Principals
A reader asked for a thread on new principals but heck, let's just open it up. What are your thoughts on principals? What, to you as a parent, makes a good principal? Is your principal responsive to parents? To staff? How is staff morale at your school?
I have said many times that I used to think that a successful school was a three-legged stool with one leg being staff, one leg being parents, and one leg being the principal (and the seat is, of course, the students being supported by the legs). However, as I've moved through the system I see that a principal is (can be) the most important part of a good school. Or rather, you can't be a successful school without a good principal
A good principal can inspire both staff and parents. A good principal can make parents believe (and therefore invest time and resources) in a school. A good principal can make students feel welcome every day.
My experience is that I've had good and not-so-good principals. There was only one principal who I felt was ineffective (for staff, students and parents). Luckily she was only around a couple of years and has now left our district. I have to say that there was really only one or two principals who I felt really tried to be there for parents. Oh, some gave lip service to parents but seemed to expect that parents would, of course, give their all for their school.
I believe that principals are more likely to want to please their staffs and their bosses. I do get that; you want to have a good relationship with the people you work with. Even though parents are the so-called consumers and the ones who are the glue in every good school, most principals will side with staff or protect their staff before agreeing with parents. I know there are union rules about what a principal can say or not say about staff but it is demoralizing to have a concern and have it - usually - vanish into a black hole in the principal's office. It is also sad to go to a principal with a new idea and ask about making it happen and it just dies.
It can feel sometimes like principals expect much from parents but parents aren't in a position to expect a lot from a principal.
I believe that the principal's job is a balancing act and I believe that many principals do their best every day. It's just that it's a job with many moving parts and it takes a good skill set to be good at it.
I have said many times that I used to think that a successful school was a three-legged stool with one leg being staff, one leg being parents, and one leg being the principal (and the seat is, of course, the students being supported by the legs). However, as I've moved through the system I see that a principal is (can be) the most important part of a good school. Or rather, you can't be a successful school without a good principal
A good principal can inspire both staff and parents. A good principal can make parents believe (and therefore invest time and resources) in a school. A good principal can make students feel welcome every day.
My experience is that I've had good and not-so-good principals. There was only one principal who I felt was ineffective (for staff, students and parents). Luckily she was only around a couple of years and has now left our district. I have to say that there was really only one or two principals who I felt really tried to be there for parents. Oh, some gave lip service to parents but seemed to expect that parents would, of course, give their all for their school.
I believe that principals are more likely to want to please their staffs and their bosses. I do get that; you want to have a good relationship with the people you work with. Even though parents are the so-called consumers and the ones who are the glue in every good school, most principals will side with staff or protect their staff before agreeing with parents. I know there are union rules about what a principal can say or not say about staff but it is demoralizing to have a concern and have it - usually - vanish into a black hole in the principal's office. It is also sad to go to a principal with a new idea and ask about making it happen and it just dies.
It can feel sometimes like principals expect much from parents but parents aren't in a position to expect a lot from a principal.
I believe that the principal's job is a balancing act and I believe that many principals do their best every day. It's just that it's a job with many moving parts and it takes a good skill set to be good at it.
Comments
I know she has had a somewhat controversial past at Madison (not wanting Spectrum), and I understand how the community would be frustrated. But it is her passion and strong opinions that make her a strong leader. I really respect her and admire her gusto!
Hale got a good deal....
Not sure how other schools did??
I will say, I think the fact that he's been with the same school/program for a long, long time is a great advantage to him, his staff, and to the larger school community. I find the extent to which the district is willing to play "musical principals" quite baffling.
One less obvious effect of the new SAP will be to move teachers around more. Now that pupils have guaranteed assignment to a specific neighborhood school, fluctuations in enrollment will be addressed by moving teachers around instead of pushing families out of their reference area schools. This will make it harder for principals to build a cohesive community, and, because of seniority rules, disproportionately affect our newest teachers.
When she was @ Garfield, she had a brand new, very energetic and amazing principal- who is dedicated to the job and to the school community.
Vive 'la difference.
I do not expect that all or even most principals to give the time and energy that Ted Howard does to Garfield- but it does make a tremendous difference to the entire school and he certainly has raised the bar.
