SEASON 3 EPISODE 4
Balancing the Tasks of a Middle Leader Role with Melanie Moore
This week on Positively Leading, I chat with Melanie Moore, a level three program coordinator at a public secondary school. Mel shares her experiences leading professional learning communities, balancing academic growth with well-being, and the complexities of middle leadership.
With a career spanning over 30 years in both the UK and Australia, Mel has navigated roles in student services, instructional coaching, and curriculum leadership.
From implementing multi-tiered support systems to nurturing professional growth among her team, Mel offers valuable insights into the challenges and rewards of being a "middle leader."
We explore:
- The differences between UK and Australian educational systems, from curriculum demands to leadership pathways.
- The importance of relationships and rapport in student behaviour management and instructional success.
- How Mel integrates strategic planning with the reactive nature of her role, including her approach to creating policies and systems that work.
- The challenge of moving from middle to senior leadership roles and the barriers that can hinder progression.
- Practical advice for aspiring leaders, including the value of empathy, networking, and self-awareness in leadership.
Mel’s warmth and wisdom shine through as she reflects on her passion for mentoring others, balancing people and processes, and prioritising wellbeing in a demanding role.
This episode is a must listen for middle leaders and aspiring school leaders, offering actionable advice and a reminder that leadership is about relationships, resilience, and continuous growth.
Episode Links
> Connect with Melanie on LinkedIn
Jenny Cole:
Hello and welcome to Positively Leading the Podcast. I'm Jenny Cole, I'm your host and I'm delighted today to be joined by Melanie Moore. Welcome, Mel.
Melanie Moore:
Thank you very much, Jenny, and it's a pleasure to be here.
Jenny Cole:
Mel is currently a Level 3 Program Coordinator in a public secondary school. Her responsibilities are leading a professional learning community of staff and students to achieve positive, successful outcomes in both academic growth and wellbeing. The role encompasses that of a student services program coordinator and an instructional coach. To build excellence in the classroom and we'll talk about that in a moment is similar to being a deputy of a sub-school. And when Mel is not working, working she enjoys walking, her dogs and well-being activities such as walking in the bush and on the beach, meditation, sound healing classes at the gym and a good old night out and a chinwag with the girls. I love that too. Mel, your background, if people haven't picked it, already began in the UK and you had a variety of roles, including some leadership roles, pretty early. Can you talk to us about your UK experience?
Melanie Moore:
Yeah, certainly. So I started my educational journey in 1993 in London schools in the East End in Stratford of London and I taught PISED and science and dance because I did a Bachelor of Education and I taught for five years. I brought GCSE dance into the school and then after five years you have to do your foundation of five years before you even get considered to move into leadership. So after my five years I moved into leadership as a second in charge of leading a house system seven to 12. It's a little bit different in the UK Like a house system here we think of the sporting house system that have all the competitions, whereas in the UK the house system is a vertical system, seven to 12 various houses, but it's more pastoral care and it's more academic care as well, rather than the sporting and house points et cetera like this year.
Melanie Moore:
So from there then I moved into a school in Battersea in Southwest London and I won a position as head of year and again, a head of year is not like a year co-hearer in WA in Australia and I was leading a year seven team of students and staff, again through learning, academic learning, pastoral care, case meetings, and it was a very low socioeconomic area in Battersea, surrounded by high-rise council buildings, a lot of gangs and drugs and guns, believe it or not. And that was where I think I had the most growth because I actually implemented a tracking system for consequences and rewards. I started it off with the year seven cohort and then it became a whole school. So, yeah, it was very, very interesting. It's where I learned to really lead and build relationships with staff and students.
Melanie Moore:
And then from there I moved out of London, had children and moved into Northamptonshire and then there I was an advanced skills teacher and a student mentor where I was going into classrooms and supporting staff with pedagogy, leading professional learning within the school to develop cleaneries and starter activities and just going in and modeling how to really teach some in-depth way of tapping into all the variety of learning styles that the students have. As you know, it's a very multi-tiered, complex role being in education because we have such a diverse range of students. It's different courses for different horses, as they say.
Jenny Cole:
That combination of curriculum, pedagogy, pastoral care set you up in good stead for the work that you're doing in your current school because it is organised slightly differently than a pretty standard high school. Do you want to talk very quickly about how the school's organised and your role now currently, where you are?
