Examples of other administrative positions at the school level include department head and assistant principal, and at the district level, curriculum specialist and subject matter supervisor.
TABLE 2. Since most principals held teaching positions before becoming principals, this means that close to half came to their job with both administrative and teaching experience. However, it also means that about half came to their job with no administrative experience in school or district positions.
About 17 percent of all principals held nonteaching, nonadministrative positions e. Additionally, most of them had experience in other positions in their pre-principalship years: Many almost 60 percent of the 17 percent held other administrative positions at the school or district level, and nearly all about 98 percent of the 17 percent held teaching positions.
TABLE 3. Less than 20 percent of all principals have prior nonteaching, nonadministrative experience in elementary and secondary education before becoming principals, averaging about 6 years.
The charts help her see whether she is spending her time on the right things. When she first joined the SAM program, an analysis showed that Henderson was spending between 50 to 60 percent of her week on instruction. Now, her average goal is 78 percent and she often hits 85 percent, she said. She cut out things others could handle, including building minutiae and student discipline. And with the school rolling out four big initiatives, the process helps him focus on the right tasks.
He can quickly spot areas in need of improvement and recognize teachers who deserve praise and others who will be great resources for their peers, he said. Gracia, the Menlo Park principal, has learned she must actively choose the activities that would move her school forward. She had to prepare her staff for the changes to come, including that they would no longer be able to stroll into her office and that they would be receiving fewer emails.
The school, she told them, would emphasize face-to-face communication. Gracia spends a lot of time talking to teachers, providing them access to professional development, and sometimes just getting out of their way, she said.
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As the building principal, you will also get credit when credit is due. When an individual student, teacher, coach, or team succeeds, you also succeed. You get to celebrate in those successes because a decision you made somewhere along the line likely helped lead to that success. When someone associated with the school is recognized for outstanding achievement in some area, it typically means that the right decisions have been made.
It may be as straightforward as hiring the right teacher or coach, implementing and supporting a new program, or offering a particular student the right motivation. As a teacher, you often only have an impact on the students you teach. Make no mistake that this impact is significant and direct. As a principal, you can have a larger, indirect impact on students, teachers, and support personnel.
The decisions you make can affect everyone. For example, working closely with a young teacher who needs some direction and guidance has a tremendous impact on both the teacher and every student they will ever teach.
As a principal, your impact is not limited to a single classroom. A single decision can be transcendent throughout the entire school. Not all aspects of being a principal are rosy. To do the job, you'll need to spend a considerable amount of time—often even nights and weekends—discharging your duties.
Additionally, along with the ability to make an impact, you'll also be taking on a great deal of responsibility to ensure the proper functioning of the school, and you'll have to deal with politics involving students, teachers, and parents.
Following are a few of the major drawbacks of the job. Effective teachers spend a lot of extra time in their classrooms and at home. However, principals spend a much greater amount of time doing their jobs.
Principals are often the first one to school and the last one to leave. In general, they are on a month contract, getting only two to four weeks of vacation time during the summer. They also have several conferences and professional development duties they are required to attend.
Principals are usually expected to attend almost every extra-curricular event. In many cases, this can mean attending events three to four nights a week during the school year.
Principals spend a lot of time away from their homes and their families throughout the school year. Principals have a greater workload than teachers do. They are no longer responsible for only a few subjects with a handful of students. You have your hand in everything, and this can be overwhelming. You have to be organized, self-aware, and confident to keep up with all of those responsibilities. Student discipline issues arise every day.
Teachers require assistance on a daily basis. Stepping stones: Principal career paths and school outcomes. Social Science Research , 41 4 , — Harris, A. Distributed leadership: What we know.
Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer. Mukuria, G. Disciplinary challenges: How do principals address this dilemma? Urban Education , 37 3 , Ni, Y. Educational Administration Quarterly, 54 2 , Pijanowski, J. The influence of salary in attracting and retaining school leaders. Education and Urban Society , 42 1 , Spillane, J. Distributed leadership. Usdan, M. Leadership for student learning: Reinventing the principalship.
Institute for Educational Leadership. Yan, R. Principal instructional leadership, working conditions, and principal turnover in K public schools Doctoral dissertation, The University of Utah.
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