I’ve been struggling lately with the perceived line between what administrators do and don’t do.  Tradition says they discipline, manage, make sure others know they are in charge, etc.  I love instructional leadership, but miss kids.  I don’t want to spend the rest of my career just interacting with “the bad kids.”  As an administrator I’m not supposed to be able to teach a class or have friendly relationships with teachers. But as we’re encouraged to move away from a hierarchical system to a learning community, why are these old standards still the norm?  I believe that I can still make opportunities for me to teach both teachers and students.  Someone once told me that if I missed having relationships with students that I needed to get back into teaching.  I believe I can have the best of both worlds.  I’m not sure how it will happen, but I know I can work to redefine what it means to be an administrator.  I also know if I were to go back into teaching I would be a much better one than when I left, but I would be worrying about what was going on in other classrooms and itching to guide those teachers. 

 

Education is all about what goes on in the classroom.  My job as an administrator is to teach the teachers so that they can be better.  But if I forget about the students or what it’s like to be in a classroom with them, then what’s the point? 

 

I want to have my cake and eat it too.