CC#33: Dr. Justin Bogart - Piper High School

Dr. Justin Bogart of Piper  High School in USD 203 is the feature on this episode of Cool Coffee w/ Kansas Principals. This episode was recorded during a long stretch of snow days and Dr. Bogart talks about his message to staff as they angst builds on missed instructional time. Check out this informative episode about Dr. Justin Bogart!

Connect with Dr. Justin Bogart:

• X: @APBogart
• Email: justin.bogart@piperschools.us 

(full transcript and chapters of the episode below)

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Chapters (time stamp does not account for 30 second intro)

00:00    Navigating Snow Days and Their Impact

06:38    Justin Bogart's Educational Journey

15:14    Reflections on Classroom Teaching

18:09    Transitioning to a New Principalship

28:03    Piper High School's Athletic Spirit

 

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT (generated by AI)

(timestamps not adjusted for intro)

Rick Sola (00:01.806)
Hello and welcome to another edition of Cool Coffee with Kansas Principals. Today I am with Dr. Justin Bogart of Piper High School, USD 203. Welcome, Justin.

Justin Bogart (00:16.231)
Glad to be here, Rick. Thanks for having me on.

Rick Sola (00:19.266)
Yeah, glad to have you on and really glad and appreciate you jumping on on this February 19th day. So for those who are tuning in and maybe that date doesn't ring any sort of bells, but we are like right in the middle of snow days, multiple snow days. So how's it treating you out there out in Piper?

Justin Bogart (00:43.075)
cold like everybody else, but we also had parent-teacher conferences last week. So last time that we saw our kids was Tuesday of last week. Then we had two days of conference, Friday off and Monday off for the holiday. And now Mother Nature has blessed us, if that's what you want to say, with a couple more days off.

Rick Sola (01:08.622)
Well, I know my own kids, they keep asking, hey, are we gonna have school off tomorrow? Why don't they just call the whole week off? You all need school.

Justin Bogart (01:14.663)
I guess we can think of it as a practice spring break.

Rick Sola (01:21.838)
Yeah, yeah, just a dress rehearsal for the spring break, other than the the temperature outside. You mentioned conferences. We had ours last week, too. And actually, we were supposed to have the makeup from our arena style conferences. What is today? Today is Wednesday. So we were supposed to have it tonight and that got canceled. So now we're going next week, next Wednesday for four hours in the evening. So, you know, the snow day, I kind of had this down to talk about, but it just kind of wreaks havoc on on the calendars.

Justin Bogart (01:24.411)
Right.

Rick Sola (01:51.95)
What's going on in the, for the account, just like the immediate impact you wake up today or maybe you get the news yesterday. What's the first thing that's on your mind when you get these snow day calls?

Justin Bogart (02:04.849)
Well, the first thing that I think about is that we all said in our interviews, either for our first teaching jobs or our first admin jobs, that we are flexible. We're often asked to describe three characteristics about ourselves. And I believe that 99 % of us said, well, we're flexible. my concern is just the consistency that we know is so important to have with

kids being at the building and teachers being in front of kids. my, one of my immediate thoughts is, okay, what do I need to do today to help my teachers and our school community persist with all of these days off? Are there messages that I need to send? What do I need my admin team to do? So there's a lot of things that go through my head.

when we get that information from the district that says we're out again. It's something that I'm preparing to think about again as we look at record cold temperatures tomorrow and the possibility that we may not be back in session tomorrow either.

Rick Sola (03:17.004)
Yeah, you know, I joke a little bit ago about how my, just see it in my own house and my kids and they get excited for the idea of not being in school. But, but just like he said, like there, there's a lot of important messaging that does go out because, know, we will be back this week. I expect that, but, you know, we could have, we have some late start options, things like that, but there are certainly some things to consider. Then you do come back where

Just like you, haven't been in session since last Tuesday, so it's over a week off. And then when you do come back and it's, let's say it's Thursday or maybe Friday, then, you know, it's just hard to get kind of get back into that groove, but you got to hit the ground running for all the lost time. I know I've had some staff reach out and there's big concerns as far as where they're at and whether they're pacing guide or in preparation for upcoming assessments and things like that.

