Growing up in a competitive society it’s difficult to wrap your mind around losing. As a former All American Athlete at the University of Michigan, failure was something that got you blasted by your friends and teammates. In the athletic arena failing teaches you that you have to try harder, work out longer, change your techniques to compensate for weaknesses and rely on your teammates and coaches to put you in the best possible position to win.

In business failure can be even more cut throat and means you could lose your job. In education, the stakes are even higher and failure could mean destroying a child’s life. Under these circumstances it’s hard to risk failure and try new things. However as a Principal you are in a leadership position in order to make decisions in which failure is a real possibility. Below are three reasons you should want to fail and fail quickly.

Demonstrates Courage
Trying innovative programs and ideas can galvanize your staff. If your building is filled with stale ideas from the past and cynicism about the future, the courage to try something new can help break you out of the malaise. During this coronavirus opportunity and the drastic changes it is forcing we can put new ideas into place.

Shows a Growth Mindset
Schools are not too big to fail. And with the massive budget cuts to education this will be truer than ever. As the Principal trying new things, failing at them and then learning from them is an essential part of leadership. We need to institute changes, collect and reflect on the data and change course accordingly. Right now is the time to shine and demonstrate the power of being a continual learner.

Models Vulnerability
Being vulnerable is an exercise in courage, especially when you're exposing yourself to criticism. Your staff will, in turn, be comfortable telling their truths and be open to asking for help. Mutual vulnerability creates a culture of community. According to Brene Brown, who was quoted in Harvard Business Review,
Vulnerability here does not mean being weak or submissive. To the contrary, it implies the courage to be yourself. It means replacing “professional distance and cool” with uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure.
Failing at something and being truthful about it is an example of vulnerability. It will give your staff and students the courage to try new things, fail and try again.

Being a great principal means you will often be in a position to fail. Failure demonstrates courage, shows that growth mindset and models vulnerability. Embrace that fact and embrace failure as an opportunity to create your future.

For more short articles and tips that support educational leaders check out my blog at the www.howtobeagreatprincpal.com and/or order my newest book How To Be A Great Principal: 36 Shared Leadership Success Strategies. You can also get a monthly email that delivers the most valuable blogs as voted by readers by joining the Principals’ Prep Minute. You can register right on the website.

If you’re an auditory learner you can download my podcast The Principal Entrepreneur, on itunes and podomatic, episodes replayed weekly. If you’re interested in sharing your experience as an edleader please email me at [email protected]. Finally, I’m part of a community of supportive principals please join our private FB group.

As principals we protect our students, and staff, budgets and everything else, but rarely do we protect our time with the same vigilance. As building leader time is always in short supply because we give it away. Being efficient with our tasks creates the opportunity for us to have more time to focus on our goals that move that actually have a chance of moving our schools forward. Summer, when we MAY have more time :-), is the perfect opportunity to reflect on the best way to protect it and spend it. These 5 ways to save time are strategies we can add to our toolbox.

Skip the nonessentials
What do you absolutely need to do in order to be highly effective and efficient? Those are the priorities that you focus on first. Everything else can either be eliminated or delegated.

Keep focused on your mission
Keeping focused on your mission will help you make decisions about what you bring into your school. This will save time as you only allow programs that support your plan. Often times we get caught up in something that is cool or fun for the kids and it doesn’t support our overall goals. Stay focused on the mission until it is complete.

Implement multiple strategies
When it comes to time management come at it from multiple angels. Use technology to help save time, find others who complement your weaknesses so that important tasks can get done more quickly. Save your bandwidth for things only you can do. Stacking time saving strategies will compound the effects and provide you the hours for which you’ve been looking.

Make time for yourself
Making time for yourself actually increases your productivity. It gives you the mental capacity to do deep thinking. You actually will accomplish less if you try to pack more busy work in. Your brain like a muscle needs to rejuvenate so it can come back refreshed.

Time for a principal is precious. Often times it is wasted putting out other people’s fires. By managing our personal time consistently we can find more time to focus on quality work.

What are ways that you save time? Share your strategies in the comment section below.

If you found this entertaining, educational or cause for reflection, please follow me and click share so your friends and colleagues can benefit as well.

For more short articles and tips that support educational leaders check out my blog at the www.howtobeagreatprincpal.com and/or order my newest book How To Be A Great Principal: 36 Shared Leadership Success Strategies. You can also get a monthly email that delivers the most valuable blogs as voted by readers by joining the Principals’ Prep Minute. You can register right on the website.