Melanie Moore:
Okay, so we're organised in what we call professional learning communities and in that community we have a variety of staff across various learning areas and what we call learning support mentors, which are EAs, and I'm called a leading teacher, which is a level three program coordinator, and I'm actually in charge of line managing and supporting and developing the staff and students through their pastoral well-care, well-being, being an instructional coach, like you said earlier. So it's basically everything to do with that community is my responsibility.
Jenny Cole:
So you really are like the deputy of a sub-school, where everything comes to you. You've still got a teaching role, though, don't you?
Melanie Moore:
Correct. Yes, even though we don't have student services. All the case management, all the documented plans, all the referrals, internal or external supports, running assemblies doing transfers, year six to year seven, year nine to ten, all those parent evenings, an organisation of reward excursions, etc.
Jenny Cole:
Is yeah a very busy role, but they're very busy, very, very busy role. Obviously, the two systems have different names for things and different ways of doing things. If you had to tell us what the fundamental differences or similarities between the UK and here are, what do you think they are? What do you notice? What's better here or worse?
Melanie Moore:
So I think some of the curriculum is slightly different in terms of what I found when I first came. We have a very full, jam-packed curriculum here in WA which sometimes I think some teachers struggle to get through, and in the, the UK, I feel it's a little bit more. When I first came, obviously it was very different, so it was more around some of the stuff that I would teach in year 10 in the UK I would teach maybe in year 8 here. So I found that a little bit, I suppose, maybe a little less targeted for the age level for each cohort, but again, there's nothing wrong with extending, going a little bit higher.
Melanie Moore:
Also, what I've noticed is the application of job interviews is slightly different. So in the UK your resume is basically bullet points of successes and achievements and your role Could be up to two pages and it's literally a range of bullet points and then you expand on that if you're successful in an interview, whereas I find you in WA you have to basically list everything that you've done. You really have to go into depth in your written application Everything that you've done.
Jenny Cole:
You really have to go into depth in your written application, which is the opposite to what I used to. Yes, yes, yeah. And we might come back to that application process, but that's thank you. In your current role as program coordinator, you're balancing both academic achievement, academic growth as well as wellbeing, and it's obviously a very busy role and it sometimes can be reactionary. Those sort of deputy roles there's lots happening. How do you prioritise either academics or student services roles, or how do you prioritise your day?
Melanie Moore:
So I often come in and I think, just like any leaders, I'll always have certain elements that I have to do throughout the day. Today, I just need to do A, b, c, d, and sometimes you might do A B, but you don't make it to C D because other things come your way that are highly important and need to be dealt with straight away. Over the years, I've learned to be very calm, to take a breath and not react, so that it is a high energy response in a situation where you need to be calm and collected. And because I've been in education 30 plus years, that's something that I've learned to just go okay, I can do this calmly and methodically. Okay, let's talk about a solution. Let's delegate.
Melanie Moore:
As a new leader, you always want to say yes, yes, yes, yes. You're like a little puppy dog chomping at the bit I'll do everything. I'll do everything because you want everybody to think that you're really good at your job and you really want to show your worth and your passion and your heart and your care. But as time goes on, it's okay to say no, okay to say yeah, I say, yeah, I can do that if possible.
Melanie Moore:
I'm happy to help. But as you grow, delegation is important as well, and developing others into the capacity of what you can do is also very, very important as well.
Jenny Cole:
I couldn't agree more. We all start the day with a list, and first is understanding that we're not always going to get through the list. I think the most stressed people are those people who get really upset that they didn't get through their list and that calmness as things come to you. I also know that you've developed plans and operational plans and systems for things to help you and your team stay on track, particularly in the wellbeing space, because that's what we've talked about before. Do you want to talk about how you do that sort of high level planning, but in a role that's often quite reactive?
Melanie Moore:
I think I've got a really good skill of having that big picture strategic thinking. Obviously we've got documented plans that we have to follow from the department and obviously every school has their business plan, which is their Bible of how they operate. And I think when you go into somewhere new you're like a fresh pair of eyes.
Melanie Moore:
I did go into a school as a student services manager, year 7 to 12. And I did a Nestle leadership executive colloquium course and on that course it was talking about authentic leadership, driving performance, innovation and I was able to see that there was some gaps and find solutions. There was a lot of referrals happening straight to student services and not going through the tiered responses. I actually implemented RTI, a response to intervention that had clear guidelines at what was expected at each level and the first one being the framework for the school, for the teaching and learning instructional framework. So there was processes along each step and where the supports were and also added in documented plans there Also, I was in charge of social and emotional learning. Also, I was in charge of social and emotional learning, so that was really good to work with the school psychologist in order to implement what we felt was tailored to the clientele and the students and staff that were actually at the school.
