More Practical Advice for Principals

MORE

PRACTICAL

ADVICE FOR

PRINCIPALS

ALBERT LEE SNOW

SCARECROWEDUCATION Lanham, Maryland • Toronto • Oxford 2004

Published in the United States of America by ScarecrowEducation An imprint of the Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www.scarecroweducation.com PO Box 317 Oxford OX2 9RU, UK Copyright © 2004 by Albert Lee Snow All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Snow, Albert Lee. More practical advice for principals / Albert Lee Snow. p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 1-57886-078-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. School principals-United States—Handbooks, manuals, etc. 2.

School management and organization—United States—Handbooks, manuals,

etc. I. Title.

LB2831.92 .S584 2004

371.2'012—dc22

2003018026

∞ ™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper

for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Manufactured in the United States of America.

CONTENTS

I N T RO D U CT I O N

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1

H OW TO B E C O M E A P R I N C I PA L Certification Background of New Principals What We Have Learned from Alternative Teachers Training Programs for Principals Finding Your First Administrative Position Make Use of Any Personal Contacts You Have The Interview Process Final Advice

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T W E LV E ST E P S FO R TA K I N G OV E R A

N EW S C H O O L Step #1: Meet the Superintendent Step #2: Evaluate Your New Facility Step #3: Meet the Teachers Step #4: School-Day Scheduling Step #5: Reviewing Handbooks Step #6: Duty Schedules for Teachers Step #7: Duty Schedules for Assistant Principals Step #8: Job Descriptions for All Employees Step #9: Hiring New Staff

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iii

CONTENTS

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Step #10: Staff-Development Days Step #11: The First Day of School Step #12: Evaluation

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S P E C I F I C S C H O O L P RO B L E M S Problem #1: How to Deal with Fights Problem #2: How to Deal with Drugs on Campus Problem #3: How to Deal with Problem Students Problem #4: How to Deal with Problem Teachers Problem #5: How to Deal with Bomb Threats Problem #6: How to Deal with Cheerleaders Problem #7: How to Deal with Extracurricular

Activities in General

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DEALING WITH DIVERSITY IN

T H E C L AS S RO O M

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WO R K I N G W I T H S P E C I A L - N E E D S

ST U D E N TS

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D I S C I P L I N E A N D S C H O O L SA F ET Y

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B U D G ET Strategies for Saving Money

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I M P R O V I N G T E ST S C O R E S How Not to Improve Test Scores How to Make Real Improvements in Test Scores Is High-Stakes Testing Here to Stay?

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APPENDIX

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REFERENCES

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A B O U T T H E AU T H O R

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iv

INTRODUCTION

A

t the start of every school year in the United States, thousands of new principals take over schools. These new situations can range from the new principal coming in from an entirely different state or area to the longtime district employee who has been promoted. In the spring of 2002, for example, half of New York City’s 1,100 public schools had principals with three years of experience or less (Archer, 2002). This trend is probably going to continue into the foreseeable future for several reasons. Thousands of aging baby boomers are reaching retirement age. Many states have retirement plans with provisions for early retirements. Principals and teachers are opting for these early outs and pursuing secondcareer options. This is particularly troubling, because it often occurs right as principals are reaching the peak of their abilities professionally. Also, the many demands of the principal’s position itself are causing many ad­ ministrators to leave the profession. Problems range from politics, inordi­ nate amounts of paperwork, irate parents, and unions to the increased de­ mand to raise standardized test scores ( Johnson, 2002a). For all of these reasons there are going to be more and more new principals. It is not an easy task to come in and take over an established school as a new administrator. In my previous work, Practical Advice for Principals, I tried to provide useful strategies for principals to use on a daily basis. This work will expand on the areas covered in the previous manuscript and add

1

INTRODUCTION

additional chapters on topics beneficial to principals taking over schools for the first time. There are some tactics that can make this transition to a new school administration easier and less stressful for all parties involved. As with my previous book, this work is written as a guide for practicing and as­ piring administrators.

2

1 HOW TO BECOME

A PRINCIPAL

T

raditionally, if you walked into any school in the United States and asked to see the principal, chances were that you would meet a male who had been a teacher and coach before moving into the principal’s po­ sition. In the past fifteen to twenty years, the demographics of the principal’s position have changed, becoming more diverse, but not drastically so. For example, women now hold 35 percent of the principal positions in this country, while they make up 70 percent of the total number of teach­ ers (Fenwick and Pierce, 2001). Another factor in the changing makeup of the principal’s position is the fact that so many current administrators are retiring or leaving the profession. Thousands of baby-boomer principals are leaving the field every year, and there is constant talk of a shortage of school principals. A 2001 report says that of the ninety-three thousand principals in the United States, 40 percent are expected to retire before 2006 (Goldstein, 2001). What this all adds up to for aspiring principals is that there will be many more opportunities for people to become prin­ cipals in the coming years than there have been in the past. One of the keys to the success of our education system in coming years is going to be how well school districts fill these positions. This chapter will deal with where principals come from, the training process, and landing that initial school administrative position.

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CHAPTER 1

CERTIFICATION

The very first step for someone who wishes to pursue a career in school ad­ ministration is to gain an administrator’s license or certification from the de­ partment of education in his or her state. Included in the appendix is a list of contact information for each state department of education in the United States and a brief summary of the requirements for a school administrator’s license or certificate in each state. Principals’ certification requirements have been evolving in recent years. For example, when I received my first school administrator’s certification in the mid-1980s, all I had to do was take fifteen graduate hours in educational administration because I already had a master’s-level teaching certificate. This was called an add-on certificate. Believe me, five graduate courses in ed­ ucational administration did very little to prepare me for my first position as an assistant principal and this experience is in large part the motivation be­ hind this book and behind my first book, Practical Advice for Principals. Today, many states require that prospective school administrators take the Principals Licensure Assessment from the Educational Testing Service. The state of Mississippi, for once, led the nation by requiring prospective admin­ istrators make a certain score on this exam as a standard for obtaining initial licensure (Lewis, 1997). The Principals Licensure Assessment was devel­ oped using the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium’s Stan­ dards for School Leaders, which are outlined by Ms. Lewis in the October 1997 issue of Phi Delta Kappan, but which can also be found on the Coun­ cil of Chief State School Officers’ website at www.ccsso.org/standards.html. These standards include the following: • Standard #1: A school leader is an educational leader who promotes the success of all students by facilitating the development, articulation, implementation, and stewardship of a vision of learning that is shared and supported by the school community. • Standard #2: A school administrator is an educational leader who pro­ motes the success of all students by advocating, nurturing, and sus­ taining a school culture and instructional program conducive to stu­ dent learning and staff professional growth.

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H O W T O B E C O M E A P R I N C I PA L

• Standard #3: A school administrator is an educational leader who pro­ motes the success of all students by ensuring management of the orga­ nization, operations, and resources for a safe, efficient, and effective learning environment. • Standard #4: A school administrator is an educational leader who pro­ motes the success of all students by collaborating with families and community members, responding to diverse community interests and needs, and mobilizing community resources. • Standard #5: A school administrator is an educational leader who pro­ motes the success of all students by acting with integrity, with fairness, and in an ethical manner. • Standard #6: A school administrator is an educational leader who pro­ motes the success of all students by understanding, responding to, and influencing the larger political, social, economic, legal, and cultural context. States use a variety of criteria for certifying administrators. Arizona, like Mississippi, uses a combination of graduate study plus a passing score on an administrative exam, the principal’s portion of the Arizona Proficiency As­ sessment. The state of Florida requires a passing score on the Florida Edu­ cational Leadership Examination, completion of a school-district manage­ ment and development program, and graduate coursework. the appendix contains information on school administrator qualifications for all fifty states.

BACKGROUND OF NEW PRINCIPALS

Who will fill these positions in coming years? That is a good question. Tra­ ditionally, the pool of candidates from which new principals were chosen consisted entirely of experienced teachers already working in school dis­ tricts. The path to becoming a school administrator went something like this. A young person decided to become a teacher at some point in high school or college. That young person then enrolled in a teacher education program, completed student teaching, and landed a job as a classroom

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CHAPTER 1

teacher. At some point that teacher decided to go back to school at night and/or in the summer to pursue a master’s degree in educational adminis­ tration in order to get certified as an entry-level administrator. Once the teacher received that administrative certificate, he or she began to actively pursue an entry-level administrator’s position, usually as an assistant princi­ pal. Sometimes a teacher can go directly from being a classroom teacher to being a principal, although I personally don’t recommend it. This happens more often in elementary schools than it does in high schools or middle/ junior high schools. On the secondary-school level, entry-level administra­ tive positions are usually assistant principal jobs. Assistant principals at all school levels are traditionally in charge of discipline. I have heard this job be­ ing described as being “in charge of books and butts.” Although not the most rewarding or glamorous job in education, it is a very important one. This bottom-level position also lets novice administrators gain valuable experi­ ence about running schools while working under a more experienced building-level principal. The assistant principal experience is invaluable for learning skills for dealing with parents, teachers, and students. I spent five years as the assistant principal in charge of discipline for an 1,100-student public high school. If that job doesn’t totally turn off or burn out an admin­ istrator, then it is time to move up to a building-level principal’s position. From there, building principals move up to central office positions such as assistant superintendent or superintendent. That is a thumbnail sketch of the traditional career path for school ad­ ministrators. There are a good many practicing administrators in this coun­ try who have followed this basic career path to the positions that they hold today. If you add in the fact that many of the teachers that follow this route were also coaches, you will have described many of your practicing school administrators. I followed this same career route and am therefore biased in thinking that this is the best way to go. Is that the only route to becoming a principal or school administrator? No, it is not. In fact some school districts are strictly seeking applicants who are not educators. I do not think this is a particularly good idea, in that schools are dif­ ferent places. Schools are not manufacturing plants or utility companies, and they need an administrator who knows and understands schools, not some corporate bureaucrat. Especially with all the current corporate scandals going

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H O W T O B E C O M E A P R I N C I PA L

on, Enron and WorldCom for example, corporate managers may not be the best choices to lead our country’s schools in the new millennium. Does the corporate world have something to teach our school leaders about manage­ ment techniques? Of course, but as was mentioned earlier, schools are unique institutions and principals need to be experienced school people. Along the same lines, university departments of educational leadership need to hire ex­ perienced school principals and superintendents to teach their courses, not just researchers. When thinking of alternatively trained principals, one also needs to examine the success, or lack thereof, of alternate-route teachers.

WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED FROM ALTERNATIVE TEACHERS

Certification programs should give pause to advocates of alternative routes to principalship: New teachers from nontraditional programs are more likely to indicate they chose teaching because of job availability rather than genuine interest in chil­ dren and their learning. They tend to have lower academic qualifications, par­ ticularly in math and science, than attendees of four-year teacher education programs. Once hired they are more likely to be rated “ineffective” or “poor” than traditionally trained teachers. Nearly 60% leave the profession by their third year, compared to about 30% of traditionally-trained teachers. And in an age where school success is measured with standardized test scores, several statewide studies (most notably in California and Texas) indicate students with traditionally-trained teachers outscore those whose teachers were alter­ natively certified. Clearly, lack of training in instruction hurts nontraditional teachers and their students. Why then do we need to open the principalship to noneducators, espe­ cially when principals say the instructional leadership demands on them have dramatically increased? How is private-sector management experience ade­ quate preparation for the instructional demands of the principalship (Fenwick and Pierce, 2001, p.38)?

I don’t think it is.

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CHAPTER 1

Another route to becoming a principal follows a pattern something like this. An outstanding teacher looking for advancement moves into a lead teacher or curriculum-specialist position. Many districts use teachers for these kinds of positions for several reasons. One reason is that the positions need filling to take some of the workload off of building-level principals. Sec­ ondly, if you elevate these positions to assistant principal, director, or assis­ tant superintendent status, the pay goes up considerably. It is much cheaper to give these positions to teachers and not pay them like full-fledged admin­ istrators. Some districts then appoint individuals who have been filling these staff or support positions directly to building-level principal positions. I per­ sonally don’t believe that this is a good idea. While serving in one of these positions is valuable experience, I advise anyone who wants to run a school to learn the ropes from an assistant principal position. That is where a per­ son will learn the management and discipline skills that will enable him or her to run a school. Experience is the best teacher. At the same time, princi­ pals who want to be superintendents would benefit from some time spent in a district-level staff position, such as director of federal programs or curricu­ lum. This is why, in the military, career officers are moved from one assign­ ment to another to prepare them for the top levels of command. I believe as­ piring principals need to pay their dues as assistant principals before taking on a building-level principal’s position. These different aspects of the principal’s position have led some schools to hire two administrators. One person is hired to be the instructional leader and the other to be the school manager. The instructional leader would be responsible for supervision of teachers, curriculum, test scores, and sched­ uling. Smith and Andrews put it like this in 1989 (p.8–9): The principal who displays strong instructional leadership: 1. Places priority on curriculum and instruction issues. 2. Is dedicated to the goals of the school and the school district. 3. Is able to rally and mobilize resources to accomplish the goals of the dis­ trict and the school. 4. Creates a climate of high expectations in the school, characterized by a tone of respect for teachers, students, parents, and community. 5. Functions as a leader with direct involvement in instructional policy by: a. Communicating with teachers, b. Supporting and participating in staff development activities, 8

H O W T O B E C O M E A P R I N C I PA L

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

c. Establishing teaching for the use of new instructional strategies, and d. Displaying knowledge of district-adopted curriculum materials. Continually monitors student progress toward school achievement and teacher effectiveness in meeting these goals. Teacher evaluation is: a. Characterized by frequent classroom visitation, clear evaluation cri­ teria, and feedback, and b. Is used to help students and teachers improve performance. Demonstrates commitment to academic goals, shown by the ability to develop and articulate a clear vision of long-term goals for the school, and to strong achievement goals that are consistent with distinct goals and priorities. Effectively consults with others by involving the faculty and other groups in school decision processes. a. Teachers feel they are genuinely encouraged to exchange ideas. b. Effectively functioning coalitions support the operation of the school, and constituent groups share a commitment to the acade­ mic mission of the school. c. A critical constructive force in the school encourages inquiry and change. Effectively and efficiently mobilizes resources such as materials, time, and support to enable the school and its personnel to most effectively meet academic goals. Recognizes time as a scarce resource and creates order and discipline by minimizing factors that disrupt the learning process.

As I mentioned earlier some school districts have hired two principals, one to be the instructional leader and one to be the school manager. The school manager is responsible for the following: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Maintenance of facilities Security of grounds, hallways, and parking lots Discipline Transportation

Traditionally all of these duties have been the responsibility of the principal and in many cases are still in the hands of one person. 9

CHAPTER 1

TRAINING PROGRAMS FOR PRINCIPALS

Traditionally, school principals have been trained by state universities’ and colleges’ departments of educational administration and leadership. I have mentioned before that taking five courses in educational administration does not qualify anyone to be a principal. Fledgling prospective principals, perched at the edge of insulated academic nests, often find themselves ill-prepared for their maiden flight into the blus­ tery skies of school leadership. As practicing administrators will attest, the match between formal pre-service training and the actual demands inherent in being a principal is not a particularly good one. Today, however, as reform and restructuring efforts gain momentum and greater awareness exists regarding the critical role principals play in the suc­ cess of school improvement efforts, this situation is starting to change. More energy is being devoted to assessing and addressing deficiencies in preservice training so that future principals will be better prepared for their bap­ tism into the realities of leadership (Lumsden, 1992, p. 1).

Again, this is one of the reasons I wrote my first work, Practical Advice for Principals, and this second book. Lumsden goes on to list several deficien­ cies in current principal training programs: 1. Too much theory. 2. Not enough real-world problem solving. 3. Internships are seen as a way to address #2 but there is a lack of collab­ oration between professors and field supervisors. 4. Not enough preparation for the fast pace of being a principal. 5. Not enough conflict resolution skills taught. 6. Not enough communication skills taught (Lumsden, 1992).

Many states now require an internship as a part of their educational ad­ ministration degree programs. I see this as a help to providing real-world ex­ perience. The following are five suggestions from Phi Delta Kappan for a successful internship: 1. The intern should be an integral part of the school. 2. The intern should have a vision of the internship.

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H O W T O B E C O M E A P R I N C I PA L

3. The intern should be given gradually increasing responsibilities. 4. There must be continuous evaluation. 5. Problems should be addressed by the university supervisor (Gray, 2001).

Most states also have some type of professional development for new ad­ ministrators offered by their own department of education. For example, the California Department of Education administers the Principal Training Pro­ gram. The state of Mississippi requires ten days of professional training dur­ ing the first two years of employment as a practicing administrator. Some large districts have their own training program that prepares district em­ ployees for administrative positions. This is an excellent idea. The District of Columbia public school system has its own Leadership Academy, which focuses on training principals to be instructional leaders (Stricherz, 2001). The state of Florida requires all of its districts to have district-level training programs for administrators. A growing trend for school districts has been to develop some type of mentoring program in conjunction with an internship. The Albuquerque public schools started a program that paired a new prin­ cipal with an experienced one in the mid-1990s (Malone, 2001).

