Chapter 5
LOSING ISN'T EVERYTHING:
Integrity in Leadership
I once attended a principal's meeting called to discuss ways of responding to student demands. A certain principal had cited an issue that was currently facing him. His all-black student body desired to change the name of their school to honor a martyred black leader whom they respected. Public opinion seemed to be against the change, but the Board of Education as yet had issued no directive.
"What can I tell the students," asked the principal, "when I don't know what position the Board will
take?"
Other principals in the group were suggesting ways of stalling for time. After sitting and listening for a while, I said: "There is still another position that nobody has mentioned. You could judge the merits of the students' request and if you agree that the students have a case, then take their side."
The key to this approach, of course, is that the principal has to be able to make up his own mind on the issue. "If it makes sense to you," I continued, "say so. Don't wait for the Board to tell you what's right or wrong. It's just that kind of follow-the-leader attitude of educational 'leaders' that has diminished our schools' ability to play a significant role in the lives of children. The kids need to know where you stand, whether you're with them or against them."
In this case the principal truly believed that the students were right. He believed that the name of the school should be changed. The trouble was, he suspected, along with the rest of us, that the Board was out to crush the students on this point. He knew that a principal can get stomped on, just like the students.
But finally he came out with the students. He argued the case at an open, televised School Board meeting. He was not speaking in an insubordinate way, but merely joining with other speakers who talked for or against the change. He spoke with candor and courage.
Predictably, the Board members really unloaded on him and his students. They condescendingly explained that they couldn't go changing a school's name every time the racial composition of the neighborhood changed. Several Board members also suggested that the principal had reduced his own effectiveness by taking a public stand alongside his students.
How wrong they were! A principal doesn't live with the Board. His life is with the students, the teachers, and the community. If he is to lead the school, he must be responding to the school as a totality, not to the needs of the distant power structure.
While it appeared on the television screen that this principal suffered a humiliating defeat, the next day at his school, student were talking about "our defeat." They felt that the principal was their own man. He hadn't lost credibility by losing the fight. A person only loses his place of respect by not fighting when he should.
I'm not saying that the teacher or principal must always side with the students and take their fight, whatever it is, as his own. For my part, I always told students my interest was in major issues. I didn't believe in making the grand march for a minor or silly cause, in wasting energy on something that wouldn't make a great deal of difference in the issue of improving the education they were getting each day.
One time, for instance, several students came into my office. They wanted to wear dashikis to class and some teachers were resisting. Would I take a strong stand on their behalf? Would I support them in a confrontation?
It wasn't the kind of thing that got my blood pumping and while I wanted to support the students'
freedom to dress in a way they thought fitting, I didn't want to make more out of the thing than it was. I said to them, "If wearing dashikis is going to make you come out of the lavatories and go to class, if wearing dashikis will make you get your lessons done rather than hanging on the corner, if it inspires you by symbolizing your rich heritage, then I say, by all means, wear your dashikis." That was the end of it. No big confrontation. A few students continued to wear dashilcis and I hope it meant something to them.
With students gaining more and more power, they will certainly make absurd demands, if for no other reason than to test out what they have. Some students will come in with their fantastic demands and I have to say: "You're out of your mind. The answer is no! What you are asking for is not educa-tionally sound." If they want to know why I think so, I try to explain it to them. I will also invite them to argue with me. Perhaps they can prove their point. If so, I would have to change my mind. This is an authentic dialogue. The process that is important is not that I should have my way, or that they should have their way, but rather that the youngsters have the experience of setting up their ideas against those of an adult.
A teacher or principal can lose it all when he loses hold of his own position and plays the dishonest game of going along with the students in order to have them think he is hip. Nothing is more harmful
to the students than having the teacher or principal say, "Solid, I'm with you," if he really thinks that the youngsters are wrong. No self-respecting teacher is going to nod his head with encouragement if his students proclaim that "two and two is five." The educational leader who falls into the trap of supporting the students in a wrong cause does more harm than good. This is what almost happened at Beta High School..
