An absolute no brainer is to never raise your voice and/or become angry with a student or staff member. They need to know that you will be firm and fair, delivering the tough love in a calm and considered manner.
Serious student offences such as stealing, physical violence, wilful damage of school property or verbal and mental abuse towards another member of the school community will be sure to require the deliverance of tough love from you or your delegated authority. There must be consequences for the student who is learning that rule breaking has consequences that are usually not pleasant. Parents need to be aware that tough love is part of the culture of your school community.
Teachers deal on the spot with classroom breaches of behaviour standards but they must do this within the tough love parameters that are part of the school culture. With serial classroom offenders you may need to deliver the tough love.
Student offences or rule breaking, if persistent, are usually a symptom of deeper underlying issue that has to investigated along with the deliverance of tough love.
Teachers operate in a context of school community commitment to best practice and when they are so committed they seldom need tough love to bring them back to the way it is. At times a teacher can stray and say administer disciplinary action that is beyond the tough love limits. Tough love may be needed if this is the case. They may breach the dress code that their school community encourages and again tough love can be needed. As I write that I can think of a case of one my teachers doing just that and I applied tough love.
Of course there are serious offences such as teacher abuse of students in various forms. This cannot be tolerated and at a certain level it can be criminal. Tough love and legal requirements say that this cannot be tolerated and must be dealt with swiftly.
If a teacher is not coping in the classroom such that their class management and general pedagogy is off the mark then there are policies that require natural justice and due process to right this. Every teacher in the school should be aware that such processes exist and that they can expect fairness, but also that the matter must be righted. In extreme cases dismissal can be the consequence. You as the Principal must play a major role in resolving such matters as the eduction of the students may be suffering. I have dealt with this at various levels of seriousness on many occasions as a school principal and as a superintendent with responsibilities across many schools in my district. In the end it is your responsibility as a principal. A tough gig that cannot be avoided if the situation arises.
When I was a principal the cane was still used in government schools. I tried to ban it in my school and was surprised at the staff resistance. It was banned many years ago now thank goodness.
Just wanted to say something about the ancient practices of making students write lines or lists of words as a punishment. I banned this in my school kindly pointing out that we were busting our insides trying to get the kids to love the English language. I cannot imagine that such practices still exist.
Another concern that I had as a principal was the regular use of 'scab' duty as a punishment. This saw students having to spend their lunch hour picking op rubbish around the school ground. I also banned this on the grounds that we again were working hard to have the students value their environment, becoming self regulating in keeping it tidy.
I sound like an old tyrant. Perhaps I should not have used the word banned rather describing how I tried to positively convince staff to accept other ways of administering tough love.
Finally on the matter of suspending a student from school for several days as a consequence of breaking school community rules. This is a serious step to take and only works if the parents are part of the action. Maybe it is needed as a circuit breaker, but again I say only if the parents are fully involved.
In a school community where student and staff wellbeing are seriously worked on tough love is needed on fewer occasions.
Forgot to mention drug use within the school community. Very tricky! Needs to be dealt with but you may need expert help with this one.
May the Force be with you!
GD
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