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AWSP Blog


  • Dr. Scott Seaman, Executive Director, AWSP
    Feb 4, 2021
    2020 was rough. Pretty sure I’m pointing out the obvious, but it feels good to acknowledge out loud and quite publicly that it was a tough year. What makes a year like 2020 even harder is when we find ourselves in leadership positions. As leaders, we are called to be strong, resilient, stoic, positive, and hopeful through all the peaks and valleys of leadership. During my time as a principal, I quickly learned that my physical, emotional, and spiritual health took a backseat to everyone else. I spent most of my days (and nights) monitoring, nurturing, and encouraging all those within my purview. I had no idea about the amount of mental health counseling I would be doing as a principal on a daily basis. Despite a super long learning curve about human behavior, I did quickly become an expert at internalizing all of my emotions, struggles, stresses, and anxiety in order to attempt to be a smiling, joyful, and positive face for everyone else. Well, guess what? That’s not healthy and is not realistic.
  • David Morrill
    May 1, 2020
    In this edition of AWSP News, we discuss a shoutout to the OSPI team, the incredible school leadership stories of connecting with students, staffulty, and your school community, making it a daily habit to check our website for updates, announcements, and resources, virtual graduation celebrations, the Washington Student Achievement Council and their fantastic resources, self-care and work-life balance with a new activity from our wellness partner, Kaiser Permanente, and the 2020 Census.
  • Roz Thompson
    Apr 30, 2020
    Here is another great activity called a Self-Care Wheel. Use it individually or with your whole staff. It’s brought to us by our fantastic wellness partners from Kaiser Permanente.
  • Dr. Scott Seaman
    Apr 28, 2020
    One unforeseen consequence of a statewide closure has been the massive forced push for all of us to engage in the virtual meeting space. We might have dabbled before in Zoom, Skype, Google Hangouts, and Microsoft Teams, but now we are all exceeding standard. AWSP is offering weekly Office Hours for members to engage with with the AWSP Executive Team and K-12 principals from all over the state. This is a wide open session of give and take, but more importantly, to hear our members (principals, assistant principals and other school leaders) share challenges, successes, and barriers they are facing as newly assigned digital leaders. It is so incredible to watch these natural and organic conversations take off each week that I find myself thinking, "Why didn't we do this sooner?"

Like to Write?

We're always looking for guest contributions. If you have a passion to write and things to share, email David about a guest post or a role as a recurring guest blogger.