FINDING YOUR FIRST ADMINISTRATIVE POSITION

One of the best ways to find a principal’s position or other school adminis­ trative position is to apply for openings within the school district that you al­ ready work in. Candidates from within a school district usually have advan­ tages that outsiders do not. The district already has firsthand knowledge of what kind of person and employee a candidate from within the district is without even looking at the application. A candidate from within the district will also have worked for administrators in the district who either are doing the hiring or are personally known to those who are. This can be a huge ad­ vantage. Many school districts also want administrators to live within the dis­ trict that employs them. On the other hand, hiring from within is not always the best policy, in that districts need to bring people in with different ideas, experiences, and perceptions that come from working in different areas. I know from my own 11

CHAPTER 1

experience that being in one district for a long period can give an adminis­ trator a particular mind-set about how schools should be run. My doctoral program gave me the opportunity to be exposed to different schools and ad­ ministrators who made me realize that just because I was accustomed to do­ ing things a certain way, it didn’t mean it was necessarily the right or best way to do something. School districts, like major corporations, need an in­ fusion of new blood from time to time to keep the organization from be­ coming stagnant. In some cases, the quality of candidates within a district is poor and school systems must look outside for a new administrator. I was hired as a high school principal in one public school district where the school board and superintendent of schools were looking for a more qualified candidate than those that they had within the district. There was also a good deal of controversy in the community over several of the internal candidates. I just happened to be a highly qualified candidate who lived in the school district, but was working elsewhere. I was just what the dis­ trict was looking for. It is relatively simple to find out about position openings in your own district. There is usually some type of internal advertisement, and word of mouth usually precedes the more formal written process. The internal grapevine loves to talk about principal openings. At the same time, it is also relatively easy to find an administrator’s position in other districts, cities, and states, especially if you can navigate the Internet. Most states post job listings by school districts on their state department of education website. The Mississippi Department of Education site at www.mde.k12.ms.us is one example. School districts have their own websites, which list their ad­ ministrative openings, such as the Cobb County School district in Marri­ etta, Georgia, at www.cobbk12.org. Also, school administrator organiza­ tions have job-listing services. An excellent example is the Texas Association of School Administrators Educator Job Bank at www.tasanet.org, which lists all administrative openings in the state by school district. Universities hold job fairs every spring so that school dis­ tricts can recruit teacher education graduates. School districts are not usu­ ally recruiting administrators at these events, but the initial contact with school districts can be useful.

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MAKE USE OF ANY PERSONAL CONTACTS YOU HAVE

Search committees get a lot of inquiries and résumés; having a personal contact in a school district can get your foot in the door, and the rest is up to you. That is one reason to stay involved in state and national school or­ ganizations. The networking is not only valuable for professional develop­ ment, but the contacts can be very useful in a job search. Also, keep in con­ tact with other administrators you have worked with. People move from district to district, and a person you worked with ten years ago may help you land a job today. I have left out one important part of the job-search process. This is a prerequisite, if you will. Prepare yourself as well as you can before you start your job search. Make sure that you have the proper certification. This is especially important if you are applying in another state. Many states recognize other states licenses, but some do not. I applied for an out-of-state position, and they would not even look at my credentials without a license from their state. Continue to work on your credentials. If you have a master’s degree and just took a few courses to get an add-on certificate in administration, continue work on a higher degree, either a specialist or doctorate. You do not want to lose jobs because you were outcredentialed. This can be especially true for jobs within the school district in which you are already employed. If two candidates are similar in ability and experience, extra training or a higher degree could tip the scale in one’s favor. I have seen districts where every administrator had a doctorate in education. Competition for jobs was so intense you had to get a doctorate to compete. One other idea is to take on more responsi­ bilities at school to showcase your leadership abilities. Coach a ball team, sponsor the student council, or volunteer for extra supervision duties. Don’t get outcredentialed or outworked.

THE INTERVIEW PROCESS

The main advice that I can give prospective principals concerning the in­ terview process is to be prepared beforehand. First of all, take the time to

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CHAPTER 1

find out something about the school district, the community, and the school itself. For example, find out about the demographics of the population served by the school at which you are seeking a position. I believe it is help­ ful to find out why there is an administrative opening. Did someone retire or was the old principal forced out? Prepare answers to commonly asked interview questions: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

What is your philosophy of education? How would you deal with problem students? How would you deal with problem teachers? How do plan to improve test scores? How do you plan to involve the community in the education process?

If you are asked a scenario question—as in, What would you do in X situation—simply rely on your experience, and hopefully you will have a similar experience to draw from. Be prepared to talk to a wide variety of people. The following are exam­ ples of different interviews you can expect to go through. Sometimes you may have various combinations of these: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Interview by superintendent of schools Interview by superintendent and assistant superintendent Interview by committee of district administrators Interview by community leaders Interview by search committee consisting of parents, teachers, com­ munity leaders, students, outside consultants, or some combination of the above 6. Interview by superintendent and school board Not only will you have to go through interviews with some combination of these groups, but you will often have to do it in sequence over a single day’s time. I had to interview with five different groups over an eight-hour period on a recent interview.

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H O W T O B E C O M E A P R I N C I PA L

FINAL ADVICE

These are some final factors to consider before taking on a search for a school administrator position. 1. Make sure you are really interested in a position before you go to the trouble of applying and interviewing for the job. 2. If your family is unwilling to move, do not apply for out-of-state positions. 3. Do not take any job just for the opportunity to be a principal. If a school has had five principals in six years, you might want to recon­ sider taking the job. There is a problem of some kind. 4. In all stages of the process, be yourself. If a search committee wants something that you are not, you do not want the job anyway. 5. Never fake anything on your résumé. Too many public figures have been humiliated over this in recent years. Always present yourself in the best possible light, but do not fabricate. Potential employers are being much more diligent about checking experience and references.

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2

TWELVE STEPS

FOR TAKING OVER

A NEW SCHOOL

E

very principal at some point experiences the initial process of taking over a new school. This transition process is very important to the new principal’s eventual success at that school. This situation is very similar to that of a teacher on the first day of a new school year. The tone a teacher sets on the first day of school in the classroom will determine if that teacher is go­ ing to be successful or not. In this chapter specific strategies will be dis­ cussed to help a new principal deal with this initial leadership challenge.

STEP #1: MEET THE SUPERINTENDENT

Following the interview process for a principal’s position, the school district superintendent will recommend a principal and the school board will ap­ prove the recommendation. Once this process takes place, the new principal will be notified of the board’s decision by the superintendent and a meeting of some kind will take place. This initial meeting between the superintendent and the new principal is extremely important to the new principal and he or she should be prepared for this meeting in advance. The superintendent will give the new principal an idea of the scope of the duties of the position. An equally important aspect of this first meeting is that the superintendent will describe his or her perceptions of the strengths and weaknesses of the school along with any perceived problems. The new principal should remember the

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T W E LV E S T E P S F O R TA K I N G O V E R A N E W S C H O O L

superintendent’s perceptions are not always the reality of what is taking place at a particular school. The superintendent could be totally clueless. However, people do not usually get to be school superintendents without be­ ing pretty sharp individuals. The better the superintendent, the more accu­ rate his or her perceptions of a school situation will be. Also remember, even if you find out that what the superintendent thought was a problem is not ac­ tually a problem, it still illustrates what the superintendent is concerned about. If the superintendent says that drugs are a problem at your school, be prepared to tell him how you are dealing with it even if the problem is not se­ rious. A principal must always remember that a big part of the job is keeping the superintendent happy.

STEP #2: EVALUATE YOUR NEW FACILITY

This is one of the first things one should do as a new principal. Once you have met with the school district superintendent, it is time to visit your new school. A tour of the school will probably have been a part of the interview process, and the superintendent may show you around as part of your initial meeting. Either way, on your first day at a new school, it is your responsibil­ ity to do an evaluation of your facility. The inspection tour of your new school facility should concentrate on several key areas: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Locating obvious safety hazards Observing potential security problems Recording maintenance problems Distinguishing cosmetic needs Determining traffic-flow problems

STEP #3: MEET THE TEACHERS

One of the most important initial tasks for a new principal is to meet the fac­ ulty for the first time. The principal usually comes on board in July before

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CHAPTER 2

school starts in August. So, the principal is basically dealing with an empty school. As soon as possible, call all certified staff to school for a getacquainted conference. It would probably be difficult to get the majority of the faculty to come in on one day and that would probably not be the best idea anyway. Therefore, you should bring them in by small groups, maybe by department or grade level. This initial meeting is important in several ways. First, it affords the new principal the opportunity to form a first impression of all staff members. First impressions are not always accurate, but they can give new principals valu­ able insights into the different personalities that make up the staff. I have done this on five different occasions in the process of taking over five differ­ ent schools, and each situation was different in some way. In one initial meet­ ing I had a teacher who chose this meeting to voice criticism of the school district superintendent. This incident could be interpreted in several differ­ ent ways. My first reaction was that this teacher was not very professional and was someone to keep an eye on. I immediately steered the conversation in another direction. However, something like this is worth investigating to see what the problem is. In another initial meeting I had a teacher arrive dressed in an inappropriate manner. I soon learned that this teacher made a habit of dressing inappropriately, and I had to have a discussion about what constituted appropriate dress with that teacher. One can only really assess teachers over a period of time, but these first meetings are of great value in making general observations about a staff. It is also important to remember that this first meeting works both ways. The teachers will also be forming first impressions of the new principal. They will be evaluating you while you are getting to know them. This is not the time to play games. The following are some guidelines for this initial meeting: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Do not keep teachers waiting to show how busy you are. Do not try to intimidate them. Do not try to impress them with how bright and intelligent you are. Have an agenda and stick to it. Ask the teachers what they perceive to be the problems at this school.

This last item can give the new principal invaluable information about the new school. For example, I once took over a school that had been run by a 18

T W E LV E S T E P S F O R TA K I N G O V E R A N E W S C H O O L

principal that was very strict and rigid with the staff. I soon realized that some of the rules had nothing to do with improving the quality of instruction or the overall school climate. I did away with some of the meaningless rules, and the teachers were big supporters of my principalship from then on. Also, use this initial meeting to express your general philosophies of edu­ cation and how a school should be run. Do not get into specifics. Specifics will come later.

STEP #4: SCHOOL-DAY SCHEDULING

Before a school can open its doors for a new school year, a “master sched­ ule” of classes must be developed. A school cannot function without a mas­ ter schedule in place. The schedule determines what teachers will teach and when. Only then can students be assigned to classes. This master schedule should be developed during the spring of the school year. This is an ideal sit­ uation, which allows students and teachers to know their schedules before summer break and lets the administration know about staffing needs early enough to hire new teachers. There are a variety of computer software sys­ tems that can be a big help in this process.

STEP #5: REVIEWING HANDBOOKS

All schools should have a student handbook that is sent home for parents and students to read. This is true for elementary, middle, and high schools. Student handbooks should contain rules, regulations, and policies regarding many different areas. The following are samples of items to be included in most handbooks: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Admission and enrollment requirements Attendance policies Code of conduct (rules and sanctions) Dress code Exam rules Grades and grading system 19

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7. 8. 9. 10.

Medication rules Report cards Honors and awards Campus visitor policies

Also, there should be a separate handbook for teachers. The teacher handbook should include the student handbook, but should also have spe­ cific rules and regulations for teachers. Items that should be included in the teacher handbook are as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Teacher work hours Leave policy Duty requirements Requisition policy Textbook procedures Uniform grading system Professional-development requirements

STEP #6: DUTY SCHEDULES FOR TEACHERS

As I stated in Practical Advice for Principals, it is impossible for a principal and assistant principal(s) to supervise all of the students in a school. This is why it is imperative that new principals prepare duty schedules for teachers as one of their first actions. The new principal should do the following: 1. Review the staff duty schedule left by the previous administration. 2. Interview teachers and other administrators to get their perceptions of any problems with the duty schedule. 3. Determine what changes need to be made, if any. This is a good place to remember the old adage “if it’s not broken don’t fix it.” Teachers should be given specific work hours. 7:30 A.M. to 3:30 P.M. is a common work schedule for teachers. Teacher work hours are probably set by the district or even by union contract, but new principals need to rein­ force this with teachers up front to save trouble later. 20

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How the school day is divided is set up by the master schedule. The school day can be divided into four, six, or seven periods, which could pos­ sibly alternate on different days. Many schools in the United States follow what is called the 4  4 block schedule. Each teacher at a school that follows the 4  4 block schedule typically teaches three classes per day of approxi­ mately ninety to ninety-five minutes with a planning period of the same length. Teachers are responsible for their classes and any other duties they are assigned. Examples of other duties are as follows: 1. Duties before school: supervision of parking lot, hallway supervision, bus zone supervision, car rider drop-off supervision, supervision of commons areas, and cafeteria duty 2. Break duty: supervision of hallways and commons areas 3. Bathroom duty: prevention of smoking and illegal activities 4. Planning period duty: possibly limited by contract or accreditation standards 5. After-school duties: supervision of hallways, parking lot, bus zone, and car rider pickup area 6. Extracurricular duties: supervision of extracurricular activities

STEP #7: DUTY SCHEDULES FOR ASSISTANT PRINCIPALS

One of the pitfalls new and old principals can run into is the do-it-all-yourself syndrome. This is an easy trap to fall into. Principals know that at the end of the day, they alone are the ones held responsible for everything that happens at their school (Snow, 2003). Therefore many principals develop the mind­ set that it if they are going to be totally responsible, they will do all the work themselves. This is the path to burn out and early retirement. It also seems easier sometimes to just do it yourself than to confront lazy or incompetent employees. Again, this is not the best option in the long run. Principals need to have assistant principals whom they can trust to carry out many different types of duties. There needs to be a formal division of duties between the supervising/building principal and all subordinate principals, whatever their title, assistant principal or vice principal. In some cases this division of duties is established by school district, but often is the responsibility of the head 21

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principal. Assistant principals should be advised of these duties verbally and in writing when they are hired or when a new principal takes over. The duties of assistant principals fall into five basic categories: 1. Discipline of students: In most schools this is the number-one duty of assistant principals. Discipline duties can be divided in a variety of ways. The following are examples of how discipline duties can be divided: Example #1 School A has a principal and one assistant principal. School A has 650 students in grades seven to twelve. The assistant principal is responsible for all discipline under the guidance of the su­ pervising principal. Example #2 School B has a principal and two assistant principals. School B has 1,100 students in grades nine to twelve. One assistant prin­ cipal is responsible for discipline in grades nine to ten. The second assis­ tant principal has responsibility for discipline in grades eleven to twelve. The supervising principal provides overall guidance in discipline matters. I have been the supervising principal at schools with similar char­ acteristics. I was the assistant principal at School B when there was only one assistant principal. Talk about a recipe for burnout. Try do­ ing discipline for 1,100 students by yourself. 2. Managing textbooks: Assistant principals are often given the responsibil­ ity for overseeing inventory and ordering of textbooks. With the limited budgets schools are dealing with, it is essential that the inventory and or­ dering process reflect the true needs of the school. An assistant principal should make sure that teachers take a beginning and ending inventory of the textbooks they use and hold them accountable for any discrepancies. One of the main themes I talk about is the way communities per­ ceive principals and schools. One surefire way to give the community a poor impression of a school is to have old worn-out textbooks or a shortage of textbooks. One suggestion is to make use of used textbook companies to fill in any needs between adoptions of new textbooks. This can save money for the school district, and I have always been well pleased with the quality of these used textbooks. Some sample companies are Follett Preowned Textbooks, Academic Book Services, BUDGEText, and Adams Book Company. Another suggestion is, if your school district has plenty of funds, buy two sets of books. One set 22

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to take home and a set for each classroom. This helps alleviate the need for students to carry all of their books around. 3. Supervision of sports: A typical high school has a wide variety of var­ sity sports, such as Football Baseball Slow-pitch softball Fast-pitch softball Girls’ and boys’ basketball Girls’ and boys’ soccer Volleyball Girls’ and boys’ track Cross-country Wrestling Swimming Each and every one of these sports will have a certain number of home and away games that have to be covered by administrators. Some of these seasons overlap, so it is possible to have two different sporting events taking place at different places and different times on the same night. The best way to divide the duties is to take a calendar of events and to divide them equally among a list of administrators. Many schools also use the athletic director to supervise sporting events. Some schools do not require administrators to attend away sporting events, and some do. These two things can help to ease some of the burden. It is impor­ tant that the principal make appearances at as many games as possible, but that does not mean that he or she has to stay through the whole event. Oftentimes an appearance is enough (Snow, 2003). Remember, there are many other events that require supervision or an appearance also. Band concerts, plays, school board meetings, and parent organiza­ tion meetings all require an appearance from time to time. It is impossi­ ble for one person to cover all of these myriad activities. A division of these duties among principals and assistant principals is essential. 4. Supervision of staff: This is a major responsibility of the supervising principal, but this can be delegated to some extent also. Assistant 23

CHAPTER 2

principals should be assigned a certain number of teachers to observe through classroom visits. Not only does this help take some of the burden off of the building principal, but it also gives the assistant prin­ cipal some experience in the supervision of personnel. 5. Scheduling substitute teachers: School districts handle scheduling of substitute teachers in various ways. Some schools assign this duty to an assistant principal. This can be a major aggravation. Imagine starting your workweek every Sunday afternoon with teachers call­ ing you at home to tell you that they need a substitute for the fol­ lowing day. That interruption of the weekend is bad enough, but that is not the end of the problem. The assistant principal then must call substitutes until one agrees to come in. This can take one minute or an hour. Some districts have teachers arrange their substitutes from an approved list. Other districts have a contract with a temporary la­ bor service to provide substitutes. A temp service takes the duty away from administrators, but it can be expensive, and the quality can be poor. I have seen this duty given to a secretary who came in early every day just to call substitutes, which again relieves adminis­ trators from the responsibility. Also I have seen some schools that did not use substitutes at all. These schools simply required teach­ ers to cover classes during their planning period. This method ag­ gravates teachers a great deal. Elementary schools are usually easier to deal with because they typically have a number of teacher assis­ tants who can cover classes if needed.

