Out of the Office and into the Classroom

This from the Wallace Foundation:

An initiative to help principals focus on instruction

In Penny Cecil’s first year as principal of Hodgenville Elementary School, management tasks dominated the agenda. School bus problems, testing schedules, personnel changes, discipline issues, building maintenance, phone calls from parents, and endless stacks of paperwork consumed her 12-hour days.

"I was always trying to triage," Cecil said, describing a job that was "driven by interruptions."
The next year, Cecil changed focus. With a trained School Administration Manager (SAM) hired to handle the organizational overflow, the principal achieved her goal of getting into every classroom at least once a week to observe teachers and interact with students. Within a few months, Cecil was spending an average of 70 percent of her time on instruction and learning, up from 40 percent at the start of the term.

She exceeded that pace going into the current school year. By the second week of the new term, Cecil had observed every teacher, knew most of the 589 students by name, and was such a regular presence in classrooms that teachers and students barely noticed when she entered or exited.

"Penny is so much more accessible," said Cherie Altman, who teaches 3rd and 4th graders.

"She’ll get on the floor with kids. She’ll talk to you about what you’re doing. She used to be a teacher, and she can share so much with us."

Teresa Fightmaster recalled the day Cecil taught a model lesson on memoir writing to her 3rd and 4th grade students. The principal brought in a suitcase from home and unpacked items that she could use to trigger descriptive details of her life.

"I welcome her into the classroom," Fightmaster said. "I need the feedback, as a new teacher. That way I know what I need to do to be better."

Hodgenville is the hub of LaRue County, KY, an agricultural region an hour south of Louisville and the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln. More recently, it also has become part of a rapidly expanding national model for school-level leadership. Designed to free principals from the tasks distracting them from teaching and learning while ensuring the smooth operation of their schools, the SAM initiative offers a way out of the daily time-crunch dilemma.

...it calls attention to a commonly acknowledged but rarely resolved obstacle to education reform: Principals can’t and shouldn’t do it all...