For Teachers RE: Administrators

[Bella the Ball 360]

Okay...do you ever wonder if there is a place on the application for school administrator that says...."are you a psycho, have you got any type of mental illness, have you ever been fired from your job because you have demoralized an entire faculty and/or are you intellectually impaired"?? If you do not answer YES to at least 3 of these we will NOT hire you!!

I swear that in my school district and most of the districts that are around me they take the worst of the worst and hire them in a leadership position. I was just wondering if it was a Massachusetts thing of if they check the same box(es) through out the country!

 

[SetzKitten]

I swear that in my school district and most of the districts that are around me they take the worst of the worst and hire them in a leadership position

I think they just promote them to a level of incompetence. It's the same everywhere.

 

[ADisneygirl]

I agree somewhat with what you are saying. What I find to be true is that when you like them as an AP, when they get promoted something changes in them. I have seen this happen twice now. Maybe it's the job.

 

[Bella the Ball 360]

I agree somewhat with what you are saying. What I find to be true is that when you like them as an AP, when they get promoted something changes in them. I have seen this happen twice now. Maybe it's the job.

I guess but I think it filters down from the Superintendent all the way to the AP. Usually an Ap cannot move up until they have developed the proper psycho attitude. That is why you think it changes them. It is there all the time but what do you think A.P. stands for ...Assistant Psycho or psycho in training.

 

[kirbsam]

nice, real nice. pathetic thread. can you imagine the outcry if an administrator started a thread about the fact that teachers are psycho? oh the horror.

 

[Marseeya]

OMG@!

It's so true!

However, I do have to give kudos to the administration in my kids' elementary school. They've been absolutely wonderful. It's not until middle school that the psychoses begin.

 

[Bella the Ball 360]

nice, real nice. pathetic thread. can you imagine the outcry if an administrator started a thread about the fact that teachers are psycho? oh the horror.

Apparently you are either an administrator or married to one...you obviously have never worked for one who is like this What is pathetic is that it is a fact of life with which many of us are forced to live. When it come to kids and education THAT is what should come first. Sadly most administrators have their own agenda and kids are not at the top.

 

[golfgal]

Well, the administration in our school district is great from the Superintendent on down. I guess you just ended up in crappy schools.

 

[Marseeya]

Apparently you are either an administrator or married to one...you obviously have never worked for one who is like this What is pathetic is that it is a fact of life with which many of us are forced to live. When it come to kids and education THAT is what should come first. Sadly most administrators have their own agenda and kids are not at the top.

I think they get a little too far removed from the kids at a certain level, and have to become political -- that can really change them.

My DS's principal continually says to him, "You're a loser. You'll never amount to anything." The middle school principal used to S C R E A M at the kids at the top of his lungs, all but using profanities at them.

What ed psych class did they pick that up in?

 

[Galahad]

Apparently you are either an administrator or married to one...you obviously have never worked for one who is like this What is pathetic is that it is a fact of life with which many of us are forced to live. When it come to kids and education THAT is what should come first. Sadly most administrators have their own agenda and kids are not at the top.

Everybody in every walk of life:

1) Sometimes has to work for bosses they can't stand and think are incompetent.
2) Think they understand what the boss' job should be, how to do it, that the boss' priorities are messed up, etc.

All those administrators are/were also teachers - many were very good teachers. An us-and-them view of the world is usually counter productive in all of these cases, IMO - whether you are the boss or the worker-bee.

 

[chobie]

Everybody in every walk of life:

1) Sometimes has to work for bosses they can't stand and think are incompetent.
2) Think they understand what the boss' job should be, how to do it, that the boss' priorities are messed up, etc.

All those administrators are/were also teachers - many were very good teachers. An us-and-them view of the world is usually counter productive in all of these cases, IMO - whether you are the boss or the worker-bee.

Actually, not ALL administrators were teachers. Especially once you get t0 the central adminstration of most school districts. Many of those are people did not work up the ranks from teacher to the central office. They got their jobs through cronyism.

 

[Bella the Ball 360]

Actually, not ALL administrators were teachers. Especially once you get t0 the central adminstration of most school districts. Many of those are people did not work up the ranks from teacher to the central office. They got their jobs through cronyism.

YOU GOT IT RIGHT!! Sometimes I wonder if all the people who posted on this thread read the title....which is directed to teachers. But at least chobie you and I can set them straight. I do not think anyone who is a teacher would disagree with what you said. The only suggestion I would have made in your reply is I would have spelled CRONYISM all in caps! I do not think many of the nay sayers got the full impact of the word. I will spell write it again for those who did not CRONYISM.

 

[kirbsam]

Apparently you are either an administrator or married to one...you obviously have never worked for one who is like this What is pathetic is that it is a fact of life with which many of us are forced to live. When it come to kids and education THAT is what should come first. Sadly most administrators have their own agenda and kids are not at the top.

you are wrong on almost all of your accounts about me. i know lousy teachers and lousy administrators. i know teachers unions that dont put kids first and have their own agendas also. i just think it is wrong to bash the whole group for the actions of some. that is stereotyping of the worst kind, and i am just shocked by the double standard and hypocrisy of teachers that do it. thats all. you are entitled to your opinion and i am entitled to mine. no need to tell me about myself, when you dont know me.

 

[Wishing on a star]

OP, So True!

Wow, this thread just kills me!!!