STEP #8: JOB DESCRIPTIONS FOR ALL EMPLOYEES

A new principal should find out if there are detailed written job descriptions for all staff positions from assistant principal to custodian. A major part of a principal’s duties is the supervision of all staff. All employees need to be aware of and have in writing their specific duties. I have already stated that a new principal should meet with all teachers. An additional part of this is meeting with all of the noncertified staff as well. Each secretary, bookkeeper, receptionist, and custodian should be made aware of his or her specific du­ ties and responsibilities. 24

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STEP #9: HIRING NEW STAFF

Most schools have some movement of personnel between the end of one school year and the start of another. Teachers retire. Teachers’ spouses get transferred. Enrollments go up. Different things happen. If a new principal is not hired until late in the summer, it can be imperative for that principal to fill vacant staff positions as quickly as possible. However, your first decisions on the hiring of personnel can affect how you are perceived as a principal. Here are some guidelines for the hiring of new teachers: 1. Hire only teachers that have the proper certification. No Child Left Behind demands this. 2. Hire experienced teachers if possible. At least try to find one who has completed student teaching. First-year teachers require a lot of direc­ tion. Hiring an experienced teacher is always a plus. 3. Always check as many references as possible, even with experienced teachers. You do not want to inherit anyone else’s problems. 4. School districts should have a personnel department that conducts an initial application process and then certifies them for hiring. 5. Do not hire someone you are not comfortable with even though he or she meets all the necessary requirements. You ultimately are the one who will have to rectify any mistakes made in the hiring process through termination or nonrenewal of contract. Always remember that you will be judged by the success of the people that you hire as principal. If you consistently hire poor teachers, your school will deteriorate, and you will be seen as a poor administrator.

STEP #10: STAFF-DEVELOPMENT DAYS

Most school districts bring teachers in for several days of staff development or in-service training before the students return for a new school year. These days are very important for a new principal. How a principal handles these first days that teachers are at school will go a long way towards establishing the professional working atmosphere that a principal wants to foster. 25

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There are several areas that need to be covered by the principal during these first days before the students come: 1. First faculty meeting: The first day that the teachers come to school, the principal needs to hold a faculty meeting with all teachers. In this meeting, the principal needs to outline the specific goals for the school for the coming year. The principal also needs to be very specific about what is expected of the teachers. It is a good idea to go through the teacher handbook and point out any changes or new items. Make sure the teachers know their duty assignments. This is one of the most im­ portant faculty meetings of the year. The principal needs to be pre­ pared. Have a script, and stick to it. At the end of this meeting, give your counselors time to talk about whatever forms have to be filled out for the start of school and hand out class rolls. Let your assistant prin­ cipal talk about discipline procedures. 2. Staff development: During the time that teachers are at school and on contract before the students arrive, many school districts start the year with several days of staff-development meetings. As a new principal, one may or may not have any say in how these meetings are set up. The school district may have a strict schedule of how these first con­ tract days are spent. Technology training, reading programs, and state testing requirements are some common topics for staff development in recent years. If you, as principal, are responsible for staff development at your school, pay attention to the following guidelines: a. Do not waste your teachers’ time. Make sure the content is rele­ vant to your school and your teachers. b. Attend as many meetings as possible. Teachers like to see their administrators in these meetings. It reinforces the importance of the training. If the principal introduces the program and leaves, it sends a message that it is a waste of time. c. Do not let teachers out of these meetings, if at all possible. Coaches are notorious for wanting to skip staff development, and sometimes this is unavoidable. It is a good idea to tape these sessions and have anyone who misses view the tape. This applies to staff development all year. Making sure that everyone partici­ pates in staff development will help teacher morale. 26

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3. Time to work in classrooms: Don’t forget that teachers need to spend time in their classrooms before school starts. Many teachers come to school before their contract starts and prepare their rooms, but many do not. Try not to overwhelm teachers with too much paperwork and staff development. Give them time to work in their rooms and get ready for students.

STEP #11: THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL

The first day that students arrive on campus is a very important day for new principals. It is very important that the first day flow smoothly. If the school is perceived as disorganized, parents, teachers, and students will think that the new principal does not know how to run a school. That perception formed on the first day of school, right or wrong, can stay with a principal a long time. It can be overcome, but will require that the principal expend a great deal of hard work, time, and energy unnecessarily. There are five elements to the first day of school at a high school: 1. Distribute class schedules to the students. 2. Get students into their regular class schedule. Depending on time lim­ itations, teachers can conduct a class orientation, hand out textbooks, and make initial assignments. 3. Feed all students lunch. It is essential to see how well the lunch sched­ ule works. 4. Get students into cars and buses and get them home. 5. Meet all of the students as soon as possible. This can be handled in several ways. You can schedule an assembly with all the students on the first day of school, or you can have several assemblies and only see one class at a time. Many schools have the means to video the princi­ pal and show it to all the classrooms at once. This is an excellent way to do things. The elementary school is very similar, except you may have to run some parents out of the building to get school started, especially with kindergarten and first-grade parents. Oftentimes, the children will be fine if the parents 27

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just let go and leave. Remember that first impressions are all-important, so be firm, but not rude.

STEP #12: EVALUATION

A principal will get feedback from a variety of sources as to how well the school year started. The superintendent of schools will certainly have an opinion, as will the students, faculty, staff, and parents. However, people of­ ten will not give a principal an honest appraisal in a one-on-one situation. It is important that the principal have an accurate gauge of his or her personal job performance. There are a variety of ways to achieve this. Ask the opinion of professional personnel in the district such as the superintendent, assistant superintendents, and curriculum supervisors. Take advantage of their pro­ fessional expertise. Hold roundtable discussions with representatives from teachers, parents, and students. You might want to survey these groups in a written form. Do whatever you are comfortable with, but find out how your initial leadership is perceived by the various communities you serve.

28

3

SPECIFIC

SCHOOL PROBLEMS

D

uring the course of a school year, a principal will have various situations that come up that are out of the ordinary school day routine. Incidents such as fights, for example, do not happen every day, but a principal must al­ ways be ready to deal with the situations as they occur. This chapter will pro­ vide a principal with a step-by-step guide for handling some specific school situations.

PROBLEM #1: HOW TO DEAL WITH FIGHTS

If you witness a fight, your first priority is to separate the two combatants. Al­ ways be aware that this can de dangerous to you personally. The last thing you need is to get injured in the process. So, even though it is your first instinct to protect the students, do not jump immediately between the students. 1. First of all, call for help. Every administrator should carry a two-way radio that can be used to summon security guards or other personnel to help break up the altercation. 2. Once help has been summoned, command the students to stop fight­ ing in as strong a voice as possible. Many students will stop at this time, but it may not be possible for them to disengage in the heat of the moment.

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3. If the students persist in fighting, try to get between the two students physically. Be reasonable about this. Breaking up two third-graders on the playground is different from trying to separate two eighteen-yearold seniors. It may be necessary to wait until help arrives. 4. Once the students are separated, get them into an area away from the main body of students in order to lessen the amount of disruption to the school as much as possible. If the fight takes place in a crowded hallway, it may be necessary to clear the hallway before moving the stu­ dents. It is always a good idea to keep the combatants physically sepa­ rated as much as possible so they do not try to fight again. If one or more of the students refuses to calm down, it may be necessary to have the police remove the student(s) from the school. 5. Once the incident is physically contained, it is time to investigate the circumstances. Start by questioning both parties. Allow each student to recount his or her side of the story. Then, question witnesses to the fight. Try to get unbiased witnesses who will tell you the truth. It is best if you have teacher witnesses because their testimony should be unbiased. 6. Once you have determined to the best of your ability what actually hap­ pened, it is time to assign punishment. Much of this will be governed by the guidelines for punishment outlined in your school’s or your district’s student handbook. State law may even mandate that certain events take place such as the notification of a local law-enforcement agency. Fighting and most other offenses usually have minimum and maximum penalties. The maximum penalty for fighting is usually nine days of out-of-school suspension. Alternative school placement is also an option. A three-day out-of-school suspension is a common punishment for a fighting incident. The principal must exercise judg­ ment as to the seriousness of the infraction. The punishment should fit the infraction. A little pushing between two students might receive some time in in-school suspension. A serious fight that causes a ma­ jor disruption of the school day must be punished with an extended suspension from school or an alternative school placement. Some ed­ ucators and parents will disagree with an out-of-school suspension. These people say that we should be about helping and educating stu­ dents, not punishing them. They are right. A suspension does not 30

SPECIFIC SCHOOL PROBLEMS

help or educate a student, and an alternative school placement would be a better option. However, the consequences are not just for the stu­ dent who committed the offense. The punishment must also send a message to the rest of the school that this type of behavior will not be tolerated. So the punishment may not be in the best interest of the stu­ dent, but it may be necessary to maintain a safe and orderly school cli­ mate. Also, if a student has any physical contact with a teacher at all, an even more severe punishment is required. Teachers must know that their personal safety is guaranteed in the school environment. If you cannot guarantee the physical safety of teachers, you cannot have school. Do not forget to seek the input of other staff members when assigning punishment. Listen to their opinions so that you examine all sides of an incident. One person may be too tough and another too le­ nient. It is also important to remember that in almost all fight situa­ tions, both parties participated. Punish both equally. Problems arise when principals punish one student and not the other. Occasionally, one student is attacked totally out of the blue and had absolutely noth­ ing to do with the incident. However, the old cliché “it takes two to tango” is usually correct. Again, both students need to be punished equally. Anything else usually leads to problems. 7. Finally, inform the parents, and remove the students from school. If the students are particularly agitated, it may be necessary to remove them immediately. Sometimes students are so belligerent that it may be necessary for law-enforcement officers to remove the students from school. In severe fighting incidents this may be your only recourse. Administrators need to ensure that the school climate returns to nor­ mal as soon as possible. The students involved in the fight do not need to be on display or in a place where they can talk to other students. Contact with others only serves to keep things stirred up. The principal’s goal is to calm things down as soon as possible. Once the parents arrive, explain to them what occurred and the actions that you took. Most of the time parents will accept your decision if both sides are treated equally. Sometimes parents will want to cause a disruption also. It may be necessary to escort a parent off of school property in this situation. Always have help nearby if needed. 31

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PROBLEM #2: HOW TO DEAL WITH DRUGS ON CAMPUS

For many years the possession, use, and sale of drugs on school campuses has been a problem across the United States. It is extremely important that principals have a plan of action for dealing with the drug problem in their schools. Some principals may claim that they do not have a drug problem in their schools. This is foolish. Every school in the country has some drugs on campus, even if only tobacco products. How the drug problem on campus is handled can affect how the community perceives the school. Schools must be perceived as proactive in preventing drug problems at school. There are several things that you can do to help alleviate the drug problems on your campus: 1. First, the administrators and teachers must be highly visible around campus. Teachers must be stationed in the hallways, parking lots, and pathways between buildings before school, after school, and during passing periods. 2. Students must be under supervision at all times. In one case at my school, the physical education instructor let students go out the back doors of the gym after class and left them unsupervised. This resulted in four students being placed in the alternative school for passing a marijuana joint around. If the students had been properly supervised, this whole incident could have been avoided. 3. Hire security guards. This is an excellent idea. The more students are supervised, the better the school atmosphere you will have. Security guards can keep drug dealers from riding through your parking lot and keep them out of your halls. Security guards can also patrol hallways during class when there are no teachers present. If your school does not have security guards, there are several alternatives for the security of hallways. You can assign teachers to hallway duty during their planning period. This works satisfactorily, but can cause teachers to be disgrun­ tled and may not be possible due to contract or accreditation conflicts. Surveillance cameras can be an effective means of hall monitoring. 4. Have local law-enforcement agencies make walk-through visits of your campus on a daily basis. This is an excellent deterrent to all kinds of crimes, not just drug use. 32

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5. Local law-enforcement agencies also have drug-sniffing dogs or pigs that can be used to search school lockers on a periodic basis. This is a good deterrent. Students don’t leave drugs in their locker, because they never know when the dog will be used. I discussed the legal ba­ sis for school searches in Practical Advice for Principals under Strat­ egy #52, “Search of a Student.” The U.S. Supreme Court in 1985 set the standard of “reasonableness under all circumstances” for school searches in the case New Jersey v. T.L.O. (Reutter, 1994, p. 762). Blanket searches of lockers on a regular basis for routine administrative purposes connected with the general welfare of the school are generally permissible, more clearly so if students are notified of the practice at the time lockers are assigned. Using dogs trained to detect contraband to sniff lockers, desks, or cars does not violate the Fourth Amendment, but al­ lowing the dogs to sniff students’ persons is constitutional only upon “in­ dividualized reasonable suspicion” (Reutter, 1994, p. 763). The court cases to back this up are Zamara v. Pomeroy 1981, Com­ monwealth v. Lang 1990, and Horton v. Goose Creek ISD 1994 (Reut­ ter, 1994). 6. In the course of a normal school year, you may at some point find some unidentified drugs, either prescription or nonprescription. It is a good idea to have a Physicians Desk Reference (PDR) or a Drug Identifica­ tion Bible on hand to help identify unknown drugs. There is no sense in calling in the police over generic ibuprofen or acetaminophen. However, many school districts choose to punish students for drug in­ fractions, even if they are only representing an innocent substance as an illegal drug. For example, a student tries to sell a student a powder that he represents as cocaine, when it is actually a headache powder. Many school districts would punish the student just as if the substance had actually been an illegal drug. I personally find the PDR to be a lit­ tle unwieldy. I like to use the Drug Identification Bible since it is smaller, more compact, and easier to use. PROBLEM #3: HOW TO DEAL WITH PROBLEM STUDENTS

In most schools in the United States, the majority of students go to school and behave in a reasonable manner. However, in every school there is a small 33

CHAPTER 3

minority of students who want to disrupt the normal routine of the school day by causing some type of discipline problem. It is the principal’s respon­ sibility to ensure that there is a safe and orderly environment for children to learn in. The school district should have a standard discipline policy for all of the schools in the district. There are several ways to deal with discipline problems. The first way is to set up a series of punishments for common offenses. It is important to have a variety of punishments to deal with different types of offenses. Lee Canter would say that there also should be rewards for positive actions (Canter, 2001). This is the idea of assertive discipline, which has been very popular in education circles over the last twenty years and is still being used in many areas. The following are some common forms of punishments: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

Corporal punishment Writing assignments Break detentions After-school detentions Saturday detentions In-school suspensions Out-of-school suspensions Expulsion Alternative school placement

Corporal punishment is a controversial topic in the United States in and of itself. The practice is banned completely in over half of the states in this country. However, it is still used on a daily basis in many schools. This basic conflict is exemplified by the following differing views. At some time or another, most children in the United States experience corporal punishment, such as spanking, without suffering harmful effects on their behav­ ior or mental health. However, studies conducted over the past sixty-two years in­ dicate that the more often and the more harshly parents resort to physical repri­ mands, the more likely their kids are to become aggressive, delinquent, and depressed, contends psychologist Elizabeth T. Gershoff of Columbia University. In the absence of any reports of any long-term benefit to behavior from corporal punishment, “we as psychologists cannot possibly recommend its use,” she concludes (“Corporal punishment,” 2002, p. 77). 34

SPECIFIC SCHOOL PROBLEMS

The American Academy of Pediatrics urges parents, educators, school admin­ istrators, school board members, and others to seek the legal prohibition by all states of corporal punishment in schools and to encourage the use of alterna­ tive methods of managing student behavior (“Corporal punishment,” 2000, p. 343).

