Monday, September 13, 2010

What is a Principal ...

Scott Macleod has been asking what Teachers feel that they need from Administrators.

Whatever happened to the real meaning of "Principal," as in, first, head, leader? Implicit in the title was that the Principal was the lead teacher.

A teacher.

The one with the most seniority or best leadership or highest level of comfort with paperwork and families or whatever was elected by the teachers from within their ranks. Private schools (who used to call teachers "masters") have a Head-master. It's the same thing. I think the administrators started being a detriment to schools when they stopped being teachers.

Lead us from the front.

"Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more." Shakespeare, Henry V

1 comment:

  1. Administrators lost the ability to be 'lead teachers' long ago when the job became much more bureaucratic and paperwork-heavy. There's a resurgence of interest in administrators returning to their roles of being 'instructional leaders' but most are still finding it hard to do because of management demands that pull them in other directions. As you note, it's very sad. Thanks for the follow-up post.

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