Join us for our first episode as we introduce Dr. Jennifer Schiele, Lake Oswego School District's Superintendent, and discuss the motivation behind creating this podcast. Hear from Daniel Hartley, our high school band director, who was instrumental in helping make it happen. Plus, we'll have a brief roundup of the upcoming events fun for the whole family.
Dr. Jennifer Schiele, superintendent, LOSD
Mary Kay Larson, executive director of communications, LOSD
Daniel Hartley, band director, Lakeridge High School
Cover Art by: Sera Parker, digital media specialist, LOSD
Podcast theme music written, produced and recorded by these Pacer Band musicians:
Mattias Balogh (piano), Emory Guyer (bass), Declan Southard (drums), Tyler Waltner (tenor Sax), Elaina Stuppler (trombone) Ocean Punsalan (piano), Spencer Becker (alto sax), Kento Klasen (trumpet)
About your hosts:
Jenn Schiele
Dr. Jennifer Schiele, or Jenn, is an experienced and compassionate administrator dedicated to keeping students at the forefront of Lake Oswego School District’s mission. She balances prioritizing social and emotional support and advocating for the best in teaching and learning to provide educational excellence. Jenn has served our schools in various capacities since 2003. She started as a school counselor at Waluga Junior High (now Lakeridge Middle School), then served as assistant principal and principal at Waluga and Lakeridge High School and as assistant superintendent and executive director of curriculum and instruction at the district office. Before moving to Oregon, Jenn was a guidance counselor for Ladue School District and a guidance counselor and math teacher for Kansas City School District in Missouri. Jenn holds a doctorate in education leadership and administration from Lewis & Clark College, a master's degree in counseling psychology from the University of Kansas, and a bachelor's degree in education from Iowa State University. Growing up in Minnesota as the youngest of nine children has shaped who she is today. Jenn is married to her college sweetheart and has raised her son and daughter while supporting our district's children.
Mary Kay Larson
Mary Kay Larson, a household name with anyone receiving a message from LOSD, has served as the Executive Director of Communications at Lake Oswego School District since 2019. Recognized for listening to dissenting viewpoints, clarifying confusion, and building community, Mary Kay supports our learning community through challenges and changes. Before working in education, Mary Kay spent over a decade managing corporate communications and product marketing for high-tech firms in Silicon Valley. She took a break from the corporate world when she and her husband moved their family of four to Lake Oswego for better schools. Mary Kay put her skills to work as a volunteer leader in our schools before returning to the workforce full-time as the Director of the Lake Oswego Schools Foundation in 2016. Having grown up in the California Bay Area, Mary Kay can trace her career path back to her time as a campaign manager for student government and editor of her school paper. She earned her Bachelor of Science in journalism with a minor in public relations from Cal Poly State University, San Luis Obispo. Mary Kay is uniquely positioned in the district office as a Lake Oswego resident and a parent who has raised children in our schools.
[00:00:00] Michelle: Welcome to Learning in Lake Oswego, a podcast providing educational insights for an engaged community. Lake Oswego School District Superintendent, Dr. Jennifer Schiele , will discuss what's important to our learning community. She'll be joined by experts examining various topics, answering important questions, and sharing upcoming events and activities you won't want to miss.
And now, it's your host.
[00:00:33] Mary Kay: Greetings, everyone. You're listening to our inaugural episode of Learning in Lake Oswego, a podcast featuring Superintendent Dr. Jennifer Shealy, who from here on out, you'll hear me refer to her as Jen. Today is October 31st, 2023. In today's episode, we're diving into the why behind this podcast, why are we doing it?
We're also going to introduce you to a key player, our band director, Daniel Hartley, who helped produce the score for this podcast. And we'll round out our first episode sharing some must attend events for you and your family. So without further ado, let's talk to Jenn.
Jen, what brought you to Lake Oswego School
[00:01:16] Jenn: District? first, hi. Hello. So fun to be here with you today. What brought me to Lake Oswego? About 20 years ago, we moved here from St. Louis, Missouri, where I worked as a counselor in the School District. So we moved for a job opportunity for my husband, and at the time he worked in banking, so he started a new position at Union Bank of California.
