Beyond Clean Bathrooms: Some Thoughts on School Management

When I first started out as a school administrator I read an article in a parenting magazine about choosing the right school for your child. The first piece of advice: go check out the bathrooms. The writer wasn’t claiming that clean bathrooms led directly to quality learning, but that a school that paid such close attention to bathrooms would, no doubt, be very careful when it came to educating children.

In a previous blog post I wrote that if a school is serious about setting learning goals, the staff need to have clarity around what they consider to be “good” or “excellent” in those target areas.  The next step is to be just as serious about what is “good” or “excellent” when it comes to the school’s organization and management. Just as Disney World creates a Magic Kingdom for visitors by using its behind-the-scenes Utilidor System for cast members, and cruise ships use their Deck 0 utility tunnels (called “I-95”) to ensure a wonderful experience on the upper decks, schools have management systems that benefit parents and students, even if they aren’t always visible.

In my experience, ensuring clean bathrooms isn’t that hard. What’s hard is creating complex policies, procedures, and systems that are effective and user-friendly.

Unfortunately, deep mastery of school management is not always seen as a priority or worth the effort. Newsletter articles and letters to donors highlight vision and innovation, not school organization.  But lack of sophistication and mastery in this area can have huge consequences.

In his book The Management Myth, Matthew Stewart writes: “management relies on both a techne (meaning “skill or craft”)…and ethos (meaning “a pattern of behavior, or character). While techne addresses the goal of efficiency, ethos is concerned with building trust...[those who master both] may lay claim to a kind of practical wisdom called phronesis…  It is the ideal toward which the gurus, in their better moments, urge us to strive.” ¹

Phronesis is developed through each administrator’s experiences, their deep understanding of the details of various situations and processes, and their moral character. A leader’s phronesis impacts the practices, policies, shared understandings, systems, and “how things work” that enable people to be at their best, and achieve their school’s goals. Ultimately, it creates and strengthens a positive school culture.

According to Richard Halverson, one way to assess an administrator’s phronesis is through artifacts. Not the physical ones found in an archaeological dig, but the operational policies, programs, and procedures found in a school². In all schools, there will be artifacts that perfectly align with an administrator’s intended practice. But there are just as likely to be some artifacts that show a lack of alignment.

Based on personal conversations and a quick internet survey of teachers in Jewish schools, there are many policies and practices that make teachers ask (or complain!): “Why are things so disorganized?” or “Why can’t they get this right?” or “Don’t they know how this makes us feel?” In other words, not only do these “artifacts” make teachers question administrator’s phronesis; they drive teachers crazy! ³

So, how can administrators ensure that their organization and management both support their educational goals and your faculty? I recommend doing a quick Phronesis Tune-Up a few times each year.

Part 1: Examine your practice.

If you are an administrator, ask yourself how your values are expressed in the operation of your school. Do others recognize these values in the way your school works? Would teachers say that one of those values is how you treat them? Would staff members say you base your decisions on a deep knowledge of the program, the staff, the building, and the community; on how things really work in a school setting? 

Part 2: Gather some facts

Here are some more questions to ask your faculty and staff:

• ·         What are some of the things that are in place that make your job difficult? Why are these a problem?
• ·         What can we do differently in these areas to make things better?
• ·         What are some of the things that are not yet in place that would be helpful? How would these help make things better?
• ·         Which rules, policies, and procedures are unclear?
• ·         Which rules, policies, and procedures are not being consistently followed?
• ·         What are some things that administrators do that frustrate you or make you feel devalued?
• ·         Are there policies and practices that save time? Waste time?

In a Harvard Business Review article⁴, Susan Peppercorn recommends that supervisors regularly ask their direct reports five questions. Here are two that summarize the issue:

• What do you need from me to do your best work? 
• Are you able to do your best work every day?  

Spend some time understanding the problematic policies or practices that bother teachers: How do they impact people? What values do they express (or fail to express)? What changes would restore trust and respect?  This approach will help you avoid hearing one of the most famous complaints from teachers who have left the profession: Nobody asks teachers!⁵

Part 3:  Re-Align

            Using the information you gather, work with staff to make some changes.

I suggest using this formula: We will now do X so that …..