Jenny Cole:
So I think it's really important to tailor documented plans and have buy-in. You know the students and the staff that are involved. Regarding the support and I apologize also, I skipped straight from the uk to your current school. You had some leadership experience, particularly that student services manager role, and that multi-tiered systems of support was obviously so important. What does that look like in a high school? What are some of the lower levels of support versus up to the more sort of targeted interventions that you might see in a high school?
Melanie Moore:
Okay so the first level is that all staff are following the instructional framework of teaching and learning and also any wellbeing policy that is in place Behaviour policies, late policies, uniform policies, your basic one of how a school operates. And then, if some students are choosing to not do the right thing, not making the right options, it's then that next little level of support. We want to build a relationship with you, we want to understand why it is that you're choosing, because all behaviors are a form of communication and be it that they're struggling in the subject area because they're very weak or they haven't formed a rapport with the staff member, or it could be that there has been an argument with somebody else that's in the class, or they were having a boyfriend-girlfriend interaction and that's suddenly broken down. There's all sorts of levels of could be some trauma that has happened. So it's having the conversation and to find out what is actually going on.
Melanie Moore:
Why are those choices been happening for the student? And then it's putting in the supports that are needed. Different schools have different levels. Obviously, there's usually collars involved that happen with support within the classroom, and then it could be UCOs as it moves up another level and then obviously next level would be student services. So the higher up the levels of support, the smaller the interventions are and more targeted. And also, obviously, case management comes into that as well, and there are a wealth of supports inside schools and external or stakeholders, you know, and make sure that you're bringing everybody in that needs to support.
Jenny Cole:
And I know one of the roles that you've played, both formally but also in previous schools, is as an instructional coach, and that's helping teachers at that foundational level get really tight on their practice.
Melanie Moore:
Talk to me about your instructional coaching, what that might look like on the ground, what you enjoy about that role and maybe some of the challenges what you enjoy about that role and maybe some of the challenges, yeah, so obviously CMS is a big part of being an instructional coach and supporting in the classroom.
Jenny Cole:
I'm just going to interrupt For those people who aren't aware. That's Classroom Management Systems and Positive Behaviour.
Melanie Moore:
Strategies, classroom Management Strategies and obviously all schools have a framework of how you deliver lessons. It could be some staff are struggling to get the lesson started, so you might need to bring in a signal to begin. One of the basics is, if they just come from students have just come from like a break time or phys ed, they might be really hyper and on high energy and then you just opened your classroom door and then they continue their high energy and party in your classroom. So's really important. Just the basic could be just lining them up, getting them calm, asking how they are.
Melanie Moore:
It's always good to also know them as individuals, not just students. You know about their likes and their passions. Oh, how did you go playing soccer on the weekend? Did you win? Know, those little incidental personal conversations go a long way in building a rapport and respect, because you're showing that you care and once they know that you care, they'll do anything for you. No, listen. So it's settling before they come in the classroom, giving them instructions so they can come in and get started straight away. Also, modeling I'm happy to model. I've always offered myself to come in and watch me. Modelling Could be the learning intention, the success criteria, not just putting it on visible throughout the lesson, but also explaining it so that everybody understands, and coming back to at the end of the lesson to check your understanding. Did they achieve it? So it's all that self-assessment and self-reflection as well they achieve it.
Jenny Cole:
So it's all that self-assessment and self-reflection as well. You seem to have, through your career, done a lot of mentoring, instructional coaching, support of newer and general teachers. What do you get out of that? Because it takes time and effort to mentor others. What do you get out of the mentoring?
Melanie Moore:
Well, one of my character strengths is teamwork, honesty and building relationships, and I've heard many of the leaders, work colleagues always saying about building relationships because it is like relationships, relationships, relationships program we have in the UK location Very, very important. What do I get out of it? I really, really enjoy and I'm passionate about helping others. I think I have a very big heart. If others talk about me, they always call me the mother of all. We have first nations students that call me mummy more and it just makes my heart swell.
