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The first principal I ever worked with was tall and sported a full beard and looked much like one of the long-ago Smith Brothers of cough drop fame. His basso profundo voice could reduce the biggest, baddest bully to quivering tears.
Like principals through the millennia, mine found the job somewhat akin to navigating a large ship through iceberg-infested waters. As do the brave captains of such ships, principals do most of their work below decks. But when disaster hits—as it does, more often than one would think—they had better be available, visible and in command.
I first met my principal when I was job-hunting after 10 years of teaching and two years spent earning a master’s degree in art education. Finding a job as a fine arts consultant proved impractical, as the government coffers were slamming shut on so-called frills such as the fine arts. Therefore, classroom teaching became my quest, and I was finally given an interview.
My new boss offered me a Grade 5/6 class and the middle school art program—far more than I had hoped for. Not only that but he would also teach my math classes while I taught art. Did I hear that right?
I would not have to teach math! I lapsed into my math reverie while my new principal answered the telephone. How could he know that I’d sooner crawl the 40 kilometres to school over broken glass—on my knees—than teach math? Numerically challenged all my life, I’d found that teaching math had brought nothing but confusion for me and certainly no joy for my students.
The telephone call snapