AWSP Blog

I’ve been “out of the building” now as a recovering high school principal for about seven years. My trips to the grocery store are still filled with high fives and hellos from kids and families. As a principal, I always prioritized relationships above all else, and the evidence of that can be found in any aisle of the grocery store to this day. There is no way those relationships would have happened with sixteen little video squares on a computer screen

If you think principaling was tough before COVID19, what about now? If we kill the will of our principals by not addressing the workload, stress and increasing demands, then our kids and schools will suffer the consequences through a constant turnover of school leaders. LPI's research highlights the obvious, principals are fighting to survive. But their research also recommends some action we can all take to breathe hope into the system for one of our most precious resources - principals and assistant principals.

We all know that positive adult-student relationships are key to students staying engaged in school. The other major factor contributing to the success of our students is their ability to see a positive future: a future of hope. In an age of school reform, talking about relationships and hope can often get pushed down the list by Common Core, instructional frameworks and testing. AWSP Leadership Framework Criteria 1 talks about the importance of Creating a Culture of learning. Where does this journey begin? It begins with hope.