Melanie Moore:
and because I'm responsible as well for professional development conversations and I've done quite a bit of training there with the growth coaching and through the Nestle Media course. The grow coaching quite quickly is able to identify our bright spots and our champions and use them then to grow others and lead them to do workshops and then within the community and then whole school, so able to move them through and many have gone into leadership positions themselves. And even though I've moved on from other schools, I'm still really really good friends with staff members that I've made along the way and I always seem to be a big support person. Everybody seems to come find me. You know, I couldn't think of you, Mel. It's okay, come in and sit down.
Jenny Cole:
What I love, though, is you're mothering but not smothering, so when you were talking about building, growing, developing and then sending people off, you're not making people dependent on you. And the other thing I loved was you referencing your character strengths. Well done, because if you've got teamwork up there at number one, you're going to want to do everything in a group with people you want to. Everything you own belongs to everybody else, so that's a really good example of teamwork in terms of character strengths does not have to be being on a basketball team or wanting to work you in a group. I just need to share what I've got with others. So well done you.
Melanie Moore:
I actually had an experienced staff member join my team and she gave me some feedback and she said you are like in the trenches with us working side by side, but when you need to step up and lead, I am in all of you and and I was just, oh my gosh, it's those beautiful comments that just you know, I just love doing it.
Jenny Cole:
Are you aware of that yourself? I mean, it's obvious by you talking. You're in the trenches, but are you aware of when you have to step up and what you do deliberately? What do you notice in yourself when you're stepping up and when might it happen? When might you get out of the trenches and lead more traditionally?
Melanie Moore:
For me, I've done it in team meetings and also if I see someone acting out of the ethos of how we operate. So at the beginning of each year we set our norms, we have an expectation of how we operate, we all have a voice and we all buy in. And I also use Patrick Lesioni's Five Dysfunctions of a Team. And because we're always operating as a we, our, us, it's not I, I, I, I, I, me, me, me, me, me. And if someone is trying to step on toes, then I think they need to be brought into line and just say, harry, this is how we operate you, then I think they need to be brought into line and just say, harry, this is how we operate here, I'm happy to support you, but next time you need to understand that by doing that, you're not working within the parameters of what we've agreed.
Jenny Cole:
I love that, and that is the classic time. I think you have to stand up and not just be one of us when you have to say, no, this group works because we have decided this is how we're going to work. I love that. Do you revisit your norms every year? Do you change them according to the team? How do you do that process?
Melanie Moore:
Well, yes, we have done that fairly recently. We did a little bit of a reset, but we also do each term. We do have a focus of what it is we're going to do in terms of our students. So, yeah, we are pretty flexible and we do revisit our norms and if we need to do a little bit of a reset because there's been some shuffling or some grumblings, I'm more than happy to do that.
Jenny Cole:
Brilliant. I know that your own wellbeing is just as important as the wellbeing of your students and staff. In a very busy role, with all of those demands, how do you manage your well-being and how do you prioritise it, and where do you find time? I suppose everyone wants to know.
Melanie Moore:
Oh look, there are some days where I just don't have a break at all. But I now make sure that I block out on my calendar admin time not always take it, because sometimes something more pressing and more important like parent can only come in at that certain time. But I do step out of the office and I do go for a walk and I do step out sometimes to go and get a coffee, especially if there's been a really intense situation when it's been very difficult for another member of staff. I will say come on, let's just go and do a drive through to get a takeaway coffee and debrief and talk, because I find when you step off site for a little bit and then come back, it is a huge reset. So, yeah, I go for a walk. I've got a very, very good group of work colleagues that I can offload on and vice versa, so I might go and find them and just have a quick 20 minutes and a quick chat and just release whatever it is that we need to release and then ready to start again.
Jenny Cole:
That is very wise advice. It's just breaking that. It's going into the next space and leaving a bit of gap between that thing that's happened before and the new thing. And I've written down reset, because that's what I like. It's not. We're not doing anything radical, we're just resetting. I think that's a really good advice. I'm going to change direction a little bit. We've talked about before the difficulty of moving from a level three leadership position. So in Western Australia that is the first rung of leadership. I mean it could be a committee leader before that or more informal leader. It's the first paid level of the leadership rung and it's often a teaching responsibility. So people who are heads of learning area or program coordinators or various other things are at level three deputies in primary schools. I know that you want to move a bit further on and there are some barriers both personally but also in the system. Are you happy to talk about what some of those challenges have been for you to progress?