And another thought on something having to do with principals that maybe has already been discussed here but I missed: Why would MGJ assign a male African-American principal at one of the least racially diverse schools in the district? I understand he's doing a pretty good job which is great. I'm just not sure if she's trying to send a message to the pretty white Loyal Heights community and if so, what it might be. Wouldn't you think a school with a much larger African-American population would have been better served?
I find the extent to which the district is willing to play "musical principals" quite baffling.
...contains an implicit question that I think is answered in part by her conclusions about the SAP:
"This will make it harder for principals to build a cohesive community"
Much easier for centralized administration to ride roughshod over a community that it prevents from coming together.
I don't expect it will make you feel any better to hear that while I hadn't formed any real conclusions about Greg King at Lowell, the interaction we had at his recent regular "coffee chat" with parents left me feeling a little more optimistic about his willingness to engage parents in dealing with curriculum issues. I can't say whether we will get what we want, but I felt like he "got it" and that he heard and shared our concerns.
It's hard to imagine that Julie B. has the time or energy for that kind of interaction these days. Sad.
First of all, the principal is the instructional leader in the school. This is the job of being the teachers' boss - guiding their work, evaluating their work, and working with them to improve their work.
Second, the principal is the face of the school. This is a sort of public relations job. It's about getting out and being seen and accessible for the community, for students, and for students' families. Most of the work here is just showing up.
Third, the principal works with students applying discipline.
Fourth, the principal has administrative duties which include the budget, the schedule, maintaining the building and grounds, and representing the school at district meetings.
These four duties (to teachers, to the community, to the students, and to the bureaucracy) are too much work for a single person. I know that in larger schools there are assistant principals to take on some of these roles, but everything else is scaled up as well.
I would like to see principals outsource the fourth set of responsibilities. I think the District could create a job like School Business Officer to relieve the principals of these tasks. I bet one school business officer could support three or four schools. I recently met someone from the Kent school district and I think they have a job like that.
It is nothing but bizarre to me that in Seattle the District wants to outsource the first job, instructional leader, and give it to the coaches. They say that the coaches don't hire, fire, or evaluate the teachers. Then they shouldn't be leading them. All of that work should remain with one person. And that person is the principal.
The District is taking the wrong duties off the principals' plate. They are usurping their role as instructional leader when they should be relieving them of their bureaucratic functions.
Her communications are crystal clear. Jill Hudson may not always agree with you, but you will know where she stands and, best of all, she can tell you WHY she holds that view. When you hear her reasons, you may find that you agree with her.
I think too many principals in this district try to "fly under the radar" and not make waves" for fear of what may come to their schools, or of their jobs. They are not vocal advocates for their communities, and even go along with the BS that the district throws at them. They would rather try to work with the BS, than stand up tall and speak up for what they believe is right. That's sad to me.
It is appalling how this principal has been left alone to manage this situation.
I remember a principal at Whittier who was able to wrangle a budget like nobody's business. He said it was really important for principals to know sources of money within the district, what is permitted, etc. Otherwise they might overlook valuable ways to bring more resources to their school.
Helen Schinske
I wonder what sail thinks of having an African American president? An African American Seattle Schools Superintendent, An African American HS Director (Michael Tolley), and two African American School Board Directors?
It is illegal to discriminate. And it is offensive to support segregation.
But, principals are doing this (discriminating) regularly to children with disabilities in the district. Check with the Special Ed PTSA which is keeping statistics.
It is pretty clear that none of the principals or communities had a say in placement this year, so it looks like MGJ doesn't agree with me.
However, in any given situation, all other things are probably not equal, and it seems a waste of time to me to over-think people's motives one way or another. If Mr. Floyd is doing a good job where he is, I'd just as soon say fine, that was one decent decision MGJ made, and put my focus on things I *know* she made bad decisions about.
Helen Schinske
He's handled discipline issues firmly and effectively. For example, there were kids using racial slurs and fighting on one of the busses. The kids now have assigned seats, one kid per bench, and there haven't been any more problems. I've heard rumblings about serious discipline problems at Marshall, but that doesn't seem to be happening at Lowell.
I think some of the "musical chairs" aspects of the recent principal moves were dictated by the union contract -- IIRC, there's a certain amount of "bumping" allowed.
That said, it's a good opportunity to once again remind everyone that last year's Principal changes at alternative schools were done with NO consultation with those school's communities, contrary to explicit board policy. Yadda, yadda, yadda.