It was one of those stories that you hear out here in Oregon all the time. They flew us out here in May. I had never seen anything like Oregon. Green, hilly. beautiful. And at that time it was dry. So I was sold immediately and was excited to make the move out west. So we moved out as soon as the school year was over and we had the most beautiful summer in what I thought was heaven.
P. S. No one told me about the rain at all. I experienced that all on my own come October. During that time, I did apply for a position at what was known as Waluga Junior High, that is now Lake Ridge Middle School, and that was my first job here in the Lake Oswego School District.
[00:02:16] Mary Kay: We have a similar story.
My family was thinking about moving up here and we followed my husband on a business trip in October, which I later learned is recruiting season because of all the beautiful fall leaves. So for as much as you give our district, I know that your upbringing really shaped who you are and how you lead.
tell us a little bit about your childhood.
[00:02:41] Jenn: I have a, what I would consider a unique family. from Minnesota, specifically Elbert Lee, and that's a small town just north of the Iowa border. So about an hour and a half south of Minneapolis, but right above the Iowa border, which many of you call the flyover states in the Midwest.
I have eight brothers and sisters, specifically I have four sisters and four brothers, and we were born as girl, boy, girl, boy, girl, boy, girl, boy, girl. That's a lot of noise and a lot of action in a house growing up, but I loved it. And I'm still really close to all my siblings. Unfortunately, both my parents have passed, but.
Before they left this world, they did instill this importance of family in all of us. And every year we get together for this family golf tournament that's super fun. And my sisters and I always try to take a sister's trip each year. My husband, Scott, and my two children, Flynn, who's a junior in college, and Brooklyn, who's a junior in high school.
We never miss these family outings. And all of their cousins, and they have 20 of them, they're all really close. And they're all over the United States, so they have a lot of fun. Visiting them and talking with them and just having these yearly trips. And I tell y'all that really, because the relationship that I have with my family greatly impacts who I am as an educator.
I truly believe that care, connection, and community are the heart of education. And we need each other to do. What is right for all of our students?
[00:04:12] Mary Kay: I think is interesting about your family dynamic is you are the youngest of nine, yet you are the fearless leader of our district. I do know that you were in charge of some beings in your household growing up.
Do you want to tell us about those?
[00:04:24] Jenn: That's cute. Furry friends. Yes, my furry friends. We always had basset hounds in my family. And so I was in charge of the basset hound, who was really the youngest in the family. And we always had a basset hound, which people laugh at because now here in My adulthood, we also have Basset hounds and love walking them, love their long ears and how soft and cuddly they are.
So it's always been a part of our family.
[00:04:49] Mary Kay: Your Basset hound was a feature during the pandemic when we'd be on at home on zoom, and we'd see them snoozing on the sofa behind you.
[00:04:58] Jenn: Yeah, for those of you that don't know, basset hounds sleep about 21 hours a day. So they're not awake very often, but they are super cute and they don't require a lot of exercise.
So they're great if you just want to chill and watch TV with them.
[00:05:10] Mary Kay: You mentioned being the principal at Lake Ridge and I know as we do different episodes of the podcast. We'll learn more about your various experiences and different roles in the district. But let's talk a little bit about being the superintendent.
What made you want to be superintendent? Or when did you in your career think, I think I might be superintendent someday?
[00:05:32] Jenn: That is an interesting story. One I've, I find fascinating. I'm not sure my son likes me telling this story, but I will do so anyway. So many years ago, I was driving him and a few of his friends to a baseball practice.
And those of you who have children know driving your kids around is sometimes the only way to learn what's going on in their lives. So you listen up very closely during those times. especially, and this is a tip when they're in middle school, sometimes that's the only time you get to hear what's going on in their lives, but Flynn and his friends.
We're having this conversation about who could be the president of the United States. It was about a year out of the election and my son blurted out that his father should run for the president of the United States, which, made the hairs go up at the back of my neck, but I immediately said, Hey, what about mom?
To which he said something along the lines of mom, you can't be the president because you're not a man. And as soon as he said that. I was in absolute shock, not, a becoming the president United States or anything like that, but just this idea that in my own family with the two parents who are working, I thought I had created this environment in which my Children could grow up.