Melanie Moore:
for you to progress. Yep, in the UK before I emigrated, my next role was, and the school that I was in that I was, you know, ready to go to the next level and and the principal had also told me you're going to get there, that's your next step. But then, I think, emigrating and then I did relief for the first year to settle the family and the, and then it was just like starting again from the bottom and building myself up as a level three. I think it's really, really hard to jump from a level three program coordinator to a level four. I do have several work colleagues that are trying to do the same thing and they have applied and applied, and applied.
Melanie Moore:
But I found it very, very difficult and I did reach out to some organisation to say I think there's a little bit of a gap here in terms of professional learning to allow staff to actually make that jump from level three to level four.
Melanie Moore:
I've been told that one way is to go country and do level four country and then come back metro and then do level four. Or the other way I think think is if a principal takes you under their wing and develops you through the school is another way. I really think there's a gap in the system in terms of professional learning that will actually honor and support that jump upwards. So I'm reaching out there to the cosmos, someone to say, hey, let's support our level threes to our level four and this is a course that we can offer you to do that, maybe some kind of networking where, I don't know, principals are looking for level four, highly effective level four staff members who could quite easily do it. I've got a lot of experience behind me. Maybe I'm not very good at selling myself, I'm just I'm a bit stuck. Maybe it's a difficult one for me and I think because I'm not from the country, then I maybe I'm.
Jenny Cole:
I don't know the system and yeah, and now you're second guessing yourself, and yeah.
Melanie Moore:
Questioning myself, I suppose yeah.
Jenny Cole:
And what you raise is really pertinent, because I say it quite a lot and I'm wondering if one of the other things that makes it more complex is there are lots of level threes and then there's probably a third as many level four jobs, so you've got a lot of people going for the role.
Jenny Cole:
But the other thing is there's a real leap, as you say, in complexity and understanding. It's like there's a really big gap and it's almost impossible to bridge that gap in the role that you're in because you just don't get enough experience to do that thing. That comes next and I think when you said networking, it was something that I was talking about just recently with people is if you're a literacy teacher, there's literacy teacher communities on Facebook and in other places, and if you're in the maths department, there's maths things, but then and even level threes and there'll be deputies, associations, but there's that little gap in the middle which is those fours which are neither the senior leaders or those rank and file junior leaders. Really hard, it's the biggest gap, I think. So there's not necessarily networks of those people, but networking is useful. It's just who do you network with?
Melanie Moore:
correct? So there's a job for you.
Melanie Moore:
Yeah, if you said go in yeah, I know, if I knew the answer, I would have told you to you already look, jenny, level threes are really, really important in schools because they're like I just went to a course at the union and they called it the meat in the sandwich, because level three middle leaders they're the conduit for the messages from above, but they also know the staff that are working below on the ground. So if you want to know anything about the staff, that middle leader knows them well. So it's a very crux point being there.
Jenny Cole:
So it's that little in-between I frequently say particularly in high school slightly different in primary schools that the school will never get to their business plan unless you've got your middle leaders on board, because it's that mud. You're right, they're taking direction from above and they're also filtering not only staff, but they know their students better and they know their staff and then they're often teaching as well, so it's not like they're leading something full-time. It is the hardest gig in the world being a teacher leader, because some days you're a really great leader, some days you're a really great teacher, but most days you're pretty average at both of them because you're too busy. What advice would you give to people wanting to move out of teaching and into a leadership role?
Melanie Moore:
Find your support network, find someone that is your advocate, find someone that is really identifies your worth and your skill set and you have really got that strong connection out there that can help you develop and just have that open scope of. Doesn't necessarily have to be a yes person, but just think about, have your eyes open and just from what you see around you, from your experience, just think you know what. That's the type of leader I want to be. Oh, that's definitely not the type of leader I want to be. And just have that growth thinking about what is it that I really want to be as a leader and where do I really want to go in terms of? What area of expertise do I want when I start leading?
Jenny Cole:
And what I'm hearing there is not. What skills do I need? Because you can learn skills on the job. What's the person I want to be and what's the person I don't want to be? What's the leader I don't want to do?
Melanie Moore:
Fantastic, yeah, it comes from your gut and your heart.
Jenny Cole:
Indeed, any other advice for new aspiring or middle leaders more generally, you've mentioned some really great professional learning already, but any good PL, any good reading books, anybody that you follow that you find interesting.
Melanie Moore:
Something that resonates with me as a leadership attribute is Hamilton's. It's that empathy. When you have empathy and you care about others, you can go a long way. Obviously, you've got your documents, that the department, you know your well-being, your strategic direction, your focus, be aware of what it is the department wants in a leader and just say, well, you know what. See what resonates with you when you read those documents oh, there is a lot out there, isn't there.