But you hit the nail on the head. think we gotta be flexible. We can't control this and it's, you when it's not safe to be at school, we shouldn't be, but we just work with what we have and kind of move forward from there.

Justin Bogart (04:24.741)
Yeah, message that I share with my staff at the appropriate times is that we're not holding the string across the finish line as far as getting all of the curriculum taught.

You know, when we have these days out and for Piper, we're on day set. The first week of January, we lost an entire week and now we're two more days lost. And I know our teachers are anxious about teaching what they know is important for kids to learn. But we're not telling them that they've got to cross that finish line. We want them to.

adjust to what they know needs to be taught and then do a good job of that. We're looking at quality versus quantity at this point and we know it's all important. What we've got to do now is teaching professionals, learning professionals, is decide how do we adjust it and then what does great instructional delivery look like under the circumstances.

Rick Sola (05:40.29)
Yeah, what a great message to send there. And I'm sure that's really, I don't know, encouraging and comforting in some ways because there's a lot of stress that teachers will put on themselves, like you said, to reach the finish line and that reinforcement from their building principal to just focus on the quality that you know, that we know you can deliver rather than the quantity. Yeah, certainly a relevant message right now and

I'm sure that that means a lot right now. And this is hitting so much of the state. I've kind of been following a little bit even beyond the KC Metro. mean, this is kind of a unique thing too, just like the blizzard back earlier in January hit much of us. So we're all in the same boat. So yeah, what a great message. So Justin, kind of moved ahead here, but I'd love to hear about your...

Road to the Chair, you're sitting here as a first year, not first year principal, but first year in Piper as principal. But what led to you along the way, your educational journey?

Justin Bogart (06:52.623)
I appreciate your interest in that. You could say that it all started when I would visit my father's classroom at Stafford High School back in the 70s and early 80s. He taught social studies in Stafford in a small South Central Kansas community. And I was just fascinated by what possibly went on.

And I watched him do a few things, both as a teacher and a coach that really intrigued me. And I knew in my heart that I was probably gonna land in the world of education. Even though I went to KU to study engineering in the first semester of my time there. But I quickly realized I was in the wrong e-school. I needed education and not engineering. So.

Rick Sola (07:40.195)
Ha.

Justin Bogart (07:47.495)
But I come from a line of educators. My grandmother was a long time English teacher in the Lawrence at Lawrence High School. My dad, obviously, teacher and later an administrator himself. He was my high school principal at both Stafford High School and Tonganoxie High School. So and for the most part, that worked out really well. You know, he never got to.

Intrusive into my life as a student and I did my very best to stay out of his office for all the wrong reasons. He was my inspiration there. My mom was a public school or excuse me public. Librarian in Stafford and then later in the both in the Kansas City, Kansas Community College and Johnson County systems so. Learning is just part of our our namesake in the Bogart household and.

It was a natural fit for me and I jumped into teaching English at DeSoto High School in 1995 and then five years there working under Dr. Joe Novak, who was our principal. And then we we transferred together to Mill Valley High School when it opened. And that's that's really where those real formative years of my teaching experience happened and crystallized at Mill Valley.

teaching English, leading the English department. I was also the boys basketball coach there. And I fell in love with teaching. I'd had my admin degree for quite a while. And I'd always thought that I'd probably teach for about 10 years and then move into administration. But I really fell in love with what was happening in the classrooms and working with kids. And I just loved it.

And then I stepped away from coaching, which was a great decision for me and just had one year of clarity about where I was. And that was year 20 of my career. So in the middle to the last third of my career, it just became natural for me to think about leadership at a higher level. was blessed to be a department chair and to be part of some of the leadership opportunities at Mill Valley. And in the absence of coaching, there was something missing.

Justin Bogart (10:08.775)
You know, being part of something or leading something that's greater than yourself, I think has always fascinated me and intrigued me. And I decided that it was time for me to see if I could be influential across the building and not just a classroom and not just a department. And those things are important. But to see if I could have an impact building wide, I really dived into some interesting things about teaching and

and leadership in my last five years as a teacher. I wanted to practice those. I was fortunate to convince Dr. Tom Berry up at Leavenworth when he was there at the time to hire me as a brand new administrator. And he was my first mentor in that. And I could have asked for a better person because he had come from a number of experiences, both in the KCK and.