However, corporal punishment is still legal in twenty-three states (“Spanking,” 2001, p. 103). Also, U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell tried to get a law passed in 2001 that would ban educators from being sued for using corporal punishment and said that local school boards should decide whether to paddle (Boser, 2001). This sentiment was part of the background for the Elementary and Sec­ ondary Education Act signed by George W. Bush in January of 2002. Under the Teacher Liability Act . . . school officials are exempt from legal lia­ bility for any harm their punishments cause students, as long as the actions fall within the boundaries of federal and state laws and don’t constitute a violent crime (“Bush signs laws,” 2002, p. 5).

Should you use corporal punishment at your school? First of all, is it legal in your state? Second, are you comfortable with it? Third, is the community comfortable with it? If the answer to any of these questions is no, do not use it. I have worked in communities where it is expected that principals will use corporal punishment to this day. I have also testified in a case where a teacher was accused of assault after bruising a child with a paddle. That teacher was acquitted and was elected to the town council shortly thereafter. Decisions of this nature are most likely made by the school board or state government.

PROBLEM #4: HOW TO DEAL WITH PROBLEM TEACHERS

Teachers make up a major ingredient of every school in the country. Good teachers can compensate for many other deficiencies in schools. I have talked about the need to hire high-quality instructors as part of what it takes to be perceived as a high-quality principal. However, there will come a time in a principal’s career when he or she will be desperate to find someone to fill a classroom position. I have had teachers quit the day before school started. 35

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When a principal gets into a situation like that, the person that is hired on such short notice may work out well or may become the principal’s worst nightmare. You never know what you will get at the last minute. It is a crapshoot. Most of the quality teachers will already have jobs. Also, when a principal takes over a new school, he or she will inherit problem teachers from the last principal. Teachers are human, just like everyone else. Many people lose sight of that for some reason. Not every employee of any company is a quality em­ ployee. In any given school, you will have poor teachers, mediocre teachers, good teachers, and great teachers. Teachers that will cause the principal problems generally fall into four categories: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Teachers who are weak in instruction Teachers who cannot discipline Teachers who do not fulfill their responsibilities Teachers who do inappropriate things

The key to dealing with all problem teachers is constant supervision by the principal. This cannot be stressed enough. The principal has to be in the hallways and in the classroom on a daily basis. The principal must be ob­ serving what teachers are and are not doing as much as possible. The larger a school is, the more difficult this is for a supervising principal and the greater the call for delegation of some responsibilities to subordinate admin­ istrators. Teacher supervision is a primary duty of principals. Teachers who are weak in the area of classroom instruction often do not spend enough “time on task.” It is the principal’s responsibility to determine which teachers are not using instruction time wisely and then instruct them on the proper way to fill a class period. Often this is a planning problem and the principal can address this by discussing the teacher’s lesson plans in a one-on-one conference. Teachers who are weak in the area of classroom discipline also often do not spend enough time on task. Again, this is something the principal needs to address. Often a teacher’s problems with discipline can be corrected by utilizing every minute of every class period for instruction. If a teacher uses time wisely and still has discipline problems, the problem could be the way the teacher deals with students on a personal basis or, in some cases, a teacher may have some of that small minority of students who are incorrigi­ 36

SPECIFIC SCHOOL PROBLEMS

ble and will not behave for anyone. However, good teachers rarely have dis­ cipline problems, and they teach all kinds of children. Again it is the principal’s responsibility to help teachers be successful. That is an integral part of the principal’s role. The principal can try several tactics to help teachers with time on task and classroom discipline: 1. Assign teachers a mentor teacher. 2. Provide one-on-one instruction by the principal or a curriculum specialist. 3. Provide professional development for these teachers. For classroom management skills, I am partial to the Wongs’ The First Days of School (1998). If teachers do not improve after receiving help and professional develop­ ment, then it is time for their evaluations to reflect their poor performance and eventually for nonrenewal of their contract or their dismissal. Teachers who do not carry out their assigned responsibilities must be dealt with in a different manner. In this case I am talking about teachers who are late to work on a consistent basis, teachers who do not cover their as­ signed duty posts, teachers who do not keep up with student records in a professional and timely manner, and teachers who fail to get work done on time. It is the principal’s responsibility, first of all, to inform these teachers verbally of their unacceptable behavior. If the behavior continues after a ver­ bal warning, it is time to issue a written reprimand and place it in the teacher’s personnel file. An example of this is a teacher who is constantly late for work. Warn that teacher verbally and then in written form. If the behav­ ior persists, other actions need to follow, such as suspension from work with­ out pay. What the principal in these situations is doing is establishing grounds for nonrenewal of contract or dismissal. Teachers, as I have said earlier, are human beings and sometimes do things that cannot be supported by the principal. I always tell teachers that I will support them as long as they are acting in a reasonable manner and in the best interests of the child. Some teachers feel that the principal should al­ ways back the teachers no matter what, simply because they are the teachers. As a general rule the principal should support a teacher strongly, but only if he or she is in the right. 37

CHAPTER 3

There are three standards that I use for teacher conduct: legality, district policy, and reasonableness. I always instruct my teachers to act in a reason­ able manner. This is a good topic for a staff-development meeting early in the school year. The following is an example of a teacher acting in an unreason­ able manner. A student tells a teacher as he comes into class that his science project is in his locker and asks permission to go get it. The teacher tells the student that he will be tardy if he leaves the class and to sit down. The teacher then proceeds to give the student a zero on the project because it was not turned in. This was extremely unreasonable in my opinion, and I in­ structed the teacher to allow the student to turn in the project. I also told that particular teacher that I did not agree with her actions and I would not sup­ port or defend such an unreasonable action. The principal must correct teachers when they are wrong or the integrity of the school and the principal is tarnished. If a teacher does something illegal, it is the principal’s responsibility to re­ port it to the proper authorities, possibly to suspend the teacher from duty, and ultimately to terminate the teacher if necessary. Always consult the school district’s attorney in situations like this. If a teacher violates school policy, this can also be grounds for nonrenewal of contract or dismissal. A principal’s main concern is to facilitate the learning of all of the students at his or her school. One of the best ways to ensure this is to hire good, qual­ ity teachers (Snow, 2003). My point here is, if a teacher continues to cause the principal problems once shown the error of his or her ways, the best so­ lution is to get rid of that teacher. The bottom line is, teachers must perform their duties in a reasonable manner or move on.

PROBLEM #5: HOW TO DEAL WITH BOMB THREATS

Bomb threats have been a problem in schools for many years and have taken on a new urgency since the terrorist attacks of 2001. However the advent of caller ID systems has done a great deal to alleviate this problem. The follow­ ing are some strategies that should be useful in dealing with this problem: 1. Purchase a caller ID phone system for your school. Some of these sys­ tems will not accept calls where the number is blocked. Talk to your 38

SPECIFIC SCHOOL PROBLEMS

local phone company and police force to help determine the best way to trace calls. I was involved in a situation where a bomb threat was made from a pay phone. The number was traced and the local police chief just happened to have noticed someone making a call on that pay phone while he was stopped getting his morning coffee. An arrest was made in a matter of minutes. 2. Have a section for dealing with a bomb threat in your crisis management plan. This should include an evacuation plan for students and all school personnel. There should be teachers and staff assigned to mon­ itor students during the evacuation and any time spent out of class. Some students will see this as a wonderful opportunity to skip school. Do not forget to make arrangements for students on crutches or in wheelchairs. Part of this plan should include how to cooperate with lo­ cal law-enforcement agencies in the actual searching of the school buildings. 3. Do not touch any device that you find in your school that resembles a bomb in any way. Let law enforcement handle that type of situation. I saw a principal pick up a fake device, and I think it contributed greatly to my hair turning gray. For more information on how to deal with a bomb threat, an interactive CD­ ROM training aid is available from the U.S. Department of Education in co­ operation with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. This can be found at www.ed.gov. Bomb threats can happen at any school in any part of the country. According to the Associated Press, Biddeford (Maine) High School was evacuated, leading to the discovery of a homemade explosive device in a student’s backpack. The bomb was made from firecrackers and gunpowder. Police were motivated to evacuate and search the school by tips from other students. The student has been suspended and faces possible expulsion as well as criminal charges of terrorizing and possession of explosives (“News updates,” 2002, p. 6).

Deal with these types of cases severely. Students must know there will be severe consequences for these types of actions. The courts have upheld lengthy suspensions even for threats. 39

CHAPTER 3

A fifteen-year-old male student wrote a note that stated “There is a bomb in this school bang bang!!” and left it on a table in art class. According to the stu­ dent the note was written as a joke for two girls in his art class and he forgot to throw it away after class. The United States District Court, M.D. Pennsyl­ vania held that the student’s ten day suspension did not violate his procedural due process rights despite absence of reference to terroristic threats in student handbook (Purvis, 2002a, p. 1).

Was the punishment excessive? Maybe, but this case illustrates the serious­ ness with which we must take these types of threats these days.

PROBLEM #6: HOW TO DEAL WITH CHEERLEADERS

Many people have seen reports of crazed cheerleader moms in the media. There was even a TV movie about a case in Texas where a cheerleader mom tried to hire a hit man so her daughter could make the cheerleader squad. That is an extreme case, but there are more problems associated with cheer­ leading than any other extracurricular activity. I knew one principal who re­ signed from his job over a cheerleader problem. This principal suspended some cheerleaders for drinking alcohol before a game, and the school board overruled his decision and reinstated the cheerleaders so they could cheer at the ball game on Friday night. I have been overruled myself in a cheerleader situation. I will explain that incident as I discuss strategies that will enable principals to avoid cheerleader problems. 1. Draw up a constitution with all rules and regulations pertaining to cheer­ leaders. This is a crucial point. If you are a new principal, make sure there is such a document and then look over it. You might want to compare it to the one used by neighboring schools. Treat this document just like you would the student handbook. Constantly revise the rules to help with any problems that arise. Eventually, you will have a very workable document. Here are some things to look for in a cheerleader constitution. a. Eligibility: Make sure that eligibility standards are covered. Is there a grade point requirement? Be careful of residency requirements. Some cheerleader constitutions contain a phrase saying that the 40

SPECIFIC SCHOOL PROBLEMS

child must have attended the school for which he or she is trying out for the full previous school year. This is designed to keep some­ one from moving in and making the cheerleader squad. This rule caused me to be overruled by the school board, which is not some­ thing principals need to have happen on a regular basis. I think it undermines the principal’s authority. The situation was this. A child’s parents divorced and the child left school and moved with one of the parents. The child moved back in a matter of weeks. I al­ lowed the child to try out, and she made the squad. The parents of the child with the next lowest score appealed to the school board saying that I had not followed the rules and had kept their daugh­ ter from becoming a cheerleader. The school board added an addi­ tional slot, so the child who appealed was added to the squad, and said that the residency requirement should be changed. 2. Cheerleader sponsors: Be careful whom you hire as cheerleader spon­ sors. Cheerleader sponsors can cause problems for themselves and the principal. I inherited one cheerleader sponsor with a bad habit of making sarcastic remarks to students. This sponsor made an offhand remark about a student “not making the squad anyway.” When the stu­ dent did not make the squad, her parents were incensed. The sponsor left my school for another district the following year because she felt I had not supported her in front of the parents. I did not strongly sup­ port her because I thought her remarks had been inappropriate to say the least. Coupled with the nonselection of the child, it gave an ap­ pearance of impropriety that I could not defend. 3. Tryouts. Be sure to do the following: a. Hold cheerleader tryouts on the last day of school before spring break or the Saturday after you get out. Then, post the results on the school door and do not answer your phone for a week. By the time you get back from spring break, hopefully everyone will have gotten over who did or did not make it. Remember, it is not the students who cause the most problems. It is the parents. b. Have outside judges from one of the two major cheerleader or­ ganizations, the Universal Cheerleader Association (UCA) or the National Cheerleader Association (NCA), conduct the try­ outs to remove all questions of bias from the judging process. 41

CHAPTER 3

c. Do not let anyone try out by videotape. I had this happen. A stu­ dent wanted to leave early for vacation with her parents and wanted to submit a videotape of the tryout routine to the judges. The criticism of this is that the student could do the routine over and over again until it was as good as it could possibly be. This would constitute an unfair advantage. d. As principal, stay out of the cheerleader tryout process as much as possible. The more you are personally involved, the greater the chance of problems. Do not tally scores. Do not do anything. Hire good sponsors, and let them do it.

PROBLEM #7: HOW TO DEAL WITH EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES IN GENERAL

Supervision of extracurricular activities takes up a great deal of a principal’s nights and weekends. A principal often works a five-day workweek, in addi­ tion to putting in three or four nights’ duty at ball games or other functions that require the principal’s attendance. Ball games are not the only extracur­ ricular activities at a typical school. The following is a partial list of ex­ tracurricular activities on the high school level that may require a sponsor and at least some involvement by the principal: Concert choir

Sports booster clubs (Diamond Club, etc.)

Student council

Beta Club or National Honor Society

School paper

Yearbook

Prom committee

Future Farmers of America (FFA)

Drama club

Quiz bowl team

Parent Teacher Association (PTA)

On the elementary school level, there are not nearly as many extracurricular activities to supervise. The PTA is still important at most elementary schools, 42

SPECIFIC SCHOOL PROBLEMS

and there are a few programs to put on such as the Christmas show. This is min­ imal compared to high school activities and is one of the reasons elementary school principals make less money than secondary school principals. I have already discussed how to split these duties among different admin­ istrators, but there are other things the principal needs to do concerning ex­ tracurricular activities: 1. Hire the best sponsor that you can find. Oftentimes principals force new teachers to take on extra duties as a requirement for being hired. Older, more experienced teachers many times do not want to sponsor the student council or be a class sponsor because of the extra hours in­ volved, often for little or no pay. Forcing new teachers to take on extra duties can be a positive thing in that you get sponsors who are still new to the profession, have new ideas, and still have the energy and enthu­ siasm to handle these extracurricular activities. Assigning extracurric­ ular activities to young teachers can also make them better teachers be­ cause it helps them relate to the students in different ways. Forcing young teachers to take on additional duties can also be negative in that you are turning over important duties to untested and inexperienced personnel. However, principals sometimes do not have any choice but to force these duties on young teachers, especially if they have a school with many experienced teachers who have been at that school for a long time. Many of these teachers feel that they have done their share and it’s time to let the newer teachers take their turn. Some of this is probably justified, but I believe all teachers must do their share of ex­ tracurricular activities. 2. Pay your sponsors as well as you can. The more attractive the salary, the easier it is to find someone to take on the additional responsibility and workload. 3. Develop a general extracurricular-activities handbook for the district and for each individual group. This can include regulations for such things as eligibility, codes of conduct, attendance, and even drug testing (some schools drug-test athletes and students in extracurricular activi­ ties). Make sure that you have specific rules of conduct governing trips of any kind away from school, whether the football team is traveling to a game thirty miles down the road or the concert choir is going to Europe. It is also important that sponsors know what is acceptable behavior and 43

CHAPTER 3

what is not. As a principal and assistant principal in charge of disci­ pline, I have had to deal with students fighting, drinking, mooning other students and teachers, having sex on a tour bus, and being al­ lowed by a sponsor to go unsupervised to a college fraternity party. The last one caused no end of trouble because one student was sus­ pended, which caused that student to not be valedictorian. That stu­ dent had a relative on the school board, as did the student who even­ tually became valedictorian. The mooning incident involved one of my football players dropping his pants and mooning a restaurant full of people. Believe me, spending time outlining rules of behavior for trips to sponsors and students will not eliminate all of these problems. Kids will be kids, but it will deter some problems and make the others easier to deal with if the rules are made clear up front. Extracurricular activities greatly enhance a school’s academic program and school climate in general. Ask any principal in the country: if the football team does well, the school year starts well. So, it behooves principals to get the best people to sponsor these programs, and supervising these programs is a large segment of a principal’s responsibility. The community also judges principals on how well extracurricular activities are handled at their school.

44

4

DEALING

WITH DIVERSITY

IN THE CLASSROOM

O

ne thing that sets the United States apart from other nations is the di­ versity of our population. We are a nation built on immigration and the population continues to become more diverse with each census. One of the challenges facing principals in the coming years is how to deal with the changing school population. And yet—no question about it—we also take enormous pride in the diversity of our public schools. Why? Because our schools refuse to exclude: we insist on including any child from the most gifted to the most challenging. Because we know that teaching young people to cooperate and excel in a diverse setting is a hugely important lesson in and of itself. And because our public schools are one of the few remaining institutions that bring together Americans of all colors, classes, cultures, and faiths . . . diversity is not easy. But when it works—when students and educators seize on diversity as a strength—we have a superior, “real world,” learning environment (Chase, 2000, p. 5).

