Find yourself frustrated with your current situation as a school-level leader? Ever wonder who makes some of the big statewide decisions impacting the work you do in your school? Ever consider getting more involved in influencing the P-16 education system? How about just getting better connected with other principals and assistant principals from around the state? Well, guess what? It’s easy to get more involved with AWSP, and WE WANT YOU!

How It Started and How It's Going

This year, we celebrate our 50th anniversary as one of the country’s premier professional membership organizations for principals. Our humble beginning started in 1972, thanks to a handful of courageous leaders who believed “principals” needed their own voice in the P16 educational system. And 50 years later, AWSP has maintained that vision and continues to be a leading voice for principals and assistant principals throughout our state and across the country. However, we’ve only maintained our powerful influence thanks to members taking leadership roles with AWSP year after year.

There has never been a more critical time for us to make a stand for the vital role and work principals and assistant principals do every day for students, staff, and school communities. As we embark on our 50th anniversary, we will spend the year celebrating you and the organization that has faithfully and consistently represented you. Your work for students, staff, and your community is too important not to be recognized and celebrated. We will use this 50th anniversary as an opportunity to continue sharing with the world the work and impact you have day in and day out. Principals matter.

Something Needs to Change

We will use this opportunity to fight for the principalship. It is often described as the best job in the world, yet most challenging. During the last ten years, it’s safe to say the job has become daunting, unrealistic, untenable, and borderline unbearable. Something needs to change because our students cannot afford ineffective or inconsistent leadership. They need you to be great and stay in your role. It’s time for action. It’s time for us to stand up and fight for more realistic working conditions and expectations. Everyone needs to be paying attention to the plight of our school leaders and coming together to brainstorm solutions that provide immediate relief before it’s too late. This is where you come in. We need more principals and assistant principals to join us in this advocacy effort.

Grade Level Leadership Committees: All Levels, All ESDs

For AWSP to maintain its strong presence and reputation in our state and across the nation, we are looking for more members to increase their level of engagement. One of the easiest ways to get involved with AWSP is by serving as an AWSP Regional Representative. We need elementary, middle, and high school grade level representatives from each of the nine Educational Service Districts to serve on our Grade Level Leadership Committees (GLLCs). Each year, positions open on these three committees; and each year, we try to fill those positions with a diverse group of principals and assistant principals throughout each of the nine regions. Is this your year? We hope so!

How Will YOU Help Shape Education?

In 2006, I was a high school principal, and I decided to get more involved with AWSP. I chose to serve as a Regional Representative for the High School Leadership Committee. Ultimately, that decision changed the trajectory of my career and had enormous benefits for my school and district. I instantly had access and the voice to influence changes at the state level, but most importantly, I joined a network of fellow school leaders walking the same leadership journey. Many of those colleagues have become lifelong friends. We have advocated together for the best interest of students in our state.

During the last few years, we’ve made long-overdue system changes at AWSP to make it easier and more accessible for any and all principals and assistant principals to get more involved. If you are in your 29th year or 1st year, your voice and input matter. If you’d like more information about what it means to get more involved, just give us a call. If serving as an AWSP Regional Representative sounds too daunting (which it is not), there are several other ways to get engaged as a member of AWSP:

• Serve on one of many AWSP Advisory Councils, 
• Launch and lead a local, regional, and/or state principal PLC, 
• Serve as an AWSP Ambassador,
• Represent AWSP as a liaison on various state-level stakeholder committees, 
• Write articles for our blog, website, and magazine, 
• Send us video ideas or a story about your school, 
• Serve as an AWSP Mentor/Coach, and/or
• Serve as a critical friend by providing feedback to us from the field.

Take the First Step

As you can see, there are lots of ways to be an active and engaged member of AWSP. Again, engaged leaders like you make our organization vibrant, relevant, and strong. Have questions about anything listed above? Just reach out to us.

On behalf of the teams at AWSP, AWSL, and Cispus, we thank you for your service to the students in our state. We also thank you for your membership. You make us strong!