Cheers to the new high school principal – here’s your first big headache

When you read any article or book published for school administrators, you can usually tell after the first paragraph if the person writing is a writer on Educational Leadership or someone who has actually been in the role of principal. Writers generally write wonderful things about how the principal is “the educational leader of the building” and other platitudes that are almost impossible to put on the calendar and actually achieve in a concentrated way during any normal school day. This writer introduces you to what your first headache will be each year that you are a boss, and you can put it on the calendar, and you will spend a lot of focused time dealing with it. The “Ivory Tower” folks didn’t mention this in graduate school, we assure you. Issues like the one mentioned in this article could be the reason why they chose the Ivory Tower in the first place and therefore have a lot of time to write!

So are you ready? Here’s your first big headache, and it’ll show up on the first day or two of the new school year. He has just returned to his office after being “all over the place” greeting children, checking buses, and talking to teachers and staff. It’s close to 10 a.m. and you sit down to catch your breath and finish the cold coffee you bought at the convenience store this morning at 6 a.m. when it was hot.

The secretary comes in and asks if you want the person who makes the announcements in the morning – you should do some, by the way, about positive things and not just sports) – to announce that the registration requests are at the office counter for students who want a parking pass that allows them to drive to school and park in the parking lot.

This seems innocuous enough, right? Buckle up, it’s going to be a bumpy ride! The announcement is made, and by Friday’s application deadline, you have 203 applications. By the way, there are 35 parking lots for students. Some of the applications are incomplete because they ask for a copy of the license, registration and insurance. The clerk reviews all of these and gives you the complete 186 applications.

Well, so far so good. Here’s the question: who parks in the 35 spots? Have you thought about criteria? Will it be only for older people? You wisely ask the secretary how things were done in the past with the previous director. She replies that she has no idea since old Mr. Brown took care of it himself; she just wrote the final list. Okay, you’re a pretty bright person, so you start with the logical thinking that seniors have the first choice, and this reduces the stack to 117 requests. So you feel that since academics is of the utmost importance, the cutoff for consideration for a permit will be that each student must have a GPA of 3.2 or better. You have about 77 requests. Now what? Well maybe you should look at the level of contribution that each student makes to the school as a whole. For example, your service to the school might be viewed as part of a band, a team, or some other student leadership activity. All good ideas so far and logically defensible. You now have about 53 apps. So far, this Captain Queeg-style analysis has cost him a lot of time and visibility. You realize you have a school to run, so you simply pull names out of the hat to finish the process (also a defensible approach: a LOTTERY!) And present the final list to the secretary for her to write and paste on. the wall outside the main office. Good. That was not so bad, you think, what is the next topic that I have to make some decisions about? You go home that night feeling like you’ve accomplished something.

The next morning there are about 15 extremely angry parents waiting for you in the reception area of ​​the office. Several angry parents have called, two members of the school board have called and the superintendent has also called, the issue? Student parking problems.

His day is completely busy dealing with angry parents whose son did not get a parking permit. They all leave with the promise that “You haven’t heard the last of me” … and, “I’m going to call the Superintendent and / or the Board members, etc.” The superintendent asks what all the fuss is about. You ask, “What fuss?” “I just made some logical decisions about who will get a permit to park on the lot considering the fact that we only have 35 spots available.” You proceed to sketch out your ironclad logic for reaching this decision, and the superintendent thanks you and tells you that he will support him, but that you have to make an exception because the Board member, Mrs. Cavendish’s son who goes to the technical school and has a job every day as a veterinary assistant needs to drive a considerable distance etc. Funny Guy / Gal that Superintendent- he / she ends with the comment, “Are we having fun yet?” Other parents argue that their children have jobs, many of which are crucial to the family’s financial problems, and those children couldn’t go out for a team if they wanted to because of financial problems. The respectful parents of some of your Indian and Pakistani students come next and tell you that their children, all of whom are excellent students and never miss a day of school, have to work in the family business every day, and they would like to apply. respectfully a parking space for your child. Two parents cry as they tell the sad story of a family illness that forces their son to drive every day for a legitimate reason. The other members of the school board call asking for a favor, one of whom is painfully outspoken at all times and reminds you that they can sway the votes and will remember you in the spring when the question of your raise comes up.

Now what? You cannot retract the published list. Your heart goes out to some of these people, and you even think pragmatically about future raises for a moment or two. They take two more days to go over all the concerns from parents, students wanting to see you, calls from their boss and board members, and unsolicited suggestions from various staff. Another idea that comes to mind and quickly passes is that maybe students who are in their sports season could keep their space until their season is over and then someone else could get the space, but then you realize that very few students are involved in only One thing. Try calling in other seasoned managers in the area, all of whom have a suggestion or two, but all come from various facilities, with varying levels of political capital depending on how long they have been on the job. You take good notes, but most of the things they say won’t help you today. At night your loving husband or wife says, “Honey, you wanted this job …”

You decide that the list sticks, and the anger continues unabated for a week or two. You will see many of these people again. Despite the threats of lawsuits, the school’s attorney assures him that anyone can sue anyone else for anything, but the plaintiff in these actions would have no real cause of action and his case would be dismissed; it would take a lot of your time, that’s all. Being a student of “shared government” – something Machiavelli would have laughed at – you gather a committee made up of several teachers, two students, a coach and one or two parents and ask them to propose some selection criteria for next year .

Now, it’s been about two weeks into the school year and she hasn’t had a chance to “get out for air.” Things seem to be on the way to work out when the secretary reminds him of an irrefutable law of nature: People get older every day. That means that as the school year progresses, each day students celebrate birthdays and grow old. Therefore, by the end of the year there will be a significantly higher number of licensed drivers than at the beginning of the year. It also reminds you that you, too, were once young and that as a senior in high school, you probably didn’t want your friends to see you taking a bus to and from school, either. It would be as embarrassing as having to bring lunch to school. What do you plan to say to parents who want to know why their children are not allowed to drive to school now that they have a license in November?

By now, you might be thinking about that vacation commercial where they ask the question … Do you want to get away? You could also look in the mirror and wonder why you quit your teaching job and those long summer vacations. Relax, things will get better and it’s only September 20th. Much more school remains. This has been your first headache. You will learn from this. We will stop now and give you some time to process. Many of your headaches this year will come unexpectedly. At least you know this will arrive, every year at the same time. Are we still having fun?