Jenny Cole:
I put you on the spot there yeah, I'm trying to think that's all right. You'll think of lots once we push stop. Something that you talked about Hamilton's leadership attributes. People in Western Australia will be really familiar with them and I'll put them in the show notes for everybody else. And they're the ways of being for a leader and it's very obvious to anyone listening that you've got a big heart, that you trust your gut. You're a very people person. It's often not as obvious that you are quite organised and planned and you write policies and procedures that kind of keep things tight. How do you balance that? Because it's very easy to be very people focused or very process focused. How do you combine those two?
Melanie Moore:
So how do I balance between supporting people and writing policy?
Jenny Cole:
I suppose you kind of answered it when we were talking about norms, when you said I'm very obvious, you're supportive of people, but if people step out of line and move away from what we've agreed or from policy or from those documents, you can bring them back in again and say, no, this is how we do it around here. And I've heard you talk about processes that you've put in place, that kind of streamline things, so people focused. Are you aware that there's policies and procedures and ways that you work that support that?
Melanie Moore:
I think they go hand in hand. We all have policies and procedures that we have to follow, and I think that's very important because if you don't, you're opening up yourself for some concerns in terms of code of conduct or how we operate in education, and I think it's really good for everybody to have that insight, to know the rights and wrongs of what it is we can and can't do, and we have to be really, really careful when we're dealing with students and young adults, for obvious reasons. I just think, if you know, it's even a formal conversation and then there's obviously levels and you can seek guidance from the associate principal and but always coming from the angle of you're not doing the right thing. But we're here to support you to get back on track, to doing the right thing. It's not that we're coming here to give you a poke in the eye or a slap across the face or anything. We're here because we're coming to support you. We don't want you to get in trouble, and that works with staff and students, with with anybody actually.
Jenny Cole:
It certainly does, mel. It's been delightful talking to you. Is there anything that we've not talked about, that you'd like to talk about? A question I haven't asked or something that you've not got around to talking about?
Melanie Moore:
Okay, I have a question for you. I've actually listened to a couple of your podcasts before today, just so I kind of thought, oh, let me have a little insight of what you might ask me. And in one of your introductions you say about a recovering principal. When you say recovering principal, what are you meaning?
Jenny Cole:
Oh, that's interesting. Thank you for asking me, because it's a throwaway line generally which makes people snigger, but it's where it came from was that I was a principal. I had burnout, became overwhelmed, left the job and the career that I absolutely loved. I loved every single second of it until I was just so exhausted that I couldn't do it anymore. And when I used to have to introduce myself, I'd say, oh, I'm Jenny and I'm a consultant and a coach and I do leadership training. But I also was a principal and I'm never quite sure if that was to let people know that I understood their context or I wanted people to understand where I came from.
Jenny Cole:
And then I heard somebody once say oh, I'm a recovering chocolateaholic or I'm a recovering... It wasn't an alcoholic, it was recovering something or other. And I thought, oh, that's what I am. I've spent the last 10 years trying to work out why I slipped into failure and I've spent the last 10 years digging myself out of it. So I've been recovering for 10 years. So it's partly a joke and partly a nod to the fact that I understand the context in schools, but a lot of a nod to the wellbeing issue around recovery is something that you take one step every day and keep moving forward and that's like your wellbeing. You just got to keep doing it every day. You can't forget about it. I don't know if that answered your question, but that's the best question anyone's ever asked me. Thank you, Mel.
Melanie Moore:
Jenny, you weren't failing. You were passionate, you were dedicated, you gave it your all, at the sacrifice of yourself, and now you're being resilient and growing yourself again.
Jenny Cole:
Yeah, yeah, indeed, and I'm really aware that when I say failure, I'm very conscious that it wasn't a failure, but it felt like it at the time. Well and truly, Mel,, it is. See, you're so clever, you've brought it back to somebody else. Well done you. It's been delightful to talk to you, Melanie Moore. We did a little bit, I talked to Mel at a conference and I said I need to have you on my podcast. You go, oh me.
Jenny Cole:
like absolutely you again because I want to make sure that people listen to people who are in the trenches, as you say, in middle leadership roles, doing all the hard stuff with curriculum and kids and staff, and still managing to smile and thrive. So thank you so much for your time.
Melanie Moore:
Thank you, Jenny.
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