountability.

The course starts with attention to the character of the leader. It continues with an exploration of the processes necessary to gain competency in the cultivation of vision, the nurture of trust, the leading of change, the building of teams, professional coaching, and the supervision of professional development. It concludes with hiring practices, handling conflict, and terminations of service.

Dr. Gideon Strauss

ICS 260005 F21

Blended (Online Asynchronous/Synchronous)

(MA-EL)

Syllabus

CANCELLED