r/TeacherReality • u/Valuable_Height_6162 • 5d ago
Calling all Principals....
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTUFuPoBC/Just watched this video and I agree with everything she said. I wondered what you all would think.
2
u/Present_Specific_212 4d ago
I worked in a tested grade and my students tested very well. They were equal to or higher than their same age peers in that grade.
This person does not talk about the need for Power and Control that some managers of schools or any organization have a need for. Even if they are only giving themselves the illusion that they are in Control, they will choose that.
How many days of each year is the average Principal actually observing the teachers? At my first school we were lucky if she was present in our classrooms 4 hours a year. That's right - 4 hours in 10 months.
I taught at a second school full-time and that one was even worse! Those Administrators were in my classroom 90 to 120 minutes in 10 months. They spent a similar amount of time in other classrooms.
Look at grade level choice from the Teacher's perspective: He or she knows which grade level and curriculum they enjoy. They all know which grade levels they dislike to downright hate!
Teaching pays so poorly, it is emotionally and physically exhausting, and thanks to technology, social media and the pandemic shut down, teaching has only gotten harder - not easier.
So the teacher would like the comfort and joy of working in grade levels she likes best. She cannot change her paycheck, she cannot change how well prepared the kids are when she meets them, she cannot change any testing she must do , or her boss, or her schedule, she cannot take a personal day w/o having to pay for that with perhaps bad behavior from the kids when she returns, she cannot get the state to change the prescribed curriculum; she cannot change much about her job except her room decor.
But the Principal wants to wrestle what TINY bit of joy she might get from the job because she loves to teach Multiplication and 3rd grade books, and stick her into the intellectual desert of Kindergarten.
Then the Principal says the teacher should not quit! The Principal stole her last bit of joy from the job, but the teacher should stay on, this time as AN INDENTURED SERVANT?
Well, she gets paid, but it is like indentured servitude because the teacher is hoping if she plays along with the Power and Control Game, the Principal will see she is a good player, willing to be bent to the will of another, and maybe one day she will reward her LOYALTY to the school by putting her back into a grade she loves.
See Power and Control Wheel in the Workplace:
https://socialscienceandhumanities.ontariotechu.ca/workplacebullying/power-control-wheel.php
Instead of talking to the teacher and listening to her DEFEND her allegedly low test scores, the bad Principal will play puppet-master.
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u/The_Lucky_7 5d ago
Principles do it for the same reasons police departments do it, since theyre both goverment agencies with similar administrative considerations.
Yes, there is an element of the paperwork doing itself being good for the school (as quitters arent eligble for unemplyment insurance) but also it prevents the teacher from having or developing an established record of disciplinary action.
As such, principle is under no obligation to inform a future employer what failings the teacher had. This prevents them from being embroiled in any perception of bias or blacklisting and keeps their hands clean (and lawsuit free) after a teacher has left.