If you’re an auditory learner you can download my podcast The Principal Entrepreneur, on itunes and podomatic, episodes replayed weekly. If you’re interested in sharing your experience as an edleader please email me at [email protected]. Finally, I’m part of a community of supportive principals please join our private FB group.

#theprincipalentrepreneur #leadership #principal #secondaryprincipals #nassp #massp #maesp #edchat #educhat #edadmin #sharedleadership #howtobeagreatprincipal #jonathanroyce #principallife

Summer time is the season for principals to craft a new version of the student handbook. This is a time honored tradition as eagerly anticipated as the annual trip to the dentist. The student handbook seems to be updated and revised every year as new state laws and new societal situations impact our schools. Like the Iphone a new one is needed each year or it will no longer be compatible with new situations.

Perhaps this year a section will need to be added about transgender students or about procedures in case of a school shooting. Regardless of what is added, as principals it’s something that needs to be done regularly. These five tips will help yours be awesome, or at least as awesome as a student handbook can be. :-D

Write from one student/parent perspective
Imagine and pick one parent as your avatar. This would be your typical parent that you want to inform of your most relevant school policies. By focusing on a single archetypical parent your writing will be more focused. If we try to write for every type of parent we could find ourselves with an overdone, unwieldy piece of writing.

Short and Sweet
By short I mean concise and focused. You still want all your policies in there but cutting and editing it down to the most essential components is necessary. A good idea if you want to expand on certain issues or give scenarios is to provide a link or QR code for more information. With the ever shorter attention spans this is a great way to have a hard copy of the essentials as well as a way to get more information out there as needed.

Research other handbooks
Don’t reinvent the wheel! There are many examples of handbooks that you can check out online. Facebook is also a great source if you’re a part of a principal's group. Every group that I am a part of is very supportive.

Attention to Detail
Being short and sweet does not mean leave that important information out. Make sure things like the school address and phone number are correct. Even your own number. I accidently put my cell phone number in a version and only noticed after the first copy was printed.

I’s and T’s
This falls easily in the realm of attention to detail. Usually we’re doing this thing on our own during the summer. If you can, have someone give it a good once over. Put it aside for a day and come back to with fresh eyes. Review it in reverse. These are great ways to avoid the trap of glazed eyed rereading. Also, double check to make sure what you have aligns with your board policies and can be backed up if you get push back from that one parent.

These 5 simple steps; having a single avatar, keeping it concise, using exemplars, attention to detail and making sure to dot your i’s and cross your t’s can support you in writing an awesome student handbook.

What is your writing process for a student handbook? Share your tips in the comment section below.

If you found this entertaining, educational or cause for reflection, please follow me and click share so your friends and colleagues can benefit as well.

For more short articles and tips that support educational leaders check out my blog at the www.howtobeagreatprincpal.com and/or order my newest book How To Be A Great Principal: 36 Shared Leadership Success Strategies. You can also get a monthly email that delivers the most valuable blogs as voted by readers by joining the Principals’ Prep Minute. You can register right on the website.

If you’re an auditory learner you can download my podcast The Principal Entrepreneur, on itunes and podomatic, episodes replayed weekly. If you’re interested in sharing your experience as an edleader please email me at [email protected]. Finally, I’m part of a community of supportive principals please join our private FB group.

#theprincipalentrepreneur #leadership #principal #secondaryprincipals #nassp #massp #maesp #edchat #educhat #edadmin #sharedleadership #howtobeagreatprincipal #jonathanroyce #principallife

5 characteristics of a great school and 5 simple ways to promote them to increase student enrollment

It’s summertime and a lot of us are reading, reflecting, looking for new books to read, reviewing handbooks, trying to come up with themes for the new school year and in general not relaxing at all :-D.

Part of my reflection is thinking about what makes a great school and how to promote that greatness to increase student enrollment. This is also the time when parents from other schools may begin to look for new schools as their children move from one grade to the next. This is a great opportunity for us to begin planting the seeds of change in their minds.

One of the difficult aspects of our public school system, however, is that it’s hard to differentiate one school from the other. As schools of choice, charter schools and perhaps an impending voucher system for every state proliferate, standing out becomes more difficult.

These days districts with money are using radio spots, billboards, and the back of city buses to promote their schools. There are lower cost and far easier ways to get the word out about our schools. Identify your 5 characteristics of greatness and use these three strategies to promote them. Use these easy to implement strategies to stand out in a crowded educational field. Help your school stay top of mind when families begin thinking of the best place for their child.

