Department Head​/Teacher, Social Studies

Middle School Social Studies Department Head/Teacher

The Natick Public Schools educate approximately 5,300 students from Pre-K through age 22. We are an innovative, supportive, and high-performing district whose outstanding staff provides high quality services for our diverse students and their families from Natick and Boston. Natick Public Schools is a community dedicated to all students achieving high standards in a safe, trusting, respectful environment where learning is exciting, dynamic, and engaging, and where connectedness and belonging are valued and actively cultivated.

We are home to families that speak almost 60 different languages and our student population is approximately 29% Students of Color and 71% White students. With a graduation rate of 97% and 90% of our students attending post-secondary schools, we are proud of our commitment to excellence in educating students to be informed and successful citizens of a global world.

We enthusiastically welcome educators to our district who seek and thrive in a diverse environment that focuses on the whole child in a strengths-based approach. Please partner with us in our mission to support the diversity of our school community, promote and deliver equitable practices for all of our staff, students, and families, and create meaningful connections that enable everyone to feel included and thrive.

Job Title
- Social Studies Department Head/Teacher
- Location
- Wilson Middle School

Reports To
- Principals at Kennedy and Wilson Middle School and the Asst. Superintendent of Teaching, Learning and Innovation
- Work days/FTE - 183 days/1.0 FTE

Salary/Benefits
- Salary and benefits per contract with the Education Association of Natick
- Benefits Eligible? - Yes

JOB GOAL

Responsible for maintaining a program of high quality curriculum, instruction and assessment in the individual's department across both middle schools and for being a productive and supportive member of the school's administrative team. The social studies department head will be responsible for being a valuable member of a team and will teach up to 3 sections of Social Studies at Wilson Middle School in a grade level within the school (Grade 5-8).

QUALIFICATIONS

Education:

• Masters Degree and a minimum of three years teaching and/or administrative experience.

Professional Certification:

• DESE Certification:
  Social Studies, 5-8
• Supervisors license preferred
• Assistant Principal/Principal license optional

Specialized Knowledge:

• Adolescent development
• Best practices in instructional pedagogy
• Strong content area knowledge
• Best practices for supervising adults

Preferred Experience:

• Minimum of three years teaching and/or administrative experience
• Prefer experience teaching in a diverse middle school

Skills:

• Demonstrated aptitude for work to be performed
• Bilingual skills, especially in Spanish and Portuguese, are highly desirable
• Ability to apply knowledge of current research and theory in specific field
• Ability to facilitate the writing of curriculum within the subject area
• Ability to perform duties with awareness of all district requirements and School Committee policies Candidates should have a passion for working with students, families, and colleagues
• Candidates must be flexible and collaborative
• Candidates must be able to multitask in a fast-paced, supportive environment that nurtures student growth
• Candidates must be organized and able to meet ongoing, time-sensitive deadlines for work production
• Ability to effectively present information and respond to questions from groups of administrators, staff and the general public.
• Ability to write reports, business correspondence and procedure manuals.
• Candidates must have highly effective communication skills with a variety of audiences including staff, colleagues, students, families and caregivers.

TOOLS AND EQUIPMENT USED

• Phone, intercom, personal computer and software applications as outlined above, scanner, copy machine, calculator, camera, printers and fax machine.

ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS OF THE JOB (not limited to)

• Establishes a positive and productive learning environment, setting challenging, yet realistic expectations for staff and students.
• Demonstrates an understanding of the learning processes of adolescents and develops policies and programs which appropriately reflect these stages.
• Demonstrates understanding of applicable educational theories and leads staff in applying effective methods of curriculum design, implementation and evaluation.
• Encourages staff development of innovative curriculum concepts.
• Oversee the writing of curriculum within the subject area.
• Ensures department's curriculum and instructional methods are adapted to address the characteristics of different cultural groups and ethnic minorities.
• Uses community resources to enhance curriculum and instruction.
• Works toward designing and implementing assessment mechanisms to measure the school's performance on the statement of purpose criteria and for the curriculum.
• Using assessment results, develops a constant feedback loop to…