Believing that they could be anything they wanted to do as long as they worked hard and, they had this right mix of talent and skills, but they could do any top position. So I was really in shock about why he would say something like this. But I just listened to it and let it go in one ear.
and obviously I went home and I talked to Scott, my husband about this. And he said, calm down. It's no big deal. It's all fine. It's, he didn't really mean that, but a few days later, same boys, different practice, but in the car, just the same interesting conversation starts. And they're talking about all their teachers in elementary school.
And one of his friends asked the other boys, like, why are all the teachers girls? And my son without. No coaching, no nothing at all from me. He said, that's easy. Everybody knows girls are smarter than boys, so of course they're gonna be the teachers. And that made me think immediately, here you go.
Here's a kid who says, I as a woman can't be the president of the United States, but I'm smarter than most boys. And that's how it took it in my head anyway. And. I was thinking to myself, wow, I didn't want to be the president, obviously, but I was thinking about leadership in what I do. And at the time I was a principal.
So I was thinking like, wow, can I be the superintendent? Is that something that I'd be interested in studying about? And at that time I decided to go back to school to get my doctorate. And I was very interested in studying. Female leadership and figuring out what I would need to do to prepare myself, not only in school, but mentally for a job of superintendency.
And that was at the moment I realized, yep, I'm going to go for this type of job. Obviously, my son, who made a big impact on me and what he said there, he also was the first person to say to me when this position came up. You absolutely need to do that, mom. So they've been very supportive of me and my career since they've even been very small children.
[00:08:37] Mary Kay: That's awesome. I know part of your leadership is that you really keep children and students centered in how you guide our district and, just, that's a great example of how your son, even the words and his perspective really guided your own career. I do know that you are one of only. A few female superintendents here in Oregon, and even in the United States,
[00:09:02] Jenn: I can tell you when I started studying, for my doctorate, it was 17 percent of superintendents were women at the time. And when I became a superintendent, it had gone up to 19%. So I lead in the charge. I think we're heading in the right direction, but we certainly have not arrived yet. Let's get to
[00:09:20] Mary Kay: why a podcast?
Why are we venturing into this project? From my perspective, one of my motivations, I will step back and say, the first time someone mentioned doing a podcast, I think my first reaction to you was No.
[00:09:35] Jenn: I think it was.
[00:09:37] Mary Kay: And then like I normally do, I go home and I process and I think about it. And then I start to think, Oh, wait, I can see the beauty of this.
I can see why this really does not solve a problem, but fill a need in our community. So then, as it usually goes, driving to work. blow drying my hair was, you're thinking mindlessly, the idea started to percolate. And I think I came back into your office and said, okay, so when we do our podcast, I think this is how we could do it.
And you're like, okay, clearly you've gotten on board. but I know that the big aha for me, the, motivation was. I am, two, two offices down from you and in my position as communications director, I'm often the go to for people. Usually it starts with, I'm not sure you're the person to ask, but I'm hoping you can help me.
And sometimes I have the answer. And if I don't, I know who, or I can go find who has the answer. And a lot of times that's me walking down to your office. And asking you for direction and oftentimes you have the answer because of all your years of experience and every time I learned something new, a lot of times I come in thinking, okay, I think I know the answer.
I think it's this and a lot of times it's well, but, and then you provide more context and perspective and history and it's okay, people need to know that. I know that's my motivation for this podcast is to provide that kind of access for people who don't work just two doors down from your office and sharing your insights and why things are the way they are in education and in our district specifically.
But tell me Jen, why did you want to do a podcast?
[00:11:15] Jenn: One of our directors, John Wallin, came back from a conference and he's the one that first suggested this. But our aim is really to build a deeper understanding of all of our initiatives and give greater access to information to our entire community, really.
And we want to reach people exactly where they are, especially busy people on the go who might be listening to us like as they're walking their dogs or commuting. or driving to work or waiting in the car line or all of those things that people spend a lot of time in their car and they want to listen to things now instead of reading.
And I know we put out a great newsletter and there's a lot of information there, but sometimes people just want to hear. Auditory learning is incredibly effective for many people. And I think this is a perfect platform to reach those. With all that said, I'm super nervous about this pod about this podcast and recording myself.
