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The Mizzou Academy team had many reasons to celebrate at our recent winter party. Among these were not one, but two recognitions for Instructional Designer, Dale Hargis.
Dale joined our Mizzou Academy team ten years ago. In addition to this milestone anniversary, he was also nominated for a school honor award. Both presentations were surprises to Dale and met with effusive compliments from his peers, beginning with this one: Dale ROCKS! (literally)
It’s true, of course, and more on that in a moment.
Like many of his colleagues, Dale has had a storied journey in education. He began his career as a middle school teacher, where he worked for 8 years in language arts, and then spent a year teaching all of the English, science, and health classes for high schoolers in the remote village of Nulato, Alaska. His next adventures included corporate training, eLearning, and higher education instructional design. And then he found Mizzou Academy. Or maybe we found him. Regardless, many of us now can’t imagine our school without him!
Lou Jobst, who leads some of our high school English classes, says that Dale’s work has “been the backbone” of the curriculum. Lou and Dale are natural curriculum partners. In addition to a love of literature and teaching language arts, both are also musicians. (While Lou tends towards autistic guitar, Dale writes and records hard rock.) How fortunate are our high school students to have such brains and energy behind their courses?!
As one nominator wrote on his honor award application, “Dale is an extraordinary resource for knowledge and expertise across his many Mizzou Academy roles, and he is an even more extraordinary colleague and friend. The sheer expanse and variety of Dale’s responsibilities—from course author to instructional designer, from project manager to middle school lead teacher, from AI pedagogy to whatever troubles need shooting—his time is stretched thin. Still, every time I am in need of tech support, design insights, course updates, or questions answered, Dale is immediately responsive and quick to solve a problem.”
One of the challenges we needed help solving was around staffing in our global middle school language arts program. Although Dale’s primary appointment is in instructional design, his background expertise in teaching and love of the middle school grade bands (pun intended) swooped in to the rescue. This was more than two years ago, and now Dale’s is the voice of our middle school language arts program.
Middle School Coordinator Brian Stuhlman agrees, saying that “A decade at any place is a feat, and we are the better for Dale’s longevity and grit!” He appreciates Dale’s
attention to detail, as well as his “wit, humor, and talent (musical and beyond),” and his “boundless concern for delivering our students an intentionally beautiful product.” Dale and Brian are currently working together on speech courses for our middle school students.
Dale’s creative and collaborative work with colleagues is a theme that emerged across the many compliments that poured in around Dale’s work celebrations. Educational Program Coordinator Karen Scales has had the good fortune of partnering with Dale on several recent and current projects. When asked for a list of those projects, she says, “Not sure how far back you want me to go, but alllllll those whiteboards for the DESE project; Grammar Lab; Student Writers’ “Survival Guide” (in development); continual course maintenance of ELA Grades 9-12; Information Literacy rewrite/reimagining; Creative Writing: Short Fiction rewrite/reimagining; Alignment Project (vertical, horizontal, and Missouri Learning Standards alignment across core high school ELA)…basically the ELA team relies on Dale for just about …. ya know…everything. (sorry, Dale!)”
The two are currently working on a standards alignment project for high school ELA. Karen shares that partnering with Dale on this project has “showcased his devotion to our values of innovation and belonging. His purposeful attention to scaffolding student support into every lesson module, in every course, at every grade level is inspiring.” Our honor award celebrates colleagues who go above and beyond. “Dale,” Karen says, “always goes above and beyond.”
Executive Director Kathryn Fishman-Weaver started at Mizzou Academy just a few months before Dale. As the two were reflecting on this past decade, both found it difficult to articulate how much change and growth we’ve seen in curriculum, teams, partners, and processes.
As Dale puts it, “We went from a small team of only a handful of full-time writers and designers to a [huge] team … We went from trying to convert old correspondence courses into building full programs of true online learning. I can only imagine what it’s going to be like ten years from now!”
Kathryn agrees that it has been a full decade. “It is hard to believe everything that has happened in our school over these last ten years.” However, she says, “When I spend a moment reflecting on this, and especially when I think about creative projects, Dale’s talents are among the first that come to mind.” Smiling, she says that she appreciates how Dale “consistently brings us new perspectives, a deep commitment to excellence, and a heart for student support and learning.”
As one nominator wrote, “Simply put: Our program is better for having Dale in it, and I am grateful to know him, to laugh with him, to learn from him, and to rock out with him every day.”
Congratulations, Dale, on your milestone anniversary, your honor award nomination, and ten full and rocking years at Mizzou Academy! Here’s to the next decade of teaching, learning, and designing!