Julie H. Rucker
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Administrative Interviews Report
Assistant Principal #1
Day 1: (6 hours)
The main issue this assistant principal was dealing with in the time that I shadowed her was the school graduation rate for the previous year. Just that week, the school had been notified that it did not make AYP because of the graduation rate based on the data provided by the school to the state. I asked the AP if she would explain to me how graduation rate is determined by the school and by the state for AYP purposes. She informed me that this was what they were trying to determine currently. She had called several people at the state office to get a definitive answer on how graduation rate was determined for AYP for this particular school and had not gotten a final response. She explained that they were having difficulty understanding how the state had identified a class size of 532 to determine graduation rate because the numbers that she and guidance uncovered for the class did not match the state number. She explained how she checked the enrollment date for the year the students had entered the school and each year thereafter using Schoolmax. For the year this class were sophomores, there were 575 students according to school data, but state data showed 532. I did ask why she was looking at sophomore scores instead of freshmen scores, and she explained that she looked at those because that is the grade when students actually entered this school, which is a grades 10-12 school. AYP was determined separately for the 9th grade school, which is housed on a separate campus. Ironically, as we were talking about graduation rates, a student called her to ask about reenrolling for the upcoming school year because she had dropped out the previous year.
Also on this day, I observed her working on inventory and purchase orders where teacher and school supplied were arriving for the current school year. She was also involved in sorting supplies and making sure the staff and faculty were receiving what they had ordered and the school board was receiving the appropriate documentation to prove the school had received what it paid for. Part of the inventory included new notebooks to be used to make the new character education handbooks for all faculty and staff members. I asked how the teachers documented the character education lessons they used, and she explained that she tried to make it as painless as possible for teachers to incorporate character education into their current lesson planning. In fact, she believes that most teachers already incorporate character building lessons into their curriculum. The notebook simply provides teachers with proven strategies to use with their curriculum that enhances character building. When I asked to review the notebook, I was especially impressed with the lengthy list of practical strategies that would be simple to implement in any subject area classroom. As it was my first year in this school, I asked her how successful the program had been thus far, and she replied that she was excited to be going to a national convention to receive a "Promising Practices" award for the school character education program. She had sent in an application detailing the character building strategies the school community currently participates in, and she was notified during the summer that the school was one of 50 award-winners for the convention. While this is not the top award presented by the association, this was a second-tier award for which she was proud.
Day 2: (2 hours)
This was a shorter day because of the AP's personal obligations. We began the day with the previous days discussion of character education at the school. I asked her about different methods the school used outside of the classroom to develop good character traits. She said she wanted the school community to take a character evaluation to give her more data about that. She indicated that she had concerns about the administration of the survey, and when I asked her for more details, it turns out that she was concerned with the length (over 100 questions) of the evaluation as well as strategic issues such as whether to provide the survey online or give a written version.
I also asked her what changes she would like to see happen within the school community to improve the character education program. She responded that from previous surveys, she had determined that students want MORE community service opportunities, and she also felt that teachers needed practical tips on how to painlessly incorporate character education in their teaching without intruding on instructional time needed to cover their class curriculum, and she was following through with the latter by providing tips in the new character education notebooks which would be provided to all faculty and staff at the beginning of the school year.
Assistant Principal #2: 1 Day (10 hours)
I shadowed this assistant principal during a school event, the region one-act play competition. He and I acted as the official time-keepers for this event which brought seven other region schools to our performing arts center. He and I started at 7 a.m. monitoring the unloading of the props and costumes for the four schools that would perform before lunch. We also monitored them when they loaded their props after performance and while the second four schools unloaded to prepare for the afternoon performances.
I was curious as to why an administrator would be backstage for a ten hour day when the activity was on our campus where several administrators can be located easily if they are needed. Besides the fact that he enjoys being a part of this event, which has been on our school campus for several years, he also needs to be there in a supervisory role to ensure all schools can get in and out of the facility in a timely manner. He also served in an official role, clarifiying the rules of the competition for those who had a question. He also was willing to handle any reasonable requests the schools may have about where they could leave their props, how much time they would have between plays, if they performed under the time limit for the competition, etc. He also was there to ensure there was no clash between the personalities of the students or their advisors and that a spirit of fair play was evident during the course of the entire event. He was familiar with all of the drama advisors in the region and indicated who could cause a potential problem. Because of his knowledge of the PAC and the facilities of our school (which is his primary job as an AP), he was able to make sure any problems backstage facility-wise were handled in a timely manner.
Another reason he wanted to serve in this capacity is because he enjoyed working with the students and watching them perform during the competition. It gave him the opportunity to be directly involved in a student event and helped him continue a positive relationship with students from our school who were participating in the competition.
Principal Observation: 1 Day (6 hours)
I chose to observe an elementary (grades 4-6) principal for this practicum activity to give me a taste of administration at a different grade level. The principal that I shadowed and interviewed was a new principal. He had previously served for several years as an AP on the high school level. He had been on the job for about a month when I shadowed him.
I asked him what he felt would be the most important part of his job as the administrator in charge of a school, and he replied that he felt the most important part was communication with parents. In his view, parents should have a say in their students' educations. He said everyone deserved a "fair shake" and should be heard. Often it is communication with parents that will prevent discipline problems with students. It is also important to communicate with parents when their students are doing something potentially destructive. If a student is open enough to tell an administrator, then that student wants someone to know. Even if it is private, we are obligated to tell parents.
Another issue of concern for this principal was vandalism that had occurred on school property over the summer. It wasn't the first incident of vandalism at the school. While we were talking, the ESOL teacher who serves his school came in to ask him to move her inside to a classroom rather than leaving her in a portable because her room had been vandalized last year--he had just inspected that room earlier in the day because of vandalism that occurred two days prior. I asked him later if he would be able to accomodate her request. He took me on a walking tour of the school and showed me where all the rooms were currently in use, and though he understood her desire to be inside the building, it currently wasn't physically possible for her to have a classroom in the building for her use when she was only at the school for half a day. Several weeks into the school year, I saw him again and asked him about this teacher. He indicated that he had been able to find a space for her to use inside the building, which, for security reasons, was a safer environment for her students.
Other issues he addressed that day included teacher certification--one teacher hadn't received his praxis scores to serve as an MI teacher--and scheduling. When I asked what potential problems they had with scheduling, he told me that students had to be scheduled for a 90 minute segment of math, uninterrupted. English/Language Arts had a minimum of 120 minutes each day, but that segment could be interrupted. Other issues included scheduling teachers for common planning times if they were co-teaching inclusion classes as well as scheduling lunches. After the draft of the schedule was completed, it had to be sent to the central office to be reviewed by personnel there and then approved before it could be distributed to faculty at the beginning of the school year.
All in all, I feel that I had a wide-variety of observation experiences, ranging from being a part of a school activity, observing and then discussing issues related to the maintenance and operation of a school building (vandalism), discussing issues related to master scheduling an elementary school, observing and discussing the character education initiative at a high school, and that's just for the longer observation periods I had with administrators. Other work at shorter periods of time included dealing with student discipline, unpacking orders for instructional use, examining data and using it to identify students for a mentoring program, addressing the faculty about the new mentoring program, and visiting the "bowels" of the school to see how the power and water systems worked for a facility of over 250,000 square feet.