Tiffany Meskimen

OGL 481 Pro-Seminar I:

PCA-Choosing an Organization Worksheet
1) Name and describe your organization.

I have chosen Deer Valley High School in The Deer Valley Unified School District.
Deer Valley High School is the smallest and oldest of five high schools in the DVUSD in
North Phoenix. Deer Valley opened in 1980 and sits within the southern, suburban
boundaries of the district, land-locked with no new build options (Crooks, n.d.). In my
experience, the student population ranges from a mid-to-low income economic and a
diverse demographic. I would estimate that approximately 25% of the faculty and staff
have been there since opening, and another 10% are former students or children of former
faculty or staff. In addition, many of the families are products of the high school or
district, so many second generation students attend the school (my husband and children
both graduated from DVHS and I attended my freshman year, before the district opened
its second high school). Stepping onto campus, one quickly recognizes that Deer Valley
has a very small-town, tight knit community feel.

2) Describe your role in the organization (it can be an internal or external role).

I began my career with DVUSD at the high school I attended, as the assistant to the
Assistant Principal. Kim and I left Barry Goldwater at the same time, she was promoted
to a principal in the district and I was promoted to the Superintendent’s Executive
Assistant. I spent four years in that position, which in addition, also served as the
Governing Board Secretary. In 2014, Kim was asked to take over the principal job at
Deer Valley, due to issues we will discuss within the case study, Kim called and asked if
I would come with her as her Administrative Assistant, which consequently was a step
down, but one I needed for personal reasons at the time. This would be my final position
within the district, and quite honestly, the most memorable and favorite position I have
ever held.

3) Describe the situation, including information you think the will help the reader
understand the most important elements of the situation. (This will require
selectivity: part of the art of case writing is separating the essential facts from the
mass of information that might be included).

The previous administration at Deer Valley had been there for over 20 years, some since
its inception. The school had a bad reputatition in the community, enrollment had

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declined, losing students to charter schools and other area high schools, and faculty and
staff were known as the rebel campus who did not follow district protocols. In early
2014, the athletic director and principal were under fire from the Arizona Interscholatic
Association (AIA) for potential recruiting violations regarding football players. Instead
of assuming guilt, the administrators blamed the bureaucracy of the district and AIA for
their actions. After a very long and public battle between the administrators, AIA and
district administration, both were fired from the district (Obert, 2014). The Board was
split, with two members publicly siding with the administrators, while the other three
were intent on the AIA and Superintendent’s decision to hold them accountable. I had
inside knowledge of the incidents, due to my position in the Superintendent’s office. The
entire situation manifested a slew of issues at the school, and brought many system
failures to light. It was an emotional battle for everyone.

When Kim was asked to take over as principal, she knew I was emotionally drained from
the months long fight at the district, in addition to some personal issues. She called and
asked if I would go with her to fix Deer Valley. I said yes, and in the fall of 2014, we
walked in to a broken campus, full of a split staff lacking trust in each other, but more
importantly, lacking trust in either of us. I felt especially vulnerable, having heard the
rumor was I was “placed” at Deer Valley by district administration as a spy, to get rid of
trouble makers.

The campus had been left to run amuck by previous administration and Kim was charged
with nothing more than bringing the campus community back together and increasing
enrollment, student growth, and graduation rates. I was charged with reorganizing office
staff to better support faculty and staff, as well as increasing community satisfaction. As
we began our new assignments we knew it would be a difficult path and that our first line
of business would be to gain trust from staff. Although it would have been easy to assign
blame to the previous administration, we also knew that similar to what we read in this
week’s lesson, “condemning individuals often distracts us from seeing system
weaknesses and offers few workable options” (Bolman & Deal, 2017, p. 29). It was clear
that there was a slew of issues to be fixed and we needed to focus on how to do that, not
how it had gotten to that point.

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 Reference

Bolman, L. G. & Deal, T. E. (2017). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice, and leadership
(6th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Jossey-Bass

Crooks, K. (n.d.). About DVHS / history/profile. About DVHS / History/Profile. (n.d.).

https://www.dvusd.org/domain/2608.

Obert, R. (2014, May 19). No resolution in sight over alleged Deer Valley recruiting situation.
The Arizona Republic. https://www.azcentral.com/story/sports/high-
school/2014/05/19/deer-valley-high-school-football-aia-recruiting-situation/9290553/.