The pressures of school principalship

I've been following the press on the reluctance of persons to take up principal positions under the pressures of contemporary Australian schooling.  It's a shame because it is a great job that requires hard innovate work with the challenges coming thick and fast but with the rewards being very satisfying.

It seems that the administrative loads and the demands for schools to be so much more than places of academic learning are detracting from the principal being the educational leader.

Making sure one has the skills through appropriate training is a big first step to managing the job.

Having  a strong network of government and non-government principal peers is also helpful.

Then comes the ability to delegate based on trust.  I love the notion of 'distributive leadership' that pervades the contemporary literature.  This form of leadership recognises the strengths of any member of staff and utilises these strengths by providing leadership opportunities for the staff who have this expertise.  One of my criteria for an effective school contains a model of how to get this distributive leadership really working but more about that later.  Leadership does not have to always come from the traditional hierarchical leadership of a school.

I am watching with much interest the movement across Australia whereby government schools are opting to become independent government schools running on a one line budget.  As a principal of a government school I always felt I had a good deal of freedom to act but would love to have the additional freedoms offered by this notion of independence.  With it of course comes more responsibility and knowing that the buck stops with you.  There is no big brother central department calling the shots in the same detail as in the past.  My old role as a superintendent of schools is largely superfluous.  Thank goodness I hear you say.

From my days studying philosophy I have continued to be challenged by that part of metaphysics that is a study of the ultimate nature of reality.  During my working life being a bit of a workaholic and watching teachers and principals and clerical staff busting a gut to be perfect plus I worried for them.  I used to counsel them to make sure that the job was kept in perspective in respect of making time for their loved ones.  To me this is the ultimate nature of reality.  My old philosophy teacher, professor Greaves would probably be appalled at this very pragmatic conclusion. For what it's worth I share it with you.