I've never really liked my voice. I've never done anything like this. I'm not an actress or, any kind of performer. And so I hope that I'm going to be able to provide information to all of you while staying somewhat entertaining. I certainly don't want to bore anyone and I want to make this fun.
[00:12:25] Mary Kay: We're modeling, trying new things. And we will learn as we go and we will take feedback and keep evolving it. But no time like the present to try something new. one of my mottos is do something that scares you every day. And I'm going to chalk this up to the week.
[00:12:46] Jenn: Yes, absolutely. We get credit.
[00:12:48] Mary Kay: So speaking of learning new things.
We are going to turn it to one of the stars of our podcast. We couldn't do this without him and his students. We have Daniel Hartley. He's a music teacher and band director at Lake Ridge High School. And Jen, you have a special reason for inviting him on our podcast today
[00:13:09] Jenn:. That's right, Mary Kay. Daniel and his students played a pivotal role in creating the original theme music.
For our show, the jazz band work under Daniel's guidance is nothing short of impressive and their ability to produce such a fantastic score in a short amount of time left me in absolute awe. I've seen him and his students at parties. I've seen him at foundation events, school events. Every time I see him, it brings tears to my eyes.
I just think they're Fantastic. And when you heard that music playing at the beginning and you'll hear some at the end, when I call him and ask Hey, is there any way you could do an original piece of music for my podcast? And he's absolutely. When do you need it by? And that's what they produce.
So they are so fantastic. So Daniel, I'm eager to hear about the process. How did you and your students manage to pull this off?
[00:14:05] Daniel: Thank you so much for having me on the first podcast. It's an honor. I want to talk about. The process and make sure we acknowledge that this was completely student done and completely student driven, which is really impressive and amazing.
And that kind of comes from a desire, I think, from most high school music teachers to try to turn over as much of the learning as possible. Like the more that our kids can do on their own without us is more towards the goal of making them into lifelong musicians and performers. so for this one specifically, there's a couple of scaffolds that were already put in place that made it.
Very easy for them to accomplish. and that's that when I came three years ago, we implemented a few things in the jazz band class specifically. and the first one is that we start every class with. A mandatory improvisation time and we put a simple chord progression out and then every kid is expected to improvise over top of those chords.
The purpose of that is to make every kid feel comfortable improvising because when a kid learns jazz, the first thing is, I don't know how to improvise, I don't know how to make up music on the spot. And so we try to make it a very calm. Environment to where every kid feels welcome. And then after a while of me doing that three years ago, I slowly turned that over to a student leader, to a class leader.
And so now, if you come to my classroom, right when the bell leaves, or even before the bell leaves, the kids are already improvising without me. And they've already started that process and they pick their own chord progressions and I just calmly take role. I let them go for five to 10 minutes. Then I say, okay, let's.
So that's the first scaffold. The second scaffold that was put in place was we started a student led jazz combo. One student we pick every year and they are in charge of that combo. They rehearse on their own outside of class time. They pick their own music. And then as people email me, Saying Oh, we have, the foundation banquet on Friday night.
Do you have a group that could play? I forward that email to that student leader and they take it over. So for example, we're recording this podcast on October 31st, this Friday, on November 3rd, that combo was going to play at an event, downtown, LO while. Me and the rest of the pep band are going to be at the playoff game at Lakeridge High School.
So those two scaffolds really made it easy when I got that email from Jen, to do this, I simply walked into class and I said, Hey, we need to record some podcast music needs to be a completely original music. That way we don't have any copyright laws to worry about. And I said, let's give them three options to pick from.
So let's pick like a medium swing. Let's pick maybe a quicker swing and then maybe a contrasting style. And I think they picked a boogie woogie. and then I actually left the room. I went to the stage and I took care of some stuff for 20 minutes and I came back and they were like, all right, we're ready to record.
And then I helped them with the recording process. We don't have fancy equipment. we just have two drop mics. So it was actually funny. The trumpet player was standing in the far back corner cause he was playing pretty loud and the alto player was. Right up by the front mic to make the balance sound right.
But really it was truly completely student driven, which is really
[00:17:01] Jenn: awesome. I absolutely love that. Promoting student leadership. I feel we are so lucky to have you and what you're doing with our students. Can you tell me a little bit about what it's like to be a high school band director?