Of course American public schools have not always been as diverse as they have become in recent years. For many years segregation of schools was the law of the land in the United States. The United States Supreme Court ruled in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896 that separate-but-equal schools were consti­ tutional. This led to entirely separate school systems (one white and one black) in many states, especially in the South. The Supreme Court did not reverse this decision until 1954 in the case of Brown v. Topeka Board of Education, which said separate-but-equal schools were unconstitutional. Integration, or 45

CHAPTER 4

desegregation, soon followed, but the process took many years to implement and was marked by some major incidents during the integration of Little Rock Central, Ole Miss, and the University of Alabama. Hopefully, we have put a lot of the problems of race relations behind us in the past couple of decades, but there are still issues to be resolved such as the use of affirmative action at insti­ tutions of higher education. However, it is not only in our nation’s colleges and universities that there are problems over diversity. Take the San Francisco school district for example: the district instituted a diversity index to diversify the student population of its schools to comply with a federal court desegrega­ tion order. The Asian American community is up in arms because they say this is forcing their children to attend schools clear across town. The school district superintendent has even been threatened with physical violence (Hoff, 2003). This is San Francisco, not the Deep South of the 1960s, but problems with di­ versity and race still affect our country. With the diversity of learners in today’s schools, the importance of knowing who these students are and how they learn is one of the most critical factors emerging as we become a global society. No matter how difficult the chal­ lenges of diversity, every student in school has a right to a teacher who under­ stands his or her needs and knows how to move students along the pathway of learning (Holm and Horn, 2003, p. 26).

As principal, what can you do to foster a climate that is conducive to learning for all segments of society represented in our schools? 1. One of the most important things that you as principal can do is to con­ stantly model the type of behavior towards all groups of students in school that you want your teachers and students to emulate. Be tolerant and accepting of all groups represented on your staff, in your student body, and in the community. Treat everyone with dignity and respect from the poorest welfare recipient to the president of the local bank. Prin­ cipals get into trouble in communities where they favor one group over another. People are not stupid. They tend to recognize pretty easily when a principal is showing favoritism towards one group or another. The prin­ cipal must not only talk the talk, but also walk the walk when it comes to diversity. In other words your actions must speak as loudly as your words. 46

DEALING WITH DIVERSITY IN THE CLASSROOM

2.

3.

4.

5.

I started my education career as an assistant football coach in a small Southern town. My boss at the time told me if you are truly prejudiced, you need to find another line of work and that still holds true today. Keep diversity in mind when it is time to hire teachers. Before anyone gets offended, I am not talking quotas or anything like that. What I am saying is this. If you have an opening, keep in mind the makeup of your staff as you search for someone to fill the position. Every group repre­ sented in your school population should have a representative on your staff. This is simply smart. Every group needs positive role models to emulate and look up to. Make sure that your teachers are aware that different racial and ethnic groups may need different instructional strategies. African American and Hispanic students prefer learning environments that are student centered, those where small-group and hands-on activities are in­ cluded, and those that include provisions for information exchange with peers (Kuykendall, 1992; Poirot and Canales, 1993). Students from Asian cultures tend to be auditory learners who learn best through lecture and discussion (Morgan, 2002, p. 269). Be prepared to deal with language problems. One of the problems as­ sociated with the large influx of Hispanic students into the Southeast in recent years is lack of a proficiency in English. There are several ways to deal with this. You can hire English-as-a-second-language (ESL) teachers, or you may want to try some alternatives. There are free translation services available on the Internet such as AltaVista Babel Fish (babelfish.altavista.com). There are also fee-based transla­ tion services available on the Web such as ProTranslations (www. protranslations.com) and Tolocalise (www.tolocalise.com). Universal Translator 2000 is available on CD-ROM (Morgan, 2002). I have had some success with charitable organizations providing interpreters free of charge when I have had to deal with parents who did not speak English. Catholic Charities provided me with a Vietnamese inter­ preter at one time. Promote activities that help students of different races work together. According to a study by James Moody at Ohio State University, “school practices regarding academic tracking, extracurricular activities, and student mixing by grade can help promote friendships among students 47

CHAPTER 4

of different races” (“Cultivating friendships,” p. 14). Once cross-racial friendships are formed, much of your battle over diversity is ended. Research shows that student participation in cocurricular activities is reflected in improved academic achievement. But, students who are struggling to do well academically are not always able or willing to take on the added commitment of participating in student activities. Often students are intimidated by the “cliques” that may have already formed around student organizations and are reluctant to try and join in. . . . One way to help students feel more accepted is through activities that provide a sense of “home.” Culture related clubs are a mainstay of mid­ dle schools and high schools that even have a slightly diverse popula­ tion. These clubs provide a link to the culture the students left. For ex­ ample, Brooklyn Technical High School, in Brooklyn, New York, which enrolls more than four thousand students coming from a wide variety of backgrounds, offers such activities as the Fuego-Latino club, the Chinese Chess Club, the Chinese Culture Club, the Dominican Club, the Indian Culture Club, the Italian Culture Club, the Korean Culture Club, the Muslim Student Organization, the Persian Asian Connection Club, and the Russian Culture Club (George, 2002, p. 25).

6. Focus on dealing with diversity in the classroom in staff development sessions. “Diversity can take many forms such as development, cul­ ture, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation” (Manning, 2002, p. 75). These are some of the topics that you might want to consider for staff development at your school. Just a few years ago, school adminis­ trators did not think about dealing with gay and lesbian issues in the school, but you must today. 7. Make this a part of your evaluation process. In Practical Advice for Principals, I talked about asking teachers what they had done for their students. As part of the evaluation process, ask teachers how they have dealt with diversity in their classrooms. Teachers take something more seriously when they know they will be evaluated on it. As with many other aspects of a school, it is the principal’s responsibility that all students are given an equal opportunity to learn (Growe et al., 2002).

48

5

WORKING WITH

SPECIAL-NEEDS

STUDENTS

O

ne aspect of being a principal is that you are totally responsible for your school (Snow, 2003). A corollary of that premise is that you are totally responsible for all of the students in your school. In chapter 4 we talked about working with different ethnic and cultural groups. In this chapter, we will discuss working with special education students. “Successfully dealing with special education students has long been a challenge for principals, who must balance the requirements of special needs students, teachers, and par­ ents with the interests of the rest of the members of the school community” (Conrad and Whitaker, 1997). This is something principals must deal with on a daily basis due to the fact that 11 percent of the school population in 1999 was made up of special-needs students (U.S. Department of Educa­ tion, 2000). With the advent of No Child Left Behind legislation, states will have to deal with special-needs students also. The Bush administration plan would put a premium on accountability for results and could potentially link IDEA [Individuals with Disabilities Education Act] funding to the ability of states and localities to demonstrate measurable gains by disabled students (“Reauthorizing IDEA,” 2003, p. 5).

The first step to having a successful program at your school for specialneeds students is to hire the best special education teacher that you can find. I discussed the importance of hiring high-quality teachers in general in Prac­ tical Advice for Principals, and the same holds true for special education

49

CHAPTER 5

teachers. Robert Pasternack, the assistant secretary for special education for the United States Department of Education, had this to say on March 14, 2002: “Having highly qualified personnel is imperative to providing quality education in special education” (“Pasternack says,” 2002). It has been my ex­ perience that special education teachers are either extremely good teachers or extremely poor ones. There seems to be no middle ground. Either they are great or they are terrible. As principal, take your time and hire the best possi­ ble candidate. However, hiring a quality special education teacher may be harder than hiring a regular education teacher. There just are not enough peo­ ple with the proper certification to go around. The special education teacher shortage has been well documented in recent years. Arizona received federal money in 2003 to help with their statewide special education teacher short­ age (“Reauthorizing IDEA,” 2003). In 2002, the city of Chicago had 340 spe­ cial education positions unfilled (“Pasternack says,” 2002). Maryland was re­ ported as having a severe shortage of special education teachers in 2001 (“Maryland schools,” 2001). A principal also needs to develop a good working relationship with the district special education director and the local site coordinator. The last thing you need is to have an adversarial relationship with special education professionals. You also need to have access to a lawyer who is well versed in handling special education problems. The school district’s lawyer may not be a special education expert, but he or she should be able to recommend a firm that is, or you can inquire whom other districts use. Another key step is for the principal to have a knowledge base of the char­ acteristics of special learners. Principals should have some basic knowledge of the following: 1. The impact of disabilities on student performance 2. Referral to placement procedures 3. Management of records and confidentiality for special-needs students 4. Discipline procedures for special-needs students (Goor and Schwenn, 1997, p. 133–134) Discipline can be a problem for principals in dealing with special educa­ tion students. According to state and federal law, principals cannot treat a regular education student and a special education student the same when it 50

WORKING WITH SPECIAL-NEEDS STUDENTS

comes to discipline. First of all, you cannot suspend a special education child from school unless that child poses a danger to him- or herself or to others. Second, even if the child is dangerous, the school district must still provide that child with a free, appropriate public education. Therefore, it is important to have a good working relationship with the special education staff. Special education teachers need to deal with as many discipline prob­ lems in the classroom as they can. At the same time, it is important that these teachers feel supported by their principal. My philosophy in dealing with special education students and discipline is that if the teacher brings it to me, I will deal with it. Part of that is, if you do not want me to take action, do not bring it to me. There are some students who should not be in a public school setting due to a history of violent behavior. If those students are special edu­ cation students, even if you expel them, the school district must pay to pro­ vide a free, appropriate public education. It is also a good idea to get legal consultation when drafting rules and regulations dealing with discipline and special education students. Federal and state laws sometimes differ, and seeking legal advice beforehand can save problems at a later date. In the 1990s and now in the first decade of the twenty-first century, there are several issues that principals will have to deal with regarding special ed­ ucation besides hiring the best possible teachers. The first of these is the trend or push to include special education or special-needs students in the mainstream of regular education. I am using the two buzzwords used to re­ fer to this movement: inclusion and mainstreaming. Inclusion, or main­ streaming, means the placement of special education students in regular ed­ ucation classes or the least restrictive environment as the law says. This has been the trend since the passage of IDEA in 1990 (Henning and Mitchell, 2002). My experience in working with special-needs students and teachers has made me a firm believer in this process. This opinion puts me in line with the thinking of many principals in this country. However, some re­ searchers do not agree. Lerner (1997) noted that the nationwide prevalence of general education placements for students with learning disabilities—the largest group of stu­ dents with mild disabilities—increased 95 percent in the five-year span from 1987–1988 to 1992–1993. However, recent research has indicated that inclusive placements are not frequently associated with, nor are they conducive to, improved outcomes for students with mild disabilities (Baker 51

CHAPTER 5

and Zigmond, 1995; Ochoa and Alvarez, 1995; Zigmond and Baker, 1990; Zigmond et al., 1995). Paradoxically, it appears that inclusion reforms are being implemented with increasing frequency despite findings that have not generally documented desired or appropriate outcomes. Kaufman, Gerber, and Semmel (1988) recommended caution regarding inclusion due to, among other reasons, lack of support among those charged with its imple­ mentation. Positive attitudes of key personnel were seen as critical prereq­ uisites for successful inclusion ( Cook, Semmel, and Gerber, 1999; Horne, 1985; Semmel, 1986; Villa et al., 1996). Special education students, regular education students, special education teachers, and regular education teachers all benefit from inclusion. I have seen good results from special education and regular education teachers teamteaching in the same classroom. However, like anything else one does in edu­ cation, before you jump into an inclusion program, some groundwork needs to be laid. One of the biggest problems with inclusion programs initially was that there was little preparation for teachers working together. Regular education teachers did not know anything about special education, and special education teachers new little about regular education. This can lead to a situation in which the special education teacher turns into the regular education teacher’s assistant. That is not what inclusion and team-teaching is all about. Teachers should collaborate on planning, teaching methods, and the assessment of stu­ dents. Teaching duties should be shared. In one middle school in Connecti­ cut, the special education teacher in an inclusion class is responsible for indi­ vidual instruction for all students and does some whole-class activities ( Jehlen, 2002). Researchers at Pennsylvania State worked with preservice teachers and developed a teacher preparation model that helped both regular and special education teachers feel comfortable in an inclusion setting (Henning and Mitchell, 2002). Principals need to plan various training activities for regular and special education teachers if they are going to work together to educate all of our children, which should be our primary goal. There is too much to be gained from inclusion for it not to work because of a lack of training. Another very viable reason to move towards teaching all students in the same classroom is that we may have to measure special education students against the same standards as regular education students. California is al­ ready working to align special education standards with the California Con­ tent Standards (Youtsey, 2003). The parents of special education students for 52

WORKING WITH SPECIAL-NEEDS STUDENTS

the most part want their children to be treated more like regular education students. A recent survey conducted by Phi Delta Kappan found that 79 per­ cent of special education parents want schools to pay more attention to aca­ demic progress for their children and 82 percent want their children to grad­ uate from high school with a diploma ( Johnson, 2002b). Is there any good news for principals about special education? Yes, there is. The Kappan survey goes on to say this: In many respects, parents of special-needs students give public schools good marks for their efforts. For example, 67% say that their current school is doing a good job or an excellent job giving their own child the help he or she needs. Eight in ten say that their child’s special education teachers really care about him or her “as a person,” and almost seven in ten (69%) say the special educa­ tion teachers know a lot about their child’s disability and how to work with it. While there is definitely a frustrated and vocal minority of parents with serious complaints—and most school administrators have encountered some of them—most special ed parents voice a great deal of satisfaction with and con­ fidence in their child’s program ( Johnson, 2002b, p. 161).

So we must already be doing some things right in this area. As a final word in this chapter, what can principals do to create a better learning environment for special education students? 1. Hire the best special education teachers that you can find. 2. Develop a good working relationship with district special education personnel. It has been my experience that these people will have for­ gotten more about special education than you will ever know. If you listen to them, they will keep you out of trouble. 3. Make sure that you, the principal, have a working knowledge base in reference to special education. 4. Find out what your district and school are doing to include special education students in the regular classroom. Once you have done that, see what you can do to facilitate the process. 5. Find out where you stand on testing special-needs students. Who has to be tested? What accommodations can be made? How are these stu­ dents being prepared?

53

6

DISCIPLINE AND

SCHOOL SAFETY

T

he day started much like any other day at my high school on Septem­ ber 11, 2001, but by the time the day was over, the world had changed forever. I received a phone call from a parent who told me to turn on the news, shortly after school got started. Once I found out what was happening, I told the students as much as I knew about the terrorist attack. We then had a moment of silent reflection. As the day continued, I did my best to keep the students informed of the events taking place. In the aftermath of these attacks, school leaders began to assess how these events would change how we all looked at school safety. There was already a strong movement to improve school safety that had started after the school shooting incidents at the Columbine and Pearl high schools. The terrorist at­ tacks of September 11, 2001, served as a further impetus for schools to im­ prove their safety measures. The discovery of terrorist-training videotapes showing al Qaeda ter­ rorists actually practicing attacks on school classrooms in Afghanistan in 2001 drove home the fact that schools must be aware of and prepared for terrorist attacks (“What the numbers say,” 2003). There has been some progress in protecting our schools from these new threats, but there is still room for improvement. Fully 95 percent of members surveyed by the National Association of School Resource Officers say their facilities are still vulnerable to terror­ ism. In addition to lax security, resource officers blamed a lack of support,

54

DISCIPLINE AND SCHOOL SAFETY

training and workable crisis plans. Of the 658 officers surveyed, 83 percent said their schools are easy to get into, 55 percent said the school crisis plan needs work, 52 percent noted the plans were untested, and 74 percent claimed their schools fail to effectively educate and inform parents about campus safety, security and crisis planning issues (“What the numbers say,” 2003, p. 8).

In Practical Advice for Principals, I outlined seven strategies for dealing with school safety: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Have a crisis management plan in place. Have your school evaluated for safety. Enclose your school as much as possible. Consider school uniforms. Consider school ID badges. Be prepared to deal with a student with a weapon. Be prepared to deal with the search of a student.

All of these items are still valid. The crisis management plan took on new im­ portance after September 11, 2001, because the contingencies for terroristtype attacks had to be addressed. One of the benefits for schools to come out of this heightened awareness of security on the national level is that the fed­ eral government has stepped in to help states and school districts with plan­ ning and funding for crisis management and school safety. U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige had this to say about crisis management plans: “I know how important emergency planning is. Schools are part of the community. They must be part of the community’s emergency plan. If you don’t have a plan, get one. If you have one practice it” (Rubelen, 2003, p. 17). The following are excerpts from the crisis management plan model that can be found at www.ed.gov/emergencyplan: 1. Conduct an assessment of each building. 2. Coordinate the plan with the surrounding community. 3. Have a plan for controlling traffic to and from the school building in case of emergency. 4. Make sure the buildings are not obscured by shrubbery. 55

CHAPTER 6

5. 6. 7. 8.

Have multiple evacuation routes and rallying points. Practice. Have a plan for dismissing students. Coordinate everything with local law enforcement (“Emergency plan­ ning,” 2003).