Distinctiveness
This isn’t easy for a public school because we have to be everything for everybody. This makes it hard to be unique. One of the advantages that private and charter schools have is their ability to define their own niche. A private school can be religion based and focused solely on a particular faith. Charter schools can have a specific theme or cater to specific ethnicities. As a public school finding your focus is essential to increasing school enrollment. This has traditionally been done through an emphasis on things like athletics or band. In today’s technological age, what are ways you can stand out from the crowd? Answering this question will help you be unique.

Remember, regardless of whether you’re a newly established principal or a veteran you are an expert at what you do. You know exactly what the students need to do to be successful and you’re able to deliver it. The families in your community need you and your school’s particular expertise. Once you identify your unique school culture the next step is spreading the word.

So how do you deliver this information? The easiest way to do so is to use social media. Presumably your school already has a Facebook account. If it doesn’t, start one. According to Facebook stats, Facebook has the largest number of users between 25 and 35. That is a prime age for beginning families. Leverage your demographic data and use a social media platform to meet your families where they are. Use pictures and the smiling faces of your staff and students from the previous year to show how welcoming and safe your school is.

While, as public schools we have to accommodate everyone, we can still specialize in certain areas. Using social media will help spread your unique characteristics.

Dependability
Another way to stand out is to be dependable. Depending on the change in leadership, every few years schools lurch from one new directive to the next. This fosters uncertainty and parents aren’t sure from year to year what their child is going to get. Being consistent in your offerings helps parents know what they’re going to see when they come in for their second and third child. With that expected way of doing things the parents and the staff can confidently state what is happening year to year and promote your school. No one likes instability. Being unstable will creates anxiety among your stakeholders and make choosing another option more likely. Be dependable and not only will families stand by you they’ll sell your school for you.

The most dependable assets at a school are also the greatest asset. The staff. Often we forget that they can do more than just teach. They have hundreds of contacts in their own email and social media accounts. Use them to help spread the word of how dependable and stable your school is. Once a month pass something onto them that they can share with those with whom they have influence. It could be as simple as a picture of them working with their students. Add a brief caption about how great the students are and send it to their friends and families asking them to share it with their friends. As the end of the year approaches have the teachers spread the word that they’ll be back and and are excited to see the new crop of kids. If this becomes a consistent practice you'll be surprised how far the word spreads.

Passion
Passion for your work is the secret ingredient and leads to sustained excellence. If you think of the great Principals they demonstrate enthusiasm on a daily basis. This enthusiasm helps principals promote their school because they're the first ones at the door in the morning greeting families, students, and staff as they come in.

An enthusiasm for the work can also lend itself to the creation of content. If you’re excited about the things you do particularly well, spread the word. Your school might have small learning communities or have a great curriculum. Write a blog post or an article highlighting the researched based reasons these unique qualities positively impact your students’ growth.

These families that you greet every day, you have them on an email list. In marketing this is one of the most valuable commodities because it give you direct access to those families. Use that list to share your content. Ask them to forward the email to families who might be interested in seeing the good things your school is doing.

Collaboration.
Collaboration is something that we all know intuitively is something we should do consistently, but sometimes we get so caught up trying to get something done that we forget. Gathering the advice and listening to the point of view of those on our staff is important in building a strong culture and helps lead to successes. Treating your entire staff as integral parts of a whole, creates the opportunity for more wins.

Families might not be able to see that collaboration first hand but they will see the impact of it. Staff will be happier and more involved and this will spill over into how the students are treated.

A great way to share the those successes that come through collaboration is through Twitter. Twitter is a great way to give a distilled version of events. Where on Facebook there’s the opportunity to expand on updates, Twitter forces you to be concise. A great way to connect to parents is through a school twitter account. Keep parents in the loop so they can feel a part of the community as well. I’ve also seen schools tweet out school events like band concerts and athletic contacts. In addition, because you have limited time you can simply grab headlines from your Facebook posts and tweet those out including a link back to your Facebook page

Growth Mindset
Schools with a growth mindset are always learning. They don’t rest on past accomplishments and continually look for ways to improve. Just like people with a growth mindset aren’t afraid of failure, schools with a growth mindset aren’t afraid to try new things and look for ways to innovate. Just like collaboration spills over from staff to students so does the growth mindset. Students with the growth mindset tend to have more grit and are more likely to find long term success. This grit is easily seen in the intense looks and focused concentration students have when working on new tasks.

Sharing these pictures is a great way to let parents know how hard their child is working. Using a school Instagram account to capture these moments and share with families is another way to promote your school’s culture. Instagram is visual based and is most often only comprised of simple pictures with captions like “hard at work”. For busy principals with a visual style it only takes a minute to say a thousand words.