             As an example, here is one of the complaints listed in the footnotes:  Multi-grade                                         assemblies are often added to the schedule; teachers are usually given one days’ notice.

             With teachers and administrators working together, a resulting policy and procedural change                  might include the following language:

We will create a deadline-driven New Program Request Procedure so that:

1.      teachers will be able to express concerns about a program’s content and/or timing;

2.      adjust their planning accordingly;

3.      feel that their time and instructional program are respected. 

Re-alignment is more than solving a logistics challenge. Finding the right way to handle these and other issues affects how students, parents, and teachers perceive their school and one another; ultimately, they can update and even transform the school’s culture.   

Part 4:  Reassess

Build into the annual calendar opportunities to revisit and reassess how your policies, practices, beliefs, and character impact the people in the building.

 

In conclusion, the following verse can serve as a reminder of what goes into thoughtful school management and organization:

בְּ֭חׇכְמָה יִבָּ֣נֶה בָּ֑יִת וּ֝בִתְבוּנָ֗ה יִתְכּוֹנָֽן וּ֭בְדַעַת חֲדָרִ֣ים יִמָּלְא֑וּ כׇּל־ה֖וֹן יָקָ֣ר וְנָעִֽים

 

A house is built by wisdom, and is established by understanding; by knowledge are its rooms filled with all precious and beautiful things.  

Mishei (Proverbs) 24:3-4

The craft and character of school management rely on practical חׇכְמָה (chochma), or wisdom, as well as sensitivity, empathy, and concern for everyone’s needs.

Great ideas, innovations, and vision are wonderful and highly valued. But thoughtful, careful execution is priceless.

 

Rabbi Jim Rogozen

 _______________________________________________________________________

 Notes:

¹ Matthew Stewart, The Management Myth, 2009 

² Richard Halverson, Accessing, Documenting, and Communicating Practical Wisdom: The  

   Phronesis of School Leadership Practice, American Journal of Education, 2004, Volume 111, #1)

³  A sampling of teacher complaints:

• ·         Teachers receive the daily/weekly schedule for the year the day before school begins. That schedule changes every day for about two weeks.
• ·         Multi-grade assemblies are often added to the schedule; teachers are usually given one day’s notice.
• ·         Afternoon assemblies are often scheduled to end too late for classes to go back to their classrooms, but too soon for dismissal, creating chaos for teachers trying to keep track of their students.
• ·         The distribution of “duties” (recess, lunch, dismissal) is uneven and goes unexplained.
• ·         Rather than hire substitutes, teachers are told in the morning they will need to cover a class or two, even if they have other important things going on. There is no direction about what to do with the time.
• ·         Teachers walking down the hall see another teacher’s students acting inappropriately, but they ignore the behavior.
• ·         Report card comments in the same grade run from one sentence to several paragraphs.
• ·         Report card categories do not align with the school’s goals or actual classroom learning.
• ·         Teachers are not trained on how to use phones, access Wi-Fi, use the copier, etc.
• ·         Teachers don’t know where to get supplies.
• ·         Teachers don’t know their classroom budgets for the year, or how to get reimbursed for their purchases.
• ·         Parents (and administrators) send emails to teachers at all hours of the day/night.
• ·         The administration does not send reminders about coming events.
• ·         The administration never sends feedback about the emails/newsletters that teachers send to parents.
• ·         Administrators don’t say “thank you” to teachers.
• ·         Policies are clear but aren’t uniformly enforced (e.g. sick days, vacation days).
• ·         Administrators always tell the staff that “we’re a family” but don’t give out name tags or introduce people during staff orientation.
• ·         Principals aren’t up to date with the curriculum or the resources available for the curriculum that they expect teachers to use. 
• ·         Administrators ask teachers to do 30-60 hours of training for a new curriculum - with only 5 days’ notice.
• ·         The Teacher Handbook says teachers may not use cellphones, but they communicate with teachers throughout the day using WhatsApp and expect teachers to respond right away.

⁴   Susan Peppercorn, 5 Questions Every Manager Needs to Ask Their Direct Reports, Harvard                                Business  Review, January 22, 2022 

⁵  https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/teachers-leaving/  May 12, 2022