Bioterrorism is one threat schools need to prepare for that was unthink­ able before the terrorist attacks of 2001. With at least one death related to anthrax-causing bacteria delivered through mail, this is something that all schools need to be aware of and plan for (Spake et al., 2003). All schools need to incorporate provisions for chemical and biological situations into their crisis management plans. Since many schools have already developed crisis management plans, it should be relatively easy to add plans for chemi­ cal and biological terror attacks (Bowman, 2001). The Indiana Department of Education has an excellent document entitled “Checklist Items for a Safe and Secure School Environment.” The following are some of the items listed in this document: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Identify CPR and first aid trained personnel at your school. Coordinate with local emergency medical personnel. Assign school personnel to record injuries. Assign a school representative to be stationed at the hospital to assist parents of the injured.

This is an excellent checklist and can be found at www.ideanet.doe.in.us/ safeschools/checklist03.html. Some other bioterrorism “plans involve stock­ ing food and water, practicing lockdowns, drafting plans for emergency pick­ ups, and herding kids into windowless rooms” (Springen, 2003, p. 9). The Los Angeles Unified School District is practicing different scenarios that would call for students to be locked down at school. Sheltering-in-place, which is likely to be a school’s response to a chemical or biological attack, can also involve shutting down all heating and air-conditioning systems and sealing vents and cracks around windows and doors with plastic sheeting and duct tape [this was a controversial statement]. . . . [B]eyond ter­ rorism, accidental chemical spills or police manhunts in neighborhoods sur­

56

DISCIPLINE AND SCHOOL SAFETY

rounding schools are also cases in which a school might be advised by local law-enforcement agencies to have children and adults locked in a school ( Ja­ cobson, 2003, p. 6).

It is a also a good idea to contact the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia, or your state emergency management agency to see what role the school would play in a chemical or biological crisis. Your school might be opened as a shelter or used as a center for inoculations. My present school has been designated as an inoculation center, and I have done shelter duty as part of hurricane preparedness. Shelter duty requires some advance planning. You can find out more about bioterrorism from FEMA at www.fema.gov and the CDC at www.bl.cdc.gov. Since September 11, 2001, the U.S. government has issued colorcoded national terrorism alerts. Red is for severe terrorist threat level. Or­ ange is for high alert and green is for low. Some districts such as Gasto­ nia, North Carolina, Guilford County in Greensboro, North Carolina, and Anne Arundel School District in Annapolis, Maryland, are canceling school trips when the Department of Homeland Security puts the country on orange or red alert. Other districts, such as the Charlotte-Mecklinburg School District in North Carolina, are canceling trips on a red alert. Some districts, like the District of Columbia public schools, are not restricting student travel at all (Zehr, 2003). As a practicing principal, I was involved with a school-trip problem myself. Many people dropped out of a sched­ uled school-sponsored trip to New York City that took place the week be­ fore the outbreak of the United States–Iraq War. Some of the parents be­ came disgruntled when deposits were not refunded. Before I deal with this again, there will be arrangements with the travel agency for a refund in this kind of situation. One other area needs to be addressed in this chapter, dealing with terroristtype threats from students. How does a principal deal with this problem? In Burlington, Wisconsin, in 1998, five students were expelled for planning a shooting spree at Burlington High School. Their expulsion was found to be justified by the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, because it was in the in­ terest of providing a safe school environment (Purvis, 2002c). The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the expulsion of a student who wrote a

57

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poem that discussed a school shooting. The student was reinstated after a psychological evaluation (Purvis, 2002b). Freedom of speech is guaranteed by the First Amendment, and that right was reinforced by the 1969 Supreme Court case Tinker v. Des Moines, which said you do not leave your rights at the school house door (Reutter, 1994). However, if there is a real danger, principals may take action against threats (Bowman, 2003). I saw a student suspended for bringing a large militarystyle duffel bag to school the day after the Columbine High School shooting. Would that have held up in a court of law? Given the context of the times, it might have. The standard for principals, as always, should be, can you rea­ sonably justify your actions? If there is a real threat to students, the principal can take action and his or her decisions have a reasonable chance of being upheld. However, a principal may not punish a student for political expres­ sion, unless it causes fights or riots.

58

7

BUDGET

O

ne of the biggest challenges facing our schools in the new millennium is the demand that we improve the academic performance of every child that we teach. That in itself is challenging enough, but state govern­ ments are making it even more difficult by appropriating less and less money for education. “From Long Island to Los Angeles, teachers and administra­ tors are strapped with the tightest budgets in ten years, forcing tough choices between textbooks and lockers, school plays and hockey rinks, band uni­ forms and computer terminals” (Wood, 2002, p. 1). The choices can be even tougher than that. In 2002, one school district in Indiana had to lay off fiftyfive teachers, close any high school class with less than fifteen students, and increase the numbers of students in classes. At the same time, their school accountability plan demanded yearly progress (Zehr, 2002), just as the No Child Left Behind Act will demand adequate yearly progress (AYP) from all schools. What does this mean for the practicing school principal today? First of all, it means that the principal must constantly evaluate the educational needs of the teachers and students at his or her school. School districts pri­ oritize in different ways. Districts may decide to place emphasis on a specific area for the whole district and allocate funds for that purpose. A school dis­ trict may choose to upgrade technology in the district, focus on staff devel­ opment, concentrate on raising teacher pay, or upgrade facilities. Many of these decisions will be made at the district level. On the school level, the

59

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principal will usually have some authority as to how funds allocated to that specific school are spent. How much discretion a principal has over funding depends on how much a district believes in site-based management. In sitebased management, many decisions about funding are left up to the princi­ pal. A principal must prioritize what funds may be spent on. It has always been my philosophy that if a teacher truly needs something, the principal should do his or her best to get it. The key to this process is determining what teachers truly need. Teachers may want expensive items that they do not really need or that do not fit in with the instructional objectives of their classes. How do principals determine what are necessities and what are not? The best way to do this is to have some type of application process. Make teachers produce justification as to why an item should be purchased. This application should illustrate how the item is correlated to the school’s and the district’s goals, how it is connected to the state cur­ riculum, and how it will aid instruction. The application should also in­ clude projected costs and any alternatives that could be purchased in­ stead of this item. One principle that I always use with teachers is justification. Can you justify your actions to the principal, students, par­ ents, the superintendent, the school board, and the community? If a teacher cannot justify an expenditure to one of these groups, then it is an unnecessary expenditure. This principle of justification is an excellent principle for principals and teachers to follow in the majority of their ac­ tions. If you cannot explain and justify an action in a reasonable manner, don’t do it. There are three formal budgeting processes that are commonly used by principals. These are incremental budgeting, zero-based budgeting, and the planning, programming, and budgeting system (PPBS). Incremental budget­ ing simply takes the current year’s budget and either adds additional money to various line items or takes it away. Basically, this approach says that the new budget will be very similar to the previous year’s with only incremental changes. This is the way things were done when I first got into the education business in the late 1970s. The second budgeting method is zero-based budgeting. In this method, every program must justify all of its spending for the coming year. All pro­ grams start with nothing. This is an effective means of eliminating ineffective, underperforming, and nonessential programs. 60

BUDGET

Finally you have PPBS. The PPBS technique requires the establishment of specific program goals and processes to achieve these goals; projection of needs—students to be served, new technology, and so on; the generation, analysis, and projection of data about program element costs; alternative processes to achieve the goals; other sources of funding; and any additional personnel or additional facilities needed and what they would cost. At its simplest, PPBS involves five steps: 1. Establishing the general goals to be achieved 2. Identifying the specific objectives that define this goal 3. Developing the program and processes that it is believed will achieve the objectives and goals 4. Establishing the formative and summative evaluation practices 5. Implementing a review and recycle procedure that indicates whether or not, or the degree to which, the program and processes resulted in the achievement of the objectives and the goals, and, if not, to help deter­ mine other procedures, processes, and programs. PPBS is designed to help a staff decide specifically what is to be accom­ plished and how to go about it. The focus is on goal accomplishment. When sensitively and sensibly applied, an efficient expenditure of monies results (Ubben, Hughes, and Norris, 1997, p. 307–308).

As you can see from my earlier remarks about justification, I am in favor of either the zero-based approach or PPBS.

STRATEGIES FOR SAVING MONEY

In times of tight budgets, like those we are seeing in this first decade of the twenty-first century, it is a good idea to find ways to save your school money. The following are some ideas to save money that can be implemented at both the district and school level. 1. Determine if there are services that can be contracted out more cheaply than they can be performed by school-district personnel. One of the advantages of this is that you do not have to pay employee benefits to these workers. Schools can follow the lead of corporate America on this. For example United Parcel Service has been hiring part-time 61

CHAPTER 7

workers for years so they do not have to pay benefits. Examples of school positions that can be outsourced are cafeteria workers, substi­ tute teachers, custodians, bus drivers, maintenance personnel, and se­ curity guards. I have worked in districts where the nighttime cleaning operations were handled strictly by outside contractors. Substitute teachers can come from a private temp service. I personally think this is a great idea. I have worked in districts where assistant principals and principals had to call substitutes on nights, weekends, and in the early hours of the morning. I would have loved to have delegated that duty to a private contractor. Some districts handle bus drivers the same way. 2. Speaking of substitute teachers, school districts can just quit using them. Schools can make teachers cover classes during their planning pe­ riod. This will antagonize your teaching staff, but it can save thousands of dollars a month even in small districts. There are some downsides to this strategy. It may violate union contracts, and it may cause accredita­ tion problems by taking teachers’ planning time. So this may only be a short-term stopgap measure for truly hard financial times. However, re­ ducing the cost of substitute teachers is a reasonable goal. Schools can do this by having an effective absentee policy. Teachers who are con­ stantly out of the classroom for no good reason are detrimental to your school climate. Substitutes cost valuable dollars that could be better spent on school improvement, and they lower the quality of instruction. 3. Monitor energy usage at your school. As principal, have your school evaluated by your energy provider or an outside consultant who can recommend how to economize on fuel bills. Cutting energy costs in schools can mean tremendous savings. This can be as simple as hav­ ing the heating and air conditioning shut off during nonschool hours. You have to be careful with this. Freezing temperatures can cause pipes to burst, and extremely hot temperatures can be detrimental to computers. This is why you need a professional evaluation. New schools should be built with energy conservation in mind. 4. Monitor your telephone bills. Once again, have your phone system evaluated by a professional with cost savings in mind. Long-distance access can be limited to certain phones, and employees must fill out a telephone log so the principal can better monitor usage. You do not want employees calling relatives from school phones or calling 900 62

BUDGET

numbers that charge huge amounts. Principals should take a few min­ utes to read the phone bill each month. Again this is a simple strategy that can save schools money in hard financial times. 5. Actively pursue federal dollars. More and more federal money is dis­ bursed through grants these days. Most school districts have a federal programs director who is responsible for writing grants and overseeing how different federal programs are administered. It is a good idea for principals to work actively with the federal programs director to seek grants for their schools. For example, if you are having problems with reading scores, there is federal money available to institute a reading pro­ gram. There is federal money available for after-school programs, sum­ mer programs, remediation programs, and enrichment programs. You can write a program director’s salary into some of these grants and pay some of your own people or even yourself to administer these programs. 6. This next item can be a controversial strategy in some areas and no problem in others. It depends on the emphasis placed on sports pro­ grams as opposed to academics in communities. In some schools sports are practiced during the school day, while in other schools sports are practiced strictly after school. Why is this a problem? What are you paying coaches to do, teach classes or coach? You can proba­ bly save teacher positions if coaches teach a full load of classes during the school day. A typical coach at some schools on the 4  4 block schedule teaches the first two blocks from 8:00 A.M. to 11:15 A.M. and then has a coaching period and a planning period for the rest of the day. The head football coach usually teaches a class during the first block from 8:00 A.M. to 9:30 A.M. and then has coaching and planning periods the rest of the day. It seems to make sense that the coaching staff should teach a heavier load. However, make no mistake, princi­ pals must still insure that their schools win some football, basketball, or soccer games, whichever is more important to the local community. Can principals lose their jobs if they do not hire successful coaches? Yes, they can. So, principals need to be aware of the demands of their community. If sports programs are a high priority, the principal may have to tolerate teaching schedules for coaches like the ones I have mentioned. Principals walk a fine line. The principal has to be the boss, but at the same time be flexible enough to keep good coaches. 63

CHAPTER 7

7. Ordering new textbooks every year is an enormous expense for schools. The norm is $50, $60, or $70 for a single textbook. There are several major used-textbook companies that offer textbooks in excel­ lent condition for a much-reduced price. Not only is the price usually about half the new price, or less, but the used-book companies will al­ low you to purchase editions that may not be available otherwise. For replacing lost or damaged books, this can be a definite plus. 8. Recycle. There are many opportunities to save money through recy­ cling. We just mentioned textbooks. Used-book companies will pur­ chase your used textbooks. For those books that cannot be used at all, there are companies that will purchase them to recycle the mate­ rials. You can also sell your used ink cartridges to recyclers. Think of how many ink cartridges a school uses in a year. How large a source of revenue this is will depend on the size of your school. 9. School consolidation is something that many rural school districts should consider. Consolidation could save school districts signifi­ cant amounts of money. For example, the county that I presently work in has two small and one medium-sized high schools. If the dis­ trict consolidated these schools into one county high school, money could be saved in many areas. a. Fewer administrators b. Fewer teachers c. Less duplication of programs (one band instead of three, one football program instead of three, and so on). There are several drawbacks. Many communities are attached to their small community schools. They are especially loyal to their sports teams. Initial costs may be high. People may balk at long bus routes for their children to get to and from school. School consoli­ dation can be accomplished, but it takes some preparation. 10. Online courses are another cost-saving alternative that school dis­ tricts should take a look at. For example, if you only have four stu­ dents signed up to take French II, you could have them take the course online rather than paying a teacher. It would be more cost ef­ fective and allow many schools to offer a wider variety of classes than is now physically possible. It is also a way to beat the teacher short­ age in some fields like foreign languages and advanced sciences. 64

8

IMPROVING

TEST SCORES

T

he movement for school improvement or academic improvement has been a challenge facing educators since the end of World War II. In 1959 when the Soviet Union launched the Sputnik satellite into orbit around the Earth, there was a sudden movement to teach the youth of America more math and science so that the country would be better able to close the space race gap with the Russians. This competition of course was just another manifestation of the Cold War, but that didn’t mean that it didn’t directly af­ fect the curriculum taught in American schools. This latest manifestation of the call for school improvement can be traced back to the 1983 study A Nation at Risk. In 1984, John Goodlad said that school improvement called for clarification of goals and functions, development of curricula to reflect a broad educational commitment, teaching designed to involve students more meaning­ fully and actively in the learning process, increased opportunities for all students to gain access to knowledge, and much more (Goodlad, 1984, p. 271).

As a response to these calls for school improvement in the 1980s, states started to develop standard curricula. In the decade of the 1990s, one of the major trends in education was the movement to make teachers, principals, and schools accountable for the ed­ ucational success of all students. Many states began to pass legislation to re­ quire standardized test scores for grade-level promotion at the elementary

65

CHAPTER 8

school level and exit tests for particular courses and high school graduation. In addition, some states reward high-performing schools, and there are con­ sequences for low-performing schools (Olson, 2002). One of the leading states in this area was Texas under Governor George W. Bush. Since Bush was elected president in 2000, we have seen the passage of the No Child Left Behind legislation, which also places a great deal of emphasis on standard­ ized testing. In Practical Advice for Principals, I outlined seven strategies for improving test scores. In this chapter, I will outline additional strategies for improving test scores.

HOW NOT TO IMPROVE TEST SCORES

As one side effect of the intense pressure to improve test scores that is a part of many principals’ everyday life, some school districts will implement strategies to improve scores that have little to do with improving student education and learning. Richard Allington from the University of Florida outlined twelve ways to increase test scores without real student growth (Allington, 2000): 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12.

Alter the answer sheets. Have some students stay home on test days. Expel low-achieving students. Place low-achieving students in special education. Use unauthorized accommodations for students with disabilities. Target resources to specific groups. Segregate problem students. Invest in test preparation. Retain large numbers of students. Start school earlier to allow for more test preparation. Make the test easier. Change cutoff scores .