What that looks like on the ground at TOPS is a tension between our school's Site Council and our new Principal over a number of issues, including the fundamental shared governance model under which we are supposed to operate.
Of course to be honest, we haven't had building leadership in years that actually fully embraced and understood alternative education, including shared governance. But new this year is a harder, more no-nonsense tone from staff, which I believe is a direct reflection of District attitudes toward alternative schools, or any school that isn't cookie cutter.
I do agree with the sentiments stated above: School administration is a complicated and difficult job, and you can't please everybody.
Contrary to what might be a public perception (and Melissa's experience!), the TOPS parent community is a reasonable bunch. We are weary of the constant struggle with the District over various issues, and just wish they would recognize at least some of our earned autonomy.
I think very often the school community does not know just how much work principals put in. A bigger school like a middle school might have several administrators to fill these duties but at elementary level that's often not the case. I think a big area where workload could be reduced is by making the SPS Facilities department more responsive. From what I have heard, that department is not well-set-up customer service-wise, with lots of fiefdoms and long, long wait times to get basic stuff done. As a result I have seen the principal have to personally: help clean graffiti, spend long time on phone/email/voicemail trying to get someone come out NOW to deal with a broken pipe or other urgent issue, spend lots of time interfacing with facilities people who: show up with the wrong work order, show up not knowing their instructions, show up not having the proper tools/equipment, show up with a poor attitude, or show up not knowing who else to bring in if there is a major facilities issue. Facilities in my opinion is a principal's huge time-sink, w/o recognition from within the community or by SPS.
Another time-sink may be duty time, like recess duty, lunch duty, etc (this is not the case in every blg. because of different ways of organizing). This is good face-time with the kids but when there are too few people to share it around it means that the principal can't leave duty to take care of emergencies without some serious re-shuffling.
Another area where principal has to commit lots of time is evening events, because at least one SPS staffer has to be at an evening event in a building. Generally principal is the one, present through the whole event, and afterward as it's cleaned up. I have seen principal with a sponge or wastecan helping with the clean-up. Now that's above and beyond.
Another area perhaps implicit in the "instructional leader" role is the principal's role as emotional support to staff. Teachers are people too, and if a difficult or stressful experience happens (like a parent in the throes of fear/uncertainty about their child behaves disrespectfully to teacher, or like a behavior issue that defies easy resolution), they may turn to the principal and actually need some intensive emotional support-- which, when done in a real way takes--TIME.
How can we as a parent community help (b/c SPS is not likely to do much more than add to the principal's job)? Here are some questions I think we might ask ourselves:
1. If I have a complaint of any type, have I followed all the other channels I could before taking it to the principal? What I mean is, if it's a teacher/classroom concern, have I presented it with specificity to the teacher so she or he has a fair chance to respond and make things better? (appropriate in most cases)
2. If I have a new program or idea I want to see implemented, have I quietly and respectfully bounced it off key stakeholders before walking it into the principal's office? Who "owns" the work that would be required: have I talked with them?
Great topic, Melissa. For the most part our principals are fabulous, but very overworked. For the 4 principals I have been most exposed to, I've been very impressed.
I might add that a principal's job could also be made easier by parents and community if some of his/her responsibilities were successfully off-loaded to trusted members of the community.
A huge problem with the current system, as both you and Charlie point out, is that principals have too much to do. If there were a little more trust of parents to handle some governance, or even some things like lunch patrol, perhaps the job wouldn't be nearly as packed as it is.
Helen Schinske
Good schools have volunteers doing much of the playground work that is needed - it requires training the volunteers. Why not seek a PTSA grant and train playground volunteers? There is a state law against bullying, but you wouldn't know it if you spent some time at nearly any school playground. All day long we want our kids in small groups led by a trained teacher and then send them out to socialize with 1:75 supervision. And most of the kids do not know how to play. They need to be taught.
Madrona has Family Support Workers who can do the work that the principal may be getting involved in unnecessarily. Some principals who do not know how to make the instructional environment better make it look like they are needed for "other" issues and then let the instructional issues take a back seat.
Our supt does not inspire principals. She does not inspire families. And she doesn't seem to have won this readership over. The best way for us to control our neighborhood schools is with local DECENTRALIZED governance that has a formal structure citywide, like the LSCs of Chicago.