Successful Principals and by extension schools promote themselves with their one of a kind offering, dependability, enthusiasm, collaboration and growth mindset. Using social media tools like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, leveraging your staff, and sharing your enthusiasm for education through content creation are quick easy ways to spread the positive word. These simple strategies can help you maintain and increase your student enrollment.

What are other tactics you use to stand out and what are ways that you connect and spread the word to your families? Share your thoughts in the comment section below

If you found this entertaining, educational or cause for reflection, please follow me and click share so your friends and colleagues can benefit as well.

For more short articles and tips that support educational leaders check out my blog at the www.howtobeagreatprincpal.com and/or order my newest book How To Be A Great Principal: 36 Shared Leadership Success Strategies. You can also get a monthly email that delivers the most valuable blogs as voted by readers by joining the Principals’ Prep Minute. You can register right on the website.

If you’re an auditory learner you can download my podcast The Principal Entrepreneur, on itunes and podomatic, episodes replayed weekly. If you’re interested in sharing your experience as an edleader please email me at [email protected]. Finally, I’m part of a community of supportive principals please join our private FB group.

If you’ve spent any time on Facebook you can’t help but to have at least caught a glimpse of kids skateboarding, BMX riding, or doing playground gymnastics and falling painfully onto sensitive body parts.

Well this is the principal’s version. My personal highlight reel of areas in which I need to improve. The school year is often composed of many fires each day which we race around and extinguish. Sometimes we’re moving so fast that embers remain and ignite the very next day so we repeat the same race. Before we know it a Quarter, Semester and then 3/4ths of the year are gone. The goals we put in place for ourselves, no matter how SMART, are not fully reached.

Below are my top fails of the 17-18 school year. These are areas that I will improve on in the 18-19 school year.

Consistently Reach Out to Parents
Connect consistently with community partners
Complete evaluations in a timely manner
Support struggling teachers consistently
Increase student attendance to 80%
Immediately address staff member/s who are out of line
Spend more time with wife/family
Spend more time with close friends
Consistently appreciate my wife’s support
Learn more, more consistently.

As you read these you’ll notice that there is almost an even split between school stuff and school’s impact on my personal time. I’m wondering if I do a better job of managing school related items this will free up time to be with my family.

As I look at my list there are items here that can be delegated and streamlined with my excellent staff and perhaps even my students. I’m thinking 1, 2, and 5.
Consistently Reach Out to Parents
Connect consistently with community partners
Increase student attendance to 80%
This will free me up to do 3 and 4.
Complete evaluations in a timely manner
Support struggling teachers consistently

Number 6, failure to address a staff member who was out of line is a priority. It is something I need to work on because I get really uncomfortable calling people out in the moment. I consistently do it the day after and come at it sideways by asking questions about the incident. I don’t know if this is the best way to handle those types of situations and is something I will continue to think about.

To spend more time with wife and family I should schedule that time just as I schedule time for school meetings and appointments. I can probably do the same thing with close friends. As for consistently appreciating my wife’s support that’s going to take the most work. I do do it, but not as much as she’d like.

Number 10 can also probably be handled like I hope to handle family and friends. I can set aside time for personal growth and independent learning. The more I learn, especially about leadership the better both my role as principal, husband, father and friend will be.

These were my top 10 failures of 17-18. My goal is to eradicate them in 18-19. Just like those kids in the Facebook videos, I’ll dust myself off, put on some ice packs and try again. It’s not the falling that counts, it’s the getting up.

In what areas do you seek to improve? Share your growth areas in the comment section below as well as possible strategies. That way we can continue to learn from each other. I know you’ll have some ideas that I haven’t even thought of.

If you found this entertaining, educational or cause for reflection, please follow me and click share so your friends and colleagues can benefit as well.

For more short articles and tips that support educational leaders check out my blog at the www.howtobeagreatprincpal.com and/or order my newest book How To Be A Great Principal: 36 Shared Leadership Success Strategies. You can also get a monthly email that delivers the most valuable blogs as voted by readers by joining the Principals’ Prep Minute. You can register right on the website. If you’re interested in principal swag that speaks to our #principallife you can take a look here.

If you’re an auditory learner you can download my podcast The Principal Entrepreneur, on itunes and podomatic, episodes replayed weekly. If you’re interested in sharing your experience as an edleader please email me at [email protected]. Finally, I’m part of a community of supportive principals please join our private FB group.

#theprincipalentrepreneur #leadership #principal #secondaryprincipals #nassp #massp #maesp #edchat #educhat #edadmin #sharedleadership #howtobeagreatprincipal #jonathanroyce #principallife