Blue Valley School Districts in Andalita. So he was a mentor there for two years and I served four years at Leavenworth High School as assistant principal. And then an opportunity opened to work under Todd Dane, Dr. Todd Dane at Shiny Mission South. And I just couldn't turn that down as I was recommended by a couple of people to look into that. And they really said the culture at Shiny Mission South is great.

And it's great because Todd Dane does such a job of empowering teachers and his admin team to develop culture. And I learned it firsthand. So the goal, though, for me as an administrator was never to be just to serve in that assistant principal role. I'd always longed for my own building. I watched my father work as a building leader from a student perspective.

I never really knew as a student what he was doing behind the scenes, but I became more aware of that as I became a teacher and we had conversations about teaching and learning and leadership. But I found out quickly. Then a great opportunity arrived in at Eudora High School to be a first year principal and Eudora has.

Justin Bogart (12:29.467)
great community, great kids, great teachers. And I fell in love with that community and had no plans to leave. But my wife and I had moved to Kansas City, Kansas in the fall of 2023 and fortunate to move into our forever home on a little bit of land. Piper job opened.

was very convenient to my house. Jessica Dane had a vision that I looked forward to supporting if I had the chance. And it was hard to say goodbye after a year to Eudora. Piper's been, Eudora was gracious in how it supported me through that transition. Piper's been great for me. It's been a real challenge in being another.

In my second year as a first year principal, which is a unique experience, so I feel like I'm really starting again at year one of the principalship and learning how to apply the skills and strengths that I have and also to develop things that I need to get better at. So every day I go in ready to learn from the kids, from our teachers, from my team, and ultimately our goal is just to get better every

Rick Sola (13:55.596)
Yeah, you mentioned there I really liked you shouted out Dr. Tom Berry, who actually was in the district that I'm in for a while, but just as a mentor. And I was just thinking that would be a really good focal point to have like a panel of principals talk about the mentors in their life. Because you mentioned you just could you couldn't have asked for a better mentor. And and I've got a couple in my career that I really think.

think of and I've heard several brought up along the way as I've done this and just talk with people and just how powerful the mentors in our profession are. And I then go back to where we started this conversation and that messaging you're giving to your teachers about missing so much and the stress they're feeling and then that mentorship that they are now getting from you and what that might impact in the future.

Yeah, you talked about leaving the teaching part of education and now going into administration. And it's awesome to hear kind of how you got to that from a teacher coach, having that year of clarity and then moving forward. But at this point, what is it you missed most about being in the classroom and being that classroom teacher?

Justin Bogart (15:14.823)
Boy, it might be easier to say what I don't miss. I don't miss all the grading. But I miss greeting the kids at the door. I really miss the first five minutes of class and finding a way.

finding a way to engage them immediately to pique their curiosity or to set the tone through an activity about what is to be learned that day and how it will make a difference for them that day and perhaps beyond. I really miss that five minute, first five minutes to set the tone for class.

To make up for that, I often try to do that in our staff meetings or in the opening moments of our professional learning days, know, build that interest, build that engagement, build those early connections. We talked with our staff this year about winning the first five minutes of class and that I do miss that a lot.

And then I missed the class closings because I thought that I got pretty good at how we ended class and, you know, setting up the learning for the next time that the kids come back and doing the simple, informal, formative assessments that help you understand that the kids learned what you wanted them to and how you need to be prepared for the next time that you saw them because they didn't learn.

So I mean, I miss so much about the classroom, but especially that opening time, that closing time, which I think can be the most powerful moments of instruction.

Rick Sola (17:15.862)
Yeah, that first, well, the first five, like you said, in the door greeting, I just don't think it can be overstated how important and impactful that could be. You know, and I've reminded staff even recently just that simple act of standing at the door, either fist bump, high five, hello greeting. It just it does set a positive tone. then when you start that that class off with.