[00:17:12] Daniel: It's really, fun.
And when I tell people, when I meet people out in the world, I'm like, what do you do for a living? I say, I'm a high school band director. Everyone's response is, wow, that's really cool. And then the second question is, can you play all the instruments? yes, I can. It's really fun. It's also really stressful.
So we'll talk about being really fun. Because the students choose to take my class, by the time they get to high school, they've been in it for a long time and we get to know them for four years. We go on bus trips. We do overnight trips. So you really develop a strong bond with your students and the music students, band, choir, orchestra, and even theater.
It's really fun people to be around. the stressful part comes Along because everything we do is put on the stage and everything is public and so you know for a pep band game The students have a lot of fun. It's really fun But for me, it's highly stressful because that might be the only time someone hears anything from my band program And they're gonna judge everything we do based on that one national anthem that we play or something like that And so we're always thinking about how can we balance having a lot of fun, but also be at the highest level That we can be at all times
[00:18:19] Jenn: and some people are probably curious like what makes it different being a teacher of music and other professions in music
[00:18:26] Daniel: Yeah, I think the biggest difference is we're working with kids and students and we're working with everyone that takes our class And so when you're in the profession of music you get to hire a professional and You send them the music in advance and they show up and they can play it perfectly and you maybe do a rehearsal and you're done and it's really easy.
And in the professional world, it's if you can't hang, you're not going to get hired for that gig. In our world, we take everyone that we can get and they're all at different levels and we start, the first day we pass out a piece, it sounds. Terrible and it's horrible and we work on it for months and it sounds beautiful at the end and helping them balance like the kids Balance that process balance being okay with sounding really bad at first and then balance Having people in the group that maybe aren't as good as them, or maybe you're better than them.
it's just a whole, it's a completely different process, but really we're, teaching them life skills that transfer to every other thing. They do taking a project from ground zero, working on a team and then. Putting this polished product out at
[00:19:27] Jenn: the end. So you had mentioned you moved here three years ago or to the district.
So what do you like about being part of the Lake Oswego school district?
[00:19:35] Daniel: It's been a wonderful three years. I'm very happy here. The first thing that I really appreciate, as a teacher is that I just feel like. A colleague with everyone. Everyone that's an adult that works in the district is clearly here for the same goal, and that's to do whatever is best for students.
and so like for, example, right now I'm on a podcast talking with my superintendent, which is my boss, but I don't feel like Jen. I know she's my boss, but it feels very calm and it feels very like she respects me as a band director. I respect her as superintendent. It's wonderful. I walk the halls at Lakeridge and everyone just feels.
Like we're on the same team for the music team district wide as well. We get together a couple of times a year. All the music teachers are, we have each other's back and we're looking out for what's best for the kids. So it feels very collegial and I really appreciate that. And then in terms of teaching the students of Lake Oswego.
I feel like our students are very driven here, which is really fun. They want to do the best they can do and they want to go above and beyond every time. And so it makes it really fun to work with them because they're meeting us halfway and trying to push themselves as well.
[00:20:39] Jenn: So what, like when you think about your goals for the next few years or what you want to accomplish with your program over the next few years, what is that?
how do you go from where you are right now, which I think is. That's amazing in the top to the next step?
[00:20:52] Daniel:. I think the next step for everyone in the probably the state and even the country right now is just to regrow our numbers. We all definitely took a hit in COVID because it's pretty obvious, but learning music on zoom isn't great.
Music is a community based thing. For my personal goal, I definitely am trying to work with my middle school program to grow those numbers, working with getting down to the fifth grade to promote music again. Because ultimately, and we talk about this a lot in our programs, you have students that come out as shining stars when they're seniors.
And then we rely on them to pass that torch down to the next, the next group. And so we always talk about having a succession plan and our programs right now are to a point where we need to make sure we have enough kids. So that just becomes automatic. And so my goal for the next five years is just to grow those numbers so that it becomes like a snowball rolling down the hill and it just becomes automatic.
We're really excited for the future. So I think it's really bright.
[00:21:51] Jenn: So when you think about any student right now who's sitting at home, possibly listening to this show, thinking, I, maybe I'd like to start an instrument or I'd like to be in the band. What advice do you have for these students or the parents about starting into a musical instrument?