It is not hard to see why these strategies can be detrimental to students. However, these strategies have been used and are still being used by some schools and school districts across this country. I have seen some of these strategies used in school districts that I have been associated with in recent 66

IMPROVING TEST SCORES

years. I know teachers who give students answers to questions on state tests to increase their class’ scores; this is sad but true. The problem with this type of cheating is that it catches up with the stu­ dents. At some point they have to be able to do the work. As another example, I can talk about a case dealing with state accreditation levels, not test scores. I was principal of a public high school that had about three hundred new ninthgrade students every school year. The problem was that only about two hun­ dred seniors graduated each year. This statistic made our graduation rate, which was one of the criteria for the school district’s accreditation ranking with the state department of education, look terrible. I fixed the problem in one school year. What wonderful program did I use to solve this dropout problem? I am sorry to say the answer is none. We simply recorded every student who left school in a category that did not count against our dropout rate. Was this against the rules? No, but you can see how statistics can be skewed one way or another. My accreditation report looked a whole lot better and that is impor­ tant for a principal who wants to stay in good standing these days. Some researchers, such as Audrey Amrein and David Berliner (2002), be­ lieve that high-stakes testing merely increases test preparation and excludes some students from testing. These are their findings of a study of eighteen states that attach rewards and consequences to standardized test scores. Included in the study were Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana, Maryland, Mis­ sissippi, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia (Olson, 2002, p.14). 1. Twelve of the eighteen states posted overall decreases in ACT perfor­ mance after high school exit tests were implemented, which were not related to changes in the proportion of students taking the exam. Ten of the states with graduation exams posted overall decreases in SAT performance after the tests were in place. Those decreases were slightly related to changes in SAT participation rates. 2. Participation rates in ACT testing were an indicator of whether more students were motivated to attend college. These rates increased in nine of the states, decreased in six, and stayed the same in three after the imposition of high-stakes exit tests. Participation rates on the SAT, compared with the national average, fell in eleven of the states with graduation exams. 67

CHAPTER 8

3. States with high school graduation exams also had a decreased per­ centage of students who passed AP tests, after controlling for studentparticipation rates. 4. Gains and losses on NAEP mathematics tests in grades four and eight were more strongly related to changes in the percentage of students ex­ cluded from NAEP in each state than to whether states used highstakes testing. If anything, the authors found, the weight of the evi­ dence suggests that students from states with high-stakes tests did not achieve as well on the grade-eight math NAEP test during the 1990s as students in other states did. Whether you agree with it or not I do not see this emphasis on test scores as a measure of school improvement disappearing from the education scene any time soon. Therefore principals need to be prepared to deal with the situation.

HOW TO MAKE REAL IMPROVEMENTS IN TEST SCORES

The first step to improving test scores is to focus your faculty on teaching and preparing these students for whatever standardized test is required. That may seem a little redundant to some observers. Isn’t that what teachers are supposed to be doing anyway? Yes it is, but you would be surprised at how many teachers and schools as a whole lose sight of that fact. As a prin­ cipal I have been involved in different school settings. In one situation, I was the principal of a medium-sized high school in a suburban community that was known as one of the top schools in the state. In that situation the teach­ ers did not want to focus on the new standardized tests that the state was re­ quiring students to pass as a graduation requirement. These teachers wanted to continue teaching what they always had and not concentrate on the content of the standardized test. Their response was that the administration wanted them to “teach to the test.” This was something akin to being a communist in the 1950s. Teachers were outraged. Nancy Buell, a fourth-grade teacher from Massachusetts, voiced a similar view in NEA Today. Teaching should build on what students already know and help them develop a rich sense of interconnected ideas. Real learning involves inquiry, hypothe­ 68

IMPROVING TEST SCORES

ses testing, exploration and reflection. Teaching to the test will not help stu­ dents think about how to use features of data sets to answer real questions. Teaching to the test is not teaching (Buell and Crawford, 2001, p. 11).

Charlotte Crawford, a fourth-grade teacher from Louisiana, offered an op­ posing view. Preparing students to take high-stakes tests does not interfere with teaching. It enhances teaching. When used properly, high-stakes tests can focus atten­ tion on weaknesses in the curriculum or in the teaching of it, as well as furnish an assessment of student progress. Once identified, student weaknesses can be strengthened (Buell and Crawford, 2001, p. 11).

My response was that if these standardized subject-area and grade-level tests are requirements for student graduation and promotion, plus the yard­ stick by which schools and school districts are measured, you had better be teaching to the test. Another part of this is to make sure that teachers are fol­ lowing the curriculum established by the state or local district. In one in­ stance, I was in a staff-development meeting when a teacher who had been teaching for several years asked what state benchmarks were. Thankfully, the teacher did not work at my school. But the incident does illustrate the im­ portance of the principal making sure that teachers are teaching the required material. The Internet has provided schools with another means to help students prepare for high-stakes exams. There are several companies that market test prep resources on the Web. The Princeton Review, Test University, and Smartthinking are a few of these. Students seem to like this type of review be­ cause it allows them to work at their own pace. Educators seem to like it be­ cause it is an additional tool to enhance student achievement, and it can be cheaper and more convenient than traditional teacher-led programs. Califor­ nia, Florida, and Massachusetts are states that are trying this (Borja, 2003). I have also been a principal in a rural high school setting where there was absolutely no pressure placed on teachers to really teach anything to the stu­ dents. Parents only wanted their children to make decent grades and receive a high school diploma. They were not really concerned with what they learned because most of them were not going to college anyway. The parents whose children made good grades did not want their children to work too 69

CHAPTER 8

hard to get their As. Teachers had been allowed to become lax and not teach as hard or as well as they could. Once the state started testing math and lan­ guage skills in the seventh and eighth grades and required students to pass subject-area tests for graduation, things got a lot more serious. Teachers must show improvement in their test scores from year to year or be trans­ ferred, reassigned, or forced out. This is not an easy process, but it is where we are headed in many districts in this country. I have seen school districts actively recruit teachers whose students do well on state-mandated tests. There are districts and school administrators who want their schools or dis­ tricts to be recognized as top performers academically, and they see recruit­ ing top teachers as one way to go about it. Recruiting high-performing teach­ ers can get cutthroat in some instances. I have seen districts try to entice good teachers with extra pay and other incentives. This is reality in states with high-stakes testing. Is it right or wrong? I do not know. It does reflect the reality that we are working under. The second thing that a principal needs to do to improve academic perfor­ mance is to inform and educate the community. Parents need to know about high-stakes testing. These are some common questions that parents may have: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

What tests are required for my child to graduate from high school? What is the school doing to prepare the students for these tests? What happens if a child fails one of these tests? Will there be remediation provided for those who fail these tests? What can parents do to help their children prepare for these tests?

Some methods that you can use to inform parents about these tests are as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Use traditional open house nights to discuss testing with parents. Send a schedule of tests to parents. Publish a regular newsletter for parents. Set up a parent resource center at your school with test prep materials. Stage community rallies before testing dates.

In summation, to improve test scores, principals should focus the faculty on test preparation and teaching the state curriculum and focus the parents 70

IMPROVING TEST SCORES

on the importance of these tests. However, I have left out one key group in this equation, the students. Students need to be reminded on a regular basis of the importance of these tests by administrators and teachers. I make it a point to visit every classroom and hold frank discussions with students about testing and its importance to them. Your counselors should be able to do this in a one-on-one situation. Once again in summation, focus teachers, focus students, focus parents, do test preparation work, and academic im­ provement should follow.

IS HIGH-STAKES TESTING HERE TO STAY?

This remains to be seen. In Florida, in the spring of 2003, thirteen thousand seniors failed to pass the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT), a requirement for graduation. Twenty-four states require exit tests or end-ofcourse tests for graduation. However, due to high failure rates, such as that in Florida, many of these states, including Alaska, California, Florida, Mass­ achusetts, and North Carolina, are taking another look at these tests as stan­ dards for graduation (Olson, 2003).

71

APPENDIX

STATE STANDARDS FOR SCHOOL ADMINISTRATOR CERTIFICATION

Alabama Type of certificate: Class A Alabama Educational Administration Certification This certificate qualifies candidates for principal, supervisor, and superin­ tendent positions. Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Master’s degree in a teaching area Two years of teaching experience Class A Alabama teaching certificate Five educational administration courses (15 hours) Internship (6 hours) Alabama Department of Education

50 North Ripley St.

Montgomery, AL 36104

(334) 242-9700

www.alsde.edu

72

APPENDIX

Alaska Type of certificate: Class B Administrative Certificate Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Master’s degree Three years of teaching experience Graduation from a school administration program One course in Alaska studies (3 hours) One course in multicultural/cross-cultural communications (3 hours) Alaska Department of Education and Early Development Teacher Education and Certification 801 West 10th St., Suite 200, Juneau, AK 99801-1894 (907) 465-2831 www.eed.state.ak.us

Arizona Type of certificate: Principal’s Certificate Requirements: 1. Master’s degree 2. A principal’s certificate from another state Or three years of teaching experience and completion of an educa­ tional administration program including at least thirty graduate hours and a practicum 3. A passing score on the principal’s section of the administrator’s test of the Arizona Educator Proficiency Assessment 4. Fingerprint card Type of Certificate: Superintendent’s Certificate Requirements: 1. Master’s degree 2. Sixty graduate semester hours 3. A superintendent’s certificate from another state Or three years of teaching experience in P–12 and completion of an educational administration program including thirty-six hours of educa­ tional administration and a practicum as superintendent

73

APPENDIX

4. A passing score on the superintendent’s section of the Arizona Edu­ cator Proficiency Assessment 5. A fingerprint card Type of Certificate: Supervisor’s Certificate Requirements: 1. A standard elementary, secondary, or special education certificate 2. Master’s degree 3. A valid supervisor’s certificate from another state or three years of teaching experience and completion of a program in educational ad­ ministration with eighteen hours in educational administration and a practicum as a supervisor 4. A passing score on the supervisor’s portion of the administrator’s test of the Arizona Educator Proficiency Assessment 5. Fingerprint card Arizona Department of Education: Certification Unit Phoenix Office: P.O. Box 6490, Phoenix, AZ 85701

(602) 542-6347

Tucson Office: 400 W. Congress St., #118, Tuscon, AZ 85701 (520) 628-6326 www.ade.az.gov/certification Arkansas Type of certificate: Building Administrator

Requirements:

Initial license

1. A standard teaching license 2. Five years of teaching experience with three years at the level of license sought (i.e., elementary or secondary) 3. A graduate degree with an internship and portfolio development in educational leadership

74

APPENDIX

Standard license 1. Three-year mentorship program 2. Score at least 158 on the School Leaders Licensure Assessment Requirements: District-Level Administrator 1. Standard teaching license and building-level administrator license 2. Five years of teaching experience 3. Have an advanced degree with an internship and portfolio assessment in educational leadership 4. Complete the School Superintendent Assessment Requirements: Curriculum/Program Administrator These standards are under review Arkansas Department of Education

Office of Professional Licensure

4 Capitol Mall, Little Rock, AR 72201

(501) 682-4344

www.arkedu.state.ar.us

California Type of certificate: Administrative Services Credential Requirements: 1. A valid teaching license 2. Complete a program of specialized preparation from an accredited university 3. Employment as an administrator This license can be upgraded to professional level with two years of experience as an administrator and a program of professional devel­ opment. California has what is called the AB75 Program. California Department of Education P.O. Box 944271, Sacramento, CA 94244-2720

(916) 319-0791

www.cde.ca.gov

75

APPENDIX

Colorado Type of certificate: Provisional Principal License Requirements: 1. Bachelor’s degree 2. Completion of an approved graduate program for the school prin­ cipalship 3. Three years of K–12 experience 4. Submission of application including transcripts 5. Passing scores on Praxis test Type of Certificate: Provisional Administrator License Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Bachelor’s degree Completion of an approved graduate program for school administration Submission of application including transcripts Passing scores on Praxis or three years of administrative experience

Type of Certificate: Professional Principal License Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Master’s degree Valid Provisional Principal License Completion of school district induction program Submission of an application

Type of Certificate: Professional Administrator License Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Master’s degree Valid Provisional Administrator License Completion of an approved induction program Submission of an application

Type of Certificate: Master Principal Certificate Requirements: 1. Valid Professional Principal License 2. Evidence of excellence in performance of duties and knowledge in the field 76

APPENDIX

Type of Certificate: Master Administrator Certificate Requirements: 1. Valid Professional Administrator License 2. Evidence of excellence in performance of duties and knowledge in the field Colorado Department of Education

201 East Colfax Ave.

Denver, CO. 80203–1799

(303) 830-0793

www.cde.state.co.us

Connecticut Type of certificate: Intermediate Administration or Supervision Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Master’s degree Eighteen graduate hours beyond the master’s Fifty school months of school experience Some graduate coursework in curriculum and instruction, administra­ tion, personnel, and supervision

Type of certificate: Superintendent of Schools Requirements: 1. Master’s degree 2. Thirty graduate hours beyond the master’s 3. Eighty school months of school experience, which must include thirty months of administrative experience 4. Some graduate coursework, same as in intermediate license All applicants for administrative licenses must pass the Connecticut Admin­ istrator Test (CAT) or the School Leader Licensure Assessment (SLLA). Connecticut State Department of Education

165 Capitol Ave., Hartford, CT 06145

Phone (860) 713-6969

Fax (860) 713-6548

www.state.ct.us/sde

77

APPENDIX

Delaware Type of certificate: Elementary Principal and Assistant Principal Requirements: 1. Master’s degree in elementary school administration 2. Three years of teaching experience Or two years teaching and one year as an administrative intern in an elementary school Type of certificate: Secondary Principal and Assistant Principal Requirements: 1. Master’s degree in secondary school administration 2. Three years of teaching on the secondary level Or two years of teaching and one year as an administrative intern in a secondary school Delaware Department of Education 401 Federal St., P.O. Box 1402, Dover, DE 19903-1402 Phone (302) 739-4601 Fax (302) 739-4654 www.doe.state.de.us Florida Type of certificate: Initial license certifies candidates to work as assistant principals, administrative interns, or district-level administrators. Requirements: Passing score on Florida Educational Leadership Examination Type of certificate: School Principal Requirements: 1. A valid administrative certificate 2. Completion of an approved district-management training program as an assistant principal, intern principal or interim principal employed for one full school year 3. Successful completion of a performance appraisal system by the school district 78

APPENDIX

Florida Department of Education

Office of the Commissioner

Turlington Building, Suite 1514,

325 West Gaines St., Tallahassee, FL 32399

Phone (850) 245-0505

Fax (850) 245-9667

www.fldoe.org

Georgia Type of certificate: Certificate in Educational Leadership Requirements: 1. Master’s degree 2. Praxis I and II 3. Twenty graduate hours in educational administration This can be upgraded to professional level after an additional ten graduate hours. Georgia Department of Education

2054 Twin Towers East, Atlanta, GA 30334

Phone (404) 656-2800

Fax (404) 651-6867

www.doe.k12.ga.us

Hawaii Type of certificate: School Administrator Requirements: 1. Principals: five years of experience, with at least three as a teacher 2. Vice principals: appropriate experience as determined by Department of Education 3. A valid teacher license and satisfactory teacher evaluations if Hawaii certified 4. A valid school administrator license and administrator evaluations if applying from another state 5. Twenty-one specific graduate hours in educational administration 6. Completion of the Certification Program for School Leaders re­ quirements 79

APPENDIX

7. A one-year internship 8. One-year probation as vice principal

Hawaii Department of Education

P.O. Box 2360, Honolulu, HI 96804

Phone (808) 586-3230

Fax (808) 586-5234

doe.k12.hi.us

Idaho Type of certificate: PreK–12 Principal Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Master’s degree Four years of experience in education An internship or one year of experience as an administrator Completion of a program in educational administration of at least thirty graduate hours 5. Institutional recommendation

Type of certificate: School Superintendent Requirements: 1. Education specialist degree (Ed.S.) or doctorate 2. Four years of experience in education 3. Completion of a superintendent internship or one year of experience as a superintendent or assistant superintendent 4. Completion of a program in educational administration of at least thirty graduate hours. 5. Institutional recommendation Idaho Department of Education

650 West State St., P.O. Box 83720

Boise, ID 93720-0027

(208) 332-6800

www.sde.state.id.us

Illinois Type of certificate: General Administration Requirements: 80

APPENDIX

1. At least twenty-seven graduate hours in educational administration 2. Two years of experience in education 3. Required certification exam Type of certificate: Superintendent Requirements: 1. Master’s degree with at least thirty hours in educational adminis­ tration 2. Two years of experience in administration 3. Required certification exam The exams are the Illinois Certification Testing System Basic Skills Test and a content test in administration. Illinois State Board of Education

100 N. 1st Street, Springfield, IL 62777

(866) 262-6663

www.isbe.state.il.us

Indiana Type of certificate: Elementary Administration and Supervision Requirements: 1. A valid elementary or junior high/middle school license 2. Forty-five hours of graduate credit (ten required courses) 3. Recommendation from institution where credits were earned An upgrade of this license to professional level requires five years of experience and sixty graduate hours in educational administration. Type of certificate: Secondary Administration and Supervision Requirements: 1. A valid junior high/middle school or high school license. 2. Forty-five hours of graduate credit (10 required courses) 3. Institution recommendation An upgrade of this license to professional level requires sixty graduate hours in educational administration and five years of experience. 81

APPENDIX

Type of certificate: Superintendent Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

A valid school license Education specialist degree (Ed.S.) or higher At least forty-five hours in specific education courses Institution recommendation An upgrade of this license to professional level requires five years of experience.