In the old days, I remember the anticipatory set they would drill into us. But just a hook and a way to get going, yeah, absolutely. And you alluded to those relationships that we form as teachers. That's certainly a piece of the teaching aspect and coaching as a former coach too, but just some of those relationships you're able to have as a classroom teacher are pretty special.

Justin Bogart (17:45.415)
I'm gonna leave.

Rick Sola (18:09.324)
So you mentioned having kind of a year two as a year one. And so I'm kind of interested in hearing about, had as a first year principal over a year ago, but then having an opportunity to be a first year again in a different building. What was kind of going through your mind as far as like maybe first order of business and maybe first order of business.

a year plus ago versus just several months ago and some of those things that maybe you did a little differently.

Justin Bogart (18:42.819)
Yeah, that's a great question. One thing that I had thought about stepping into the principalship at Eudora was that Ron Abel had been there for a long time and that he had quite a legacy. And how would I follow that? And he had built such great

relationships with the teaching staff there and then naturally with the students. And who is who am I then to come in and follow someone like Ron Able who established the CTE programs and was a significant driver of Eudora being ahead of the 21st century learning that our schools are now organized around. So.

You know, one thing I did make a focus on was making sure that the kids really knew who I was coming in as a new principal. And perhaps I neglected doing that with my staff. And I had conversations with a few of them about, know, there was a family feel in place and then that felt a little different now that I was there. So.

You know, I took that to heart. It's not always easy to hear where you may be falling short on things, but every conversation like that is a chance for me to get better. And I use that to help me adjust my lens and my approach with people at Eudora in the last two thirds of my time there.

And again, it's such a great place. It was difficult to leave. I felt that I was we had gotten some work started there that I was exiting from. that was difficult because you want things to be in place after you leave. That's your legacy. that we're doing things that are

Justin Bogart (20:57.041)
helpful for kids and teachers and you want those to remain after you're gone. And that work was unfinished for me and that was an empty spot that I couldn't fill at Eudora. But I made a decision to move to Piper in the best interest of my family and me.

had that year at U-Door to prepare me for now, opening a brand new building, meeting a whole other staff, a larger staff, a school about almost twice as big as U-Door. So there were some unique challenges there. And one thing that I really focused on right away was building relationships with the adults. And what I was a little unprepared for at

Piper was the the stress of moving into a brand new building. So for me, it was I just needed to get my office set up and learn all about the building. And what I what I realized was that there was so much on our teachers to move out of a building and into a new building in the time that they had had to do it.

and there's so much going on in our district and that we'd actually had teachers moving into three different buildings that had been either brand new or had been remodeled in some ways. There was a lot of adult stress happening. And our district did a nice job of giving us, we delayed the start of school a week and we did as much as we could give teachers time to get themselves set up.

Rick Sola (22:27.906)
Ha

Justin Bogart (22:43.951)
It's like moving into a new house. You just realize what what you don't have that you need to get. What seems to have gotten lost in the move. And there was a lot of things that had gotten shifted to buildings that took a long time to get back to us and the stress that created for teachers. So one thing that I knew I had to concentrate on early was building connections with teachers. The teachers are going to take care of the kids. And so we've got to make sure the teachers feel welcome and that they had a

an understanding of who I was as a leader and who I looked to to influence me. And one thing that we did at the beginning of the year was we talked about who is your who? Who are those people that have been so instrumental in your life that you think about them every day? And for me, it was my dad and it was Joe Novak, the first principal who hired me.

and a couple of other people who were very important to me in my professional journey. So we let staff have conversations around that on the very first day that we were all together. And I did get a few notes from people that they were really appreciative of that. Because one thing that we had to remember, Piper patrons supported and the district built this incredible learning space for us.

at Piper High School. The building is one thing. It's a great space for learning. But ultimately, it's the work that we do in the building and who's doing the work and how we're building those relationships that's going to sustain us. Kids are going to love the building and it's going to make a difference for about a month. But it's the people who are going to sustain and nourish the work. And it's very true. Our kids are now used to this incredible building.

