Fruit Basket Turnover

  • Friday, May 27, 2016

I have been teaching for 21 years now, so I’ve been through my share of school leaders. Every one of them taught me something important. Whether it was Don Bishop from Red Bank High School who, after almost 30 years at Red Bank, taught me to invest in the longevity of my career, Wade Kelly who taught me to thoroughly weigh options before making a decision, Gail Chuy who taught me to say what I needed to say, and even when there was disagreement, retain the ability to listen, Eddie Gravitte who truly valued establishing an academic school culture, Dr. Tom McCullough who taught me adapt to changes in culture and education while maintaining my core values, or Robin Copp who taught me that a vision can only be realized with consistency and fortitude, all of these school leaders have made me a better teacher and person. However, there was a time when principals were given more than a 2 to 3-year time span to realize their visions and impact their school communities.

Today, we have once again experienced a fruit-basket turnover. Now don’t get me wrong…I am so happy for some of my friends who have gotten their first appointments as heads of schools. They are some of the finest educators I know, so the current powers at Central Office may have a larger vision that I cannot see. And I understand that assistant principals need to move around to gain experience. But every time we change leaders at Central Office, which is far too often, we seem to change principal leadership all over town. I just hope that we have gotten a fresh start with the new administrative changes and not just traded one “good ole boy network” for another.  It’s like one of my friends said, “…more politics as usual, but another team has captured the flag.” The changes cannot be undone and maybe they don’t need to be; I get that. But for all these new appointments and new school leaders, I want to ask that the HCDE administration, school board, and community at large to take this into consideration:

I’m not sure people realize how important school leaders are for teachers and students. As soon as a principal gets to know and understand the community and establish a vision for the school , he/she gets moved. This is not just in my school; it’s all over our district. It happens every three years with our superintendents, who are the leaders for all of us.  Even Rick Smith was ousted just as he was beginning to share his highly researched and progressive vision for our schools. I’ll be honest, I was not too happy at the time of our last principal change, but I adapted and grew to respect the choices my principal made because she has been consistent and articulated what we were trying to accomplish every step of the way. Did I grow to respect her? Yes. Did I agree with every decision she made? No. Did she answer every email? No. 

But if you are a disgruntled parent trying to email your principal, think about this…if you got 500+ emails a day from teachers and parents and you answered every one, how much time would you spend each day in front of your computer screen? Let’s say it took you two minutes for each response…1,000 minutes. That’s approximately 16+ hours a day. That is 16+ hours that would not be spent making sure the school is safe, teachers are delivering quality instruction, or that kids are engaged in learning. 

We have got to start establishing a sense of professional trust in the educators of our community. I hope our interim leaders have the vision to see that moving people around isn’t always what is best for a school or, more importantly, for the students. Think about your elementary principal. I remember mine—Mr.Lane, at DuPont Elementary. He was kind, but we had a healthy fear of him, too. How many of you remember your principals? 

How many of you think, “Well, there was some guy when I was a freshman, and then this lady my junior year, and Mr. ___ my senior year.” 

Or do you think, “I remember Mrs. ___. I got sent to her office one time in 3rd grade, but by my 5th grade year, I was one of her favorites.” 

Or “I remember Mr. ____. He used to call every student in the lunch line by name.”

School culture is set by the school leader. A culture is not established in two years. It takes at least three to five years to build a strong team, am I right, coaches? Then once you have your team in position, you start making strides.

Here’s my proposal… 

Central Office needs to focus on building its own culture of leadership for our district and establish a professional trust with the school board members so that the board will let them do their jobs. And the community needs to learn to trust the school leaders to do what’s best for kids. But we all need to vote for board members who care first and foremost about educating our children. That’s every educator’s goal, but sometimes politics can get in the way of that.

Will we make mistakes? Yes, educators are also human. 

Will you be mad when the mistake involves your child? Absolutely. 

Will your child face unfairness or injustice in their adult lives? Without a doubt. 

Will your child have to learn to overcome personality conflicts in his/her professional life?  Unless he/she works in La-La land, the answer is, probably, once again, yes. 

We are never going to have a perfect superintendent, principal, or teacher that makes 100% of us happy 100% of the time. But that’s not real life. We must learn to trust and respect that there is something to be learned from every person we deal with, whether we like it or not, whether it’s easy or not.

Central Office…don’t replace one corrupted system with another, and HCDE School Board…don’t corrupt the educational process for petty self-interests. Let’s focus on hiring, training, and developing great educators and leaders who are worthy of our trust…then trust them and give them the time they need to build a learning community that will best serve all of our kids, from Soddy Daisy to Brainerd to Ooltewah to Tyner to Red Bank to Central to Hixson to Howard to Sale Creek to Signal Mountain to Lookout Valley and everywhere in-between. They all deserve school leaders who care about them and about their community. Students and teachers will follow their leaders to the highest heights if you just let them.

Tara Tharp

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