Type of certificate: General Supervision and Curriculum Specialist Requirements: 1. A teaching license 2. Education specialist degree (Ed.S.) with at least forty-one graduate hours and an internship Indiana Department of Education Room 229, State House, Indianapolis, IN 46204-2798 (317) 232-6610 www.doe.state.in.us Iowa Type of certificate: Professional Administrator Requirements: 1. A valid teaching certificate 2. Three years of experience. For principals this must be at the level at which they are seeking endorsement (elementary or so on). For super­ intendents this experience must be as a building principal, a dis­ trictwide administrator, or a Department of Education employee 3. Completion of an administrative preparation program Iowa Department of Education Grimes State Office Building, Des Moines, IA 50319-0146 Phone (515) 281-5294 Fax (515) 242-5988 www.state.ia.us/educate

82

APPENDIX

Kansas Type of certificate: District Administrator Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

A graduate degree Completion of a district school administrator program Completion of a building administrator program Three years of experience in education

Type of certificate: Building Administrator Requirements: 1. A graduate degree 2. Completion of a building administrator program 3. Three years of experience in education Kansas State Department of Education

120 SE 10th Ave., Topeka, KS 66612-1182

Phone (785) 296-3201

Fax (785) 296-7933

www.ksbe.state.ks.us

Kentucky Type of certificate: School Principal Requirements: 1. Basic skills test 2. Two years of teaching experience or completion of Kentucky Teacher Intern Program 3. Completion of Kentucky Specialty Test of Instructional and Adminis­ trative Practices Kentucky Department of Education

500 Meno St., 19th Floor, Frankfort, KY 40601

Phone (502) 564-3421

Fax (502) 564-6470

www.kde.state.ky.us

83

APPENDIX

Louisiana Type of certificate: Elementary Principal Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

A valid Louisiana teaching certificate Master’s degree Five years of teaching on the elementary level A score of 620 on the Educational Administration and Supervision Area Exam of the National Teachers Exam (NTE) 5. Thirty specific hours of graduate credit in educational administra­ tion This license will be upgraded after a two-year internship. Require­ ments for the secondary principal are the same, but the experience must be on the secondary level.

Type of certificate: Parish or City School Superintendent Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

A valid Louisiana teacher certificate Five years of experience in administration Master’s degree Forty-eight graduate hours in educational administration Louisiana Department of Education Personnel 626 N. 4th St., P.O. Box 94064, Baton Rouge, LA 70804-9064 (625) 342-3774 www.doe.state.la.us

Maine Type of certificate: Initial Administrator Certificate Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Matriculation in a master’s degree program Three years of teaching experience Participation in the Maine Academy for School Leaders Demonstration that required competency areas are met

84

APPENDIX

Maine State Department of Education

23 House Station, Augusta, ME 04333-0023

(207) 624-6603

www.state.me.us

Maryland Type of certificate: Principal Administrator II Requirements: 1. Master’s degree 2. Three years of education experience 3. Completion of a state-approved program in administration and su­ pervision or eighteen graduate hours in administration and super­ vision 4. Passing score on a state-approved principal certification assessment Type of certificate: Superintendent Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Teacher certification Three years of teaching experience Two years of administration experience Sixty hours of graduate work, including a master’s degree and a twoyear program in administration and supervision Maryland State Department of Education

200 West Baltimore St., Baltimore, MD 21201

(410) 767-0100

www.msde.state.md.us

Massachusetts Type of certificate: School Principal (Levels: PreK–6, 5–8, 9–12) Requirements: 1. Teaching license 2. Three years of education experience 3. Completion of a program of studies including a supervised practicum (300 hours) at the appropriate level

85

APPENDIX

Or three years of experience in administration at the building or district level and a 150-hour internship

Or a year-long internship

Or a portfolio review and interview

4. A passing score on an assessment of school leadership This license can be upgraded to professional license with com­ pletion of a two-year induction and three years of experience as a principal. Massachusetts Department of Education

350 Main St., Malden, MA 02148-5023

(781) 338-3000

www.doe.mass.edu

Michigan Michigan has no certification for principals Michigan Department of Education

608 W. Allegan, Lansing, MI 48933

(517) 373-9235

www.michigan.gov/mde

Minnesota Type of certificate: Administrator

This qualifies a candidate to be a superintendent or principal.

Requirements:

1. Three years of teaching experience 2. Completion of a specialist or doctoral program in educational administration 3. Completion of an eight-week mentored field experience Minnesota Department of Education 1500 Highway 36 West, Roseville, MN 55113-4266 (651) 582-8200 www.education.stste.mn.us

86

APPENDIX

Mississippi Type of certificate: Standard Administrator License Requirements: 1. Passing score on the School Leader Licensure Assessment (SLLA) 2. Completion of an approved program in educational administration at the master’s degree level. If a candidate already has a master’s degree in another area, an adminis­ trator license can be obtained by completing an approved program leading to an education specialist degree (Ed.S.) or doctoral degree. Mississippi Department of Education Central High School, P.O. Box 771, 359 North West St., Jackson, MS 39205 (601) 359-3513 www.mde.k12.ms.us Missouri Type of certificate: Elementary Principal, Secondary Principal, and Superin­ tendent Requirements: These certificates require an advanced degree in educational administration and a valid teaching certificate at the appropriate grade level. Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education P.O. Box 480, Jefferson City, MO 65102

Phone (573) 751-4212

Fax (573) 751-8613

www.services.dese.state.mo.us

Montana Type of certificate: Class 3 Administrative License—Elementary Principal Endorsement Requirements: 1. Master’s degree in an approved school administration program. 2. Three years of experience in elementary teaching

87

APPENDIX

The Secondary Principal Endorsement requires three years of experience on the secondary level The Superintendent Endorsement requires at least eighteen additional graduate hours or a specialist or doctoral degree. A superintendent must also have one year of experience as a principal or assistant superintendent. Montana Office of Public Instruction P.O. Box 202501, Helena, MT 59620-2501

(406) 444-3095

www.opistate.mt.us.instruction

Nebraska Type of certificate: Administrator Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Basic skills competency test Human relations training Special education requirement Two years of teaching experience Fingerprint requirement Completion of an approved program of administrator training Nebraska Department of Education

301 Centennial Mall South, Lincoln, NE 68509

(402) 471-2295

www.nde.state.ne.us

Nevada Type of certificate: Professional Administrator of a School Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Master’s degree A valid teaching license Three years of teaching experience Twenty-four specific hours in educational administration Twelve additional hours in educational administration or a master’s degree in educational administration

88

APPENDIX

Nevada Department of Education

700 East Fifth St., Carson City, NV 89701

(702) 486-6458

www.nde.state.nv.us

New Hampshire Type of certificate: Superintendent Requirements: 1. Completion of an education specialist degree or a doctoral degree Type of certificate: Principal Requirements: 1. Three years of teaching experience 2. Completion of an approved program for school principals New Hampshire Department of Education

101 Pleasant St., Concord, NH 03301-3860

Phone (603) 271-3494

Fax (603) 271-1953

www.ed.state.nh.us

New Jersey Type of certificate: Principal and Superintendent Requirements: 1. Master’s degree 2. A passing score on NTE Administration and Supervision section 3. Completion of an internship New Jersey Department of Education P.O. Box 500, Trenton, NJ 08625

(609) 292-4469

www.state.nj.us

89

APPENDIX

New Mexico Type of certificate: Administrator K–12 Requirements: 1. A valid New Mexico teaching license 2. Master’s degree with eighteen graduate hours in educational administration 3. Completion of an internship New Mexico State Department of Education

Education Building, Santa Fe, NM 87501-2786

Phone (505) 827-6587

Fax (505) 827-4148

www.sde.state.nm.us

New York Type of certificate: School Administrator and Supervisor Requirements: 1. Bachelor’s degree 2. Eighteen graduate hours in educational administration 3. An internship supervised by an institution of higher learning and a practicing school administrator

Or one year of experience in administration

4. Twelve additional hours of graduate study 5. Three years of teaching experience 6. Attendance at a child abuse identification workshop 7. Attendance at a school violence prevention workshop 8. Fingerprint card Type of certificate: School District Administrator Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Bachelor’s degree Twenty-four graduate hours in educational administration Internship Thirty-six additional graduate hours Master’s degree

90

APPENDIX

6. 7. 8. 9.

Three years of experience in education Attendance at a child abuse identification workshop Attendance at a school violence prevention workshop U.S. citizenship New York State Education Department

89 Washington Ave., Albany, NY 12234

(518) 474-3852

www.nysed.gov

North Carolina Type of certificate: Principal Requirements: 1. Completion of an approved program in school administration at the master’s level or above 2. Passing score on the SLLA from ETS A superintendent certificate is available, but having a principal certificate is a prerequisite. North Carolina Department of Public Instruction

301 Wilmington St.

Raleigh, NC 27601

(919) 807-3300

www.dpi.state.nc.us

North Dakota Type of certificate: Elementary Certificate Requirements: 1. A valid North Dakota teaching license 2. Three years of experience in elementary schools To upgrade this to a level II certificate, one must have twenty graduate hours in a master’s program in educational administra­ tion. To upgrade this to a level I certificate, one must have a full master’s degree in educational administration

91

APPENDIX

Type of certificate: Secondary Principal Requirements: Same as for elementary principal, but experience must be in a secondary school Type of certificate: Superintendent Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

A valid North Dakota teacher license Three years of teaching experience Two years of administrative experience Qualification for a principal license Eight additional graduate hours specifically for superintendents North Dakota Department of Public Instruction 600 E. Boulevard Ave., Dept. 201, Floors 9, 10, 11 Bismarck, ND 58505-0440 Phone (701) 328-2260 Fax (701) 328-2461 www.dpi.state.nd.us

Ohio Type of certificate: Principal Requirements: 1. Two years of teaching experience 2. Completion of a principal preparation program Ohio Department of Education

25 South Front St., Columbus, OH 43215-4183

(877) 646-6338

www.ode.state.oh.us

Oklahoma Type of certificate: Principal Requirements: 1. Two years of teaching experience 2. Master’s degree in any field 92

APPENDIX

Oklahoma State Department of Education

2500 N. Lincoln Blvd.

Oklahoma City, OK 73105-4599

Phone (405) 521-3301

Fax (405) 521-6205

www.sde.state.ok.us

Oregon Type of certificate: Principal Requirements: 1. Three years of experience in education 2. Completion of a master’s degree program in principal preparation with an internship Oregon Department of Education

255 Capitol St. NE, Salem, OR 97310-0203

Phone (503) 378-3569

Fax (503) 378-5156

www.ode.state.or.us

Pennsylvania Type of certificate: Administrative Requirements: 1. Five years of experience in education 2. Completion of an approved program in educational administration Pennsylvania Department of Education

333 Market St., Harrisburg, PA 17126-0333

(717) 783-6788

www.pde.state.pa.us

Rhode Island Type of certificate: Superintendent of Schools Requirements: 1. Master’s degree or above consisting of at least thirty-six graduate hours of educational administration 93

APPENDIX

2. Eligibility for Rhode Island teacher’s certificate 3. Eight years of experience in teaching and administration This is a provisional certificate and can be upgraded to professional level after six additional graduate hours and three years as a superin­ tendent. Type of certificate: Secondary Principal’s Certificate Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Master’s degree Eligibility for Rhode Island secondary teaching certificate Three years of secondary teaching experience Completion of a preparation program for secondary principals (grad­ uate coursework can be substituted for this requirement) This is a provisional certificate and can be upgraded to professional level with six graduate hours and three years of experience as a sec­ ondary principal.

Type of certificate: Elementary Principal’s Certificate Requirements: 1. 2. 2. 3.

Master’s degree Eligibility for a Rhode Island elementary teaching certificate Three years of elementary teaching Completion of a preparatory program for elementary principals (grad­ uate coursework can be substituted for this requirement) This is a provisional certificate and can be upgraded to professional level with six graduate hours and three years of experience as an ele­ mentary principal.

Type of certificate: Administration of Instruction and/or Curriculum Requirements: 1. An advanced degree in curriculum and supervision 2. Eligibility for a Rhode Island teaching certificate 3. Six years of professional education experience This is a provisional certificate and can be upgraded to professional level with six graduate hours and three years of experience as an ad­ ministrator of curriculum or instruction. 94

APPENDIX

Rhode Island Department of Elementary and Secondary Education 250 Westminster St., Providence, RI 02903 (401) 222-4600 www.ridoe.net South Carolina Type of certificate: Administrator Requirements: Master’s degree in educational administration South Carolina Department of Education

1429 Senate St., Columbia, SC 29201

Phone (803) 734-8815

Fax (803) 734-3389

www.sde.state.sc.us

South Dakota Type of certificate: Administrator Requirements: 1. Completion of an approved program in educational administration 2. Training in human relations and coursework in South Dakota Indian studies South Dakota Department of Education

700 Governors Drive, Pierre, SD 57501

(605) 773-5669

www.state.sd/deca

Tennessee Type of certificate: Beginning Administrator License (BAL) Requirements: 1. Completion of a graduate program in school administration 2. Completion of a practicum or one semester internship under a mentor principal 3. Completion of a state required test/assessment This license can be upgraded to professional level with two years of experience and completion of a professional development program. 95

APPENDIX

Tennessee Department of Education Andrew Johnson Tower, 6th Floor, Nashville, TN 37243-0375 (615) 741-2731 www.state.tn.us/education Texas Type of certificate: Standard Principal Certificate Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Master’s degree Two years of experience as a teacher Completion of a principal assessment First time principals: participation in a one-year mentored induction period Texas Education Agency

1701 N. Congress Ave., Austin, TX 78701

(512) 463-9734

www.tea.state.tx.us

Utah Type of certificate: Administrative/Supervisory Certificate This certificate is required for superintendents and all levels of principal and assistant principals. Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Teacher certificate Master’s degree in school administration Completion of a principal internship Two years of professional experience This certificate can be upgraded to standard level after three years of experience in administration. Utah State Office of Education

250 East 500 South

P.O. Box 144200, Salt Lake City, UT 84114-4200 (801) 538-7500 www.usoe.k12.ut.us 96

APPENDIX

Vermont Type of certificate: Principal Requirements: 1. Master’s degree in educational administration 2. Three years of teaching experience 3. Demonstration of general competencies required for school adminis­ trators Type of certificate: Supervisor Requirements: 1. Master’s degree in education 2. A valid teaching license 3. Three or more years of teaching experience 4. Demonstration of general competencies for school district administrators Type of certificate: Superintendent Requirements: 1. Master’s degree in educational administration 2. Five years of experience. including three teaching and two in administration 3. Demonstration of general competencies for school administrators State of Vermont Department of Education

120 State St., Montpelier, VT 05620-2501

(802) 828-2445

www.state.vt.us/educ

Virginia Type of certificate: Administration and Supervision Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Master’s degree Three years of experience as a teacher Completion of an approved program in administration and supervision Completion of a beginning administration and supervision assessment Or an internship Or one year of experience as principal or assistant principal 97

APPENDIX

Type of certificate: Division Superintendent License Requirements: Option 1 a. Doctorate in educational administration b. Five years of experience (at least two teaching and two in administration)

Option 2

a. Master’s degree plus thirty graduate hours b. Completion of requirements for administration and supervision license c. Five years of experience (at least two teaching and two in administration)

Option 3

a. Master’s degree b. An out-of-state superintendent’s license c. Five years of experience (at least two teaching and two in administration. Virginia Department of Education P.O. Box 2120, Richmond, VA 23218

(804) 371-2471

www.pen.k12.va.us

Washington Type of certificate: K–12 Principal Requirements: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Background check Valid teacher certificate Master’s degree Completion of state-approved preparation program or three years of experience Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction Old Capitol Building, P.O. Box 47200, Olympia, WA 98504-7200 (360) 725-6400 www.k12.wa.us

98

APPENDIX

West Virginia Type of certificate: Superintendent, Principal, Supervisor of Instruction, Vocational Administrator Requirements: 1. Master’s degree West Virginia Department of Education 1900 Kanawha Boulevard East, Charleston, WV 25305 (304) 558-7842 wvde.state.wv.us Wisconsin Type of certificate: School District Superintendent Requirements: 1. Principal license 2. Completion of an approved graduate program with twelve specific Type of certificate: Pre-K–12 Principal Requirements: 1. Completion of an approved graduate program with twelve specific hours Type of certificate: Director of Instruction Requirements: 1. Completion of an approved graduate program with twelve specific hours Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

125 S. Webster St., P.O. Box 7841, Madison, WI

(800) 441-4563

www.dpi.state.wi.us

Wyoming Type of certificate: Principal Requirements: 1. Three years of teaching experience

99

APPENDIX

Wyoming Department of Education

Hathaway Building 2nd Floor, Cheyenne, WY 82002-0050

Phone (307) 777-7673

Fax (307) 777-6234 or (307) 777-5421

www.k12.wy.us

100

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Albert Lee Snow has been employed in the public and private schools in Mississippi for the past twenty-five years. During that time he has taught on all levels from junior high to college. As an administrator, he has served as a high school assistant principal, elementary school principal, principal of two different public high schools, headmaster of a K–12 private school, and as­ sistant superintendent of administration of a county school district. Dr. Snow received his doctorate in education from the University of Southern Mississippi. He is also the author of Practical Advice for Principals (Scare­ crowEducation, 2003).

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