They do a good job of taking care of it, but ultimately we have to build those relationships professionally with each other so that we can sustain the momentum that we had from moving into that space. again, it's a focus on people, not about programs. It's just a focus on people. And I felt that I've grown in my capacity to do that in my second year as a first year principal.

Rick Sola (24:58.872)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Rick Sola (25:10.914)
Yeah, you hit on, I mean, it is all about the people and there's been a lot of different variations of that conversation right here on this show. But it is about the people and those connections and being authentic and genuine. And you touched on something earlier. You didn't use the word, but what I heard was a lot of humility. You mentioned that the feedback that sometimes it's hard to get, but it can be used to help better ourselves and especially in an opportunity.

to go from one building to another in a year's time to take some of those things. like I said, that can be maybe hard to hear, but I think staff, students, parents, they appreciate humility and authenticity and certainly just hearing a lot of that as you talk about Piper and all the challenges. And it's interesting, kind of an aside, we had a similar situation here.

in Olathe where we closed down one school and opened it up with Santa Fe Trail Middle School. And a lot of the movement taking contents from the old building into the new, that's a big shift and a big task for everybody involved. then like you said, it goes back to the people who there's a lot of stresses, but then, you know, it's...

we'll get the job done and just take care of your kids and then take care of the people and that sort of thing. So yeah, really, really good stuff and appreciate you sharing that. Cause as I realized, I didn't realize that initially about you, but I saw your bio online and thought, you know, that's a, an opportunity to that's fairly unique to have a, have a chance to, okay, last year, I don't know if I would want to do that again, or maybe I do want to do that again.

but a chance to kind of start fresh.

Justin Bogart (27:10.796)
I'm looking forward to being a second year principal.

Rick Sola (27:17.998)
Yeah, like you said, you get a lot of work going and you know, at the end of the day though, because you touched on this, you made a decision that was good for your family and whatnot. And you know, I really try to emphasize that to my staff too. you may be in our building for a year and opportunities come up and you know, that's relevant for all of us. And what an awesome opportunity. You went from one Dr. Dane to another.

Justin Bogart (27:45.784)
Yeah.

Rick Sola (27:46.01)
with the Shiny Mission South to Piper there, two very highly qualified, or qualified, certainly qualified quality people. I've worked with both of them in my career and found myself very fortunate to do so. anyway.

Justin Bogart (28:03.013)
Well, Dr. Todd Dane says this often that he and I both have the same boss. So.

Rick Sola (28:09.506)
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've heard him refer to your your current boss, your professional boss as the better Dane or I can't remember his words, but but no.

Justin Bogart (28:24.231)
We say that she is the real Dr. Dane.

Rick Sola (28:27.95)
The real Dr. Dane, that's awesome. Yeah. Well, Justin, I don't want to keep you too much. know there you mentioned this was your third Zoom call of the day. So I don't want to keep you too much, but we are right in the middle of basketball season. I was kind of curious how Piper's doing as a basketball team. I'm a former basketball coach. I know you are. How's the season going out there? But I also imagine you're probably dancing around the this these snow days and your coaches are probably trying to get back in the gym and

How are things going out there? Basketball related.

Justin Bogart (29:01.233)
Well, we have two very good teams at Piper this year, and I think between them we have three losses. So we've got high expectations for the rest of the season and potentially some deep runs into the postseason. And we play in a very competitive league in the United Kansas Conference. And we've got back to back games for

This week because of the reschedules, so we go to Topeka Seaman on Thursday. That's a makeup game and then we turn around and go to De Soto on Friday night. Both games that we've played against these teams this year and both boys and girls have been hard fought. Contest have gone down to the very end and. So there's no easy. are no easy nights for our teams, but I'm just proud of our kids and.

You know, our kids show up and they play hard and that's what you want. And because they play hard, then the outcomes on the scoreboard are what we want them to be. I really enjoy watching basketball from the principal's side of the floor. I don't miss being on the coach's side of the floor.

Rick Sola (30:21.272)
Haha.