I don't know whether to
or to
or

 

[mickeyfan2]

Okay...do you ever wonder if there is a place on the application for school administrator that says...."are you a psycho, have you got any type of mental illness, have you ever been fired from your job because you have demoralized an entire faculty and/or are you intellectually impaired"?? If you do not answer YES to at least 3 of these we will NOT hire you!!

I swear that in my school district and most of the districts that are around me they take the worst of the worst and hire them in a leadership position. I was just wondering if it was a Massachusetts thing of if they check the same box(es) through out the country!

I think it is country wide. They just move from district to district.

 

[mickeyfan2]

My DS's principal continually says to him, "You're a loser. You'll never amount to anything." The middle school principal used to S C R E A M at the kids at the top of his lungs, all but using profanities at them.

WOW that is so sad and so wrong. Cutting a kid down who is struggling is not going to help.

 

[chobie]

you are wrong on almost all of your accounts about me. i know lousy teachers and lousy administrators. i know teachers unions that dont put kids first and have their own agendas also. i just think it is wrong to bash the whole group for the actions of some. that is stereotyping of the worst kind, and i am just shocked by the double standard and hypocrisy of teachers that do it. thats all. you are entitled to your opinion and i am entitled to mine. no need to tell me about myself, when you dont know me.

Why should a teacher's union put the kids first? The teacher's unions are there to put the teachers first so the teachers can put the kids first. What other union puts someone other than their own members first?

 

[Beth76]

My parents are retired teachers who worked at the same school for many years. All I heard about were the wacky administrators. So they're here in MO too!

My son is entering school in August. I've met the Pricipal and As. Principal who both seem very nice and competent--so far!

 

[pigletz]

OP you read my mind. I was actually going to post something about the horribly insensitive thing my principal said to a teacher yesterday and then I saw your post so I'm putting it here. She called a meeting to inform us that all teachers would be going on the trip to Cedar Point. We had all expressed some reservations about the trip since she bought tickets for every student including those that have been in multiple fights and/or have cursed out teachers throughout the year.
Anyways we have a teacher in our building who doesn't go on field trips because years ago on an overnight trip a kid killed himself by jumping out of the window of his hotel room. Our principal is new to the building but not to the district and apparently didn't know the story. So a couple of us were still in the library when this teacher went up to the principal and started to explain why she couldn't go. The principal said "I don't want to hear it you're going". This of course shocked the teacher who started crying and continued to try to explain. The principal put her had up in the teacher's face and said "Stop talking to me now and get out." After the teacher left, we tried to tell her that this had really happened. Her response was that she had never heard of that happening in this district so it didn't happen. We tried to tell her that it was in a different district but she walked out of the room while we were talking to her.
It really made me sick. Why would she think that someone would make up a story that horrible just to get out of a field trip. This is a very well respected teacher, not someone who is known for doing anything to get out of work. It really made me miss our old principal who was definatly one of the good ones.

 

[momm2four]

I will have to say that I work for an absolutely WONDERFUL principal. The problem with that in our county is that it seems if you are satisfied/happy with the administrator you have, they will definitely move them to another school after one to two years.

We have 79 schools in our county. 21 were just moved to a different school. That's ONE FOURTH of the schools who will now go through adjustments...and they're supposedly not finished moving people.

Our news is showing several schools picketing/protesting the moves, however, it won't help, because our central office personnel NEVER make mistakes. It's always "we're doing what's best for all the schools involved". Talk about words that sound good, but mean nothing....

Now...speaking of psycho administrators....my children's principal takes the cake. She should run for some kind of public office, because if you ever met her, you'd think, "What a wonderfully sweet, kind, lovely woman. To hear her talk, she must really love those students. I bet her teachers just love her." Well...you'd be WRONG!

She lies ("I never told you that"), she refuses to accept the blame for anything ("My secretary didn't tell me you called"), she puts hardships on her teachers ("I'm taking the one kindergarten assistant in the school, and making her my personal assistant"), etc, etc etc.

All you teachers know good subs are valuable to a school (actually, we'll almost take ANY sub on some day, lol). The school secretary called a sub for a job, but the sub couldn't be there until 9 (school starts at 8:15). The secretary told her that it was fine, to just come in at 9. She pulls into the parking lot, only to be met by our principal who was pulling in at the same time. Our prin. asked her why she was there (she does NOT allow anyone to park in front of the school except teachers), and upon finding out that she was a sub arriving late, she told the sub that if she couldn't get there on time, then she was not welcome to sub at that school. SHE SENT HER HOME!!!

She then goes into the office and berates the secretary for telling the sub that she could come in late without asking her because this is HER school. She proceeds to take all the kids in the absent teacher's room and divides them up between the other teachers. (This was directly from the sec, not second hand info)

I can't believe that any sane administrator would do that. Three of our best teachers are leaving our school this year, and many of our parents are applying for hardships to go to other schools.

Our school used to be such a family type, close-knit environment, but since she came 1 1/2 years ago, it has turned into a rigid, rule-ridden place where parents feel like unwelcome visitors.

Sorry to ramble, but your post just struck a nerve with me. It seems that the worse a principal is, the higher in the chain they go. We had another principal in our system that EVERYONE hated. What did they do with her? They made her director of elementary education. It's like "You did such a crappy job managing these 25 people, we're going to put you in charge of ALL the elem. schools!"

And to the poster who thought the OP was being harsh to administrators, I'm sure she meant it tongue in cheek to some degree. I'm pretty sure she doesn't really think ALL principals are that way.

Lori P.