Escaping the School Leader's Dunk Tank by Rebecca Coda & Rick Jetter

Author:Rebecca Coda & Rick Jetter
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-9969896-7-1
Publisher: Dave Burgess Consulting, Inc.
Published: 2016-12-22T16:00:00+00:00

The Hunger to Advance

Chances are you chose the field of education because you wanted to make a difference. In fact, most educators are in the business of serving the community and putting student achievement ahead of their own needs — even if that requires putting in long days on occasion. But there are those in education whose driving motive is getting ahead. They are willing to put in excessive hours in hopes of earning a better title. Let’s examine a scenario about a federal programs director who allowed work to preoccupy every aspect of his life. Tune in and notice what his administrative secretary says about her boss’s all-consuming motive to advance his career:

Nearly every day was the same broken record. I would receive a call from the Chief Academic Officer (CAO) and Rafael (my director) would run down to her office to meet at her beck and call. Rafael would return with a steno pad filled out front and back with another long list of things to do. He would agree to do anything for her, last minute, even if it wasn’t anywhere near the jurisdiction of our department.

It was my job to manage Rafael’s calendar and fit in everything. I needed to set appointments on his calendar to follow up with principals, gather data on the instructional coaches, organize the luncheon for the district secretaries’ meeting, redo the assessment graphs to look at the data in a different way, check in with the other departments to put in an office supply order, all while planning and coordinating the district-wide professional development day. Rafael was literally the CAO’s puppet. He wanted to advance his career so badly that he was willing to take on work outside his department, do menial tasks, and work all hours of the night just to try to impress the CAO.

Many times I overheard personal phone calls in Rafael’s office that sounded like this: “Mom, I’m not going to be able to help you tonight. I’ve got this really big project I’m working on, and I have to do this if I want to ever move into an assistant superintendent position.” Or “Hi, honey, I’m not going to make it home for dinner tonight, so just go ahead and feed the kids. Hopefully I will be back before you go to bed. I gotta do this, honey, if I am going to make it to the next level; I just have to put in my time. It is just the price we have to pay to get to the next level.”

Rafael was leashed to his phone. He answered texts at all hours of the night and responded to e-mails within minutes. He always told me about how much he worked. I was afraid that he would eventually crash and burn. I could look at things objectively, but he couldn’t see the storm that he was creating. He really didn’t have a life other than work.

— Marietta Schmidt, Administrative Secretary, Nevada

For some people, the need to advance their careers becomes all-consuming.

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