Rick Sola (30:25.484)
Yeah, I did not. I was not a varsity coach, but I really enjoyed my time. But I agree with that sentiment, too. There's certain parts of the coaching side of it that it's a grind all to itself as well. you draw a blank here. I was going to ask you a question. and feel free not to answer this, but maybe this is a question more from like the student if you don't

want to answer this directly, but Piper, Pirates, who's the big rival out there? Like who do the students kind of really gear up for annually or does it just kind of vary on who's got the team to beat that year?

Justin Bogart (31:10.401)
Well, it's easily baser Linwood and across all sports there. They are five miles down the road from us. It's been a natural rivalry for a long time. And I have enjoyed the appropriate competitiveness and the competitive ferocity between the two communities.

Rick Sola (31:15.009)
Okay.

Justin Bogart (31:39.041)
And I have very good friends who coach and teach in Baser. so we talk about it a little bit. The gyms have been full when we play each other. And we've got to go to Baser next week. So we've got three challenging basketball games ahead of us. And when Baser came over for wrestling earlier this year, they brought a ton of fans. So they're.

That community is heavily invested in boys and girls wrestling. And their boys and girls basketball programs have always been competitive. They got the better of us this year on the football field, but our kids are just so fired up for that game. And we packed the stands. So yeah, we get pretty excited when we know we're going to play the green and gold from Baser.

Rick Sola (32:32.012)
Yeah, that's a lot of fun. like you said, the positive competitiveness between two schools is just part of the magic of high school sports. And it's fun in any community to see that. And you say that, that makes total sense. I was drawing a blank on who that natural rival was, but of course, yeah, I write down the road from you. So that's great. Hey, before we go, I'll give you a chance here. Bragg on your people out in Piper.

Justin Bogart (33:01.851)
Wow. You know, we're a wall to wall Academy school, the only one of our sort or any one of our type like that on this side of the state line. teachers are, you know, continually navigating what it means for our kids to be in wall to wall academies from their freshman through their senior year. There's a lot of work involved in that. Our teachers teach a lot of preps so that we can

offer a number of CTE pathways and for our kids to get those market value assets. Our teachers are doing really hard work and we're at the front of it, you know, and it's not always easy to navigate choppy waters. We're pirates after all. So our teachers are navigating some choppy waters when it comes to a cabin, but it's in a good way. We're just.

We have lot of problems that we have to sit down and discuss. How do we do this? How do we do this? What does this look like? What does this look like moving forward? How do we embed our Academy structure across the building and all of our content areas? So we are sailing in some uncharted waters for schools on the Kansas side, and we get a lot of interest regarding that. I just I.

Anytime I can, I direct them to our teachers who are really doing that work and my admin team, we are there to support, provide resources and direction where we can.

Rick Sola (34:39.308)
Yeah, that's awesome. you know, you mentioned your admin team there at the end. I had a chance to meet one of your assistants last year. I think it was at USA, Kansas, Bobby Cave, right? Yeah, so connection here, his sister teaches at my school. And so we made that connection, but really, really great guy. it kind of just reminds me of just how

Justin Bogart (34:52.047)
Barbie cave, yep.

Justin Bogart (34:59.086)
Okay.

Rick Sola (35:05.332)
small our profession is and even in the state of Kansas there's so many little connections like that but well really good words about your people. I enjoyed talking with you and hearing a little bit more about Piper and for you sharing that with principals across the state of Kansas and perhaps here coming up this spring semester when it warms up maybe we'll run into each other at a conference or something but or in the basketball gym if they're catching some high school games but

Justin, thanks for taking the time here. I know it's a day out of the building, but there's a lot to do. So thanks for taking the time.

Justin Bogart (35:41.767)
May the work never ends, and I think it's important for all of us and as leaders to know that we can always reach out to each other if we need to. And that's that's important to being part of the KPA network.

Rick Sola (35:53.218)
Perfect. And I will put your information and the show notes here as well in case anyone wants to reach out to you. all the best to you as you reschedule everything and get things going again. And we get through this crazy third quarter and back after spring break.

Justin Bogart (36:14.341)
Yeah, it'll be here before we know it and then we're talking graduation. So, lots to look forward to.

Rick Sola (36:18.19)
Yeah, right. All right, well hey, thanks a lot and we'll see you around.