My school year ended yesterday. It was a long one, though not quite as long as last. My classes were wonderful, filled with earnest and intelligent young men and women. But it was a year in which adults didn't always play nicely with one another, myself included.
Our outgoing chair left us with schedules that made hardly anyone happy. I'll have wonderful classes, though I'll have to work hard (more than 90% of my schedule is Advanced Placement). One colleague will pick up a challenging course he's never had before, in addition to the already challenging course he teaches. Another lost a course she invested a great deal into. Another got a back-handed compliment like mine.
The schedules were the fruit of a war of attrition fought between that outgoing chair and many in the department who never sufficiently bent the knee. Wait, that's cynical. Many in the department never offered the respect due the position. Relationships weren't there allowing adults to reasonably discuss good options in the best interest of the kids. As a result, we're left with schedules that reward friends and chastise enemies.
Sigh. In today's climate we need to be grateful for jobs, for jobs with wonderful kids, and for jobs with outstanding colleagues.
So, what have I learned (or re-learned) from 2011-12? The lessons go like this:
1) Relationships matter.
2) Small difficult conversations marked by candor and honesty make large impossible conversations less likely.
3) There is much more cost than benefit from discussing colleagues.
4) A shared set of values matters. I know this from working in an absence of them. Are we here for the kids? The program? The school? Or ourselves?
5) Making everyone's happiness a goal is to set oneself up for failure.
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