My
[00:22:07] Daniel: biggest advice is to get involved and to start early. Ultimately, when I talk to adults, I've never heard anyone say, Man, I'm so glad I never did music, or they never say I'm so happy that I quit the alto saxophone Everybody always says I wish I had done music in high school and they always say I wish I still played my instrument We are battling some unfortunate publicity on like In terms of like TV commercials, like if you watch the super bowl, there's almost always a TV commercial portraying a marching band.
It's like really nerdy and really bad. And, I always hate those because I'm like, that's not actually true. And being in music is really wonderful. And it's something that they can do for their entire life. You can play your instrument, you can sing all the way up till the moment that you leave us on this earth.
And it's incredible because not everything you do will last you that long for middle school and high school students. and parents, my biggest recommendation is to keep them in music. as they leave middle school and go into high school, there are so many amazing course offerings. There's also a lot of pressure to take really advanced classes to get into college and there's all these wonderful sports and I think that's all great.
I love all that, but keep them well rounded, keep them well balanced and keep them in that music class and make sure they at least try it in high school because high school music is very different than middle school music. And then for elementary parent, I would definitely say. Have them try it in sixth grade, put them in band, choir, orchestra, make sure they give it a shot before they say no to it because it is really, a fun place to be and it's life changing.
[00:23:39] Jenn: Amazing advice. And I think, I hope everyone's listening to that. Get your child in the performing arts, any of them, just get them out there and trying new things. I think that's great. Thank you so much for being here today on our. First show, I really appreciate you answering the phone and coming in and being here and answering these questions today.
Absolutely.
[00:23:59] Daniel: Thank you for having me.
[00:24:00] Mary Kay: Thank you. I think we are now, getting into our next regular part of our podcast. We are going to talk a little bit about some upcoming events. Jen is. It's someplace almost every night of the week. Some things are more fun than others, but most everything you're at is actually public and everyone's welcome to join you.
Jen, do you want to talk a little bit about what you have coming up that you might want to encourage people to join
[00:24:28] Jenn: along? There is always something happening in our district from school board meetings, I'm not sure those are the most fun, but that we have them very regularly. They're interesting though.
[00:24:36] Mary Kay:.
[00:24:37] Jenn: You always learn something. we also have committee gatherings, to various student performance and events. All, everything is open to the public and we are entering one of my favorite times, the season of school drama, musicals, band, orchestra, and choir performances. So something I know is a great draw is our high school a cappella groups.
The Windjammers and company, they both sing at the city's tree lighting ceremony. I encourage everyone to check out our district calendar for dates, times, and locations. We want you there. We love when we have tons of people to cheer on our students. And these events are a fantastic way to engage with your neighbors and experience the incredible talent of our students firsthand.
[00:25:22] Mary Kay: I would echo that and, just two things of advice. One, bring your tissues, if you're anything like me. I always find myself getting a little verklempt when the students are singing or performing without fail. I think our cast members from an upcoming musical came and performed at the board meeting and I found myself getting a little weepy eyed.
thinking not now, And then the other thing is some of the events do sell out. I know the winter choir concerts are a hot ticket. So when you do see notices for the box offices opening, get your tickets fast because you really will. Want to go and I would say for everyone in the family I really encourage everyone to take full advantage of what our schools have to offer Thank you so much for everyone listening in on our first episode of learning in Lake Oswego We plan to publish an episode about every two weeks depending on a holiday season Schedules.
And next episode, we plan on talking about career and college paths for our students. It's that time of year and we're gonna bring on one of our amazing school counselors and also hear from a student on what it's like during this time of year. So look forward to that, next episode. Thank you everyone for listening.
[00:26:35] Jenn:
Thank you.
[00:26:39] Michelle: We hope you found this episode informative and helpful. While our discussions are general, we understand each family's experience is unique. If you have specific questions about your child, please contact your school principal. To learn more about the topics we discussed, ask a question, or share ideas for future episodes, please visit LOSDSchools.org. And remember to like and follow us wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you for engaging with Learning in Lake Oswego. We appreciate your support and look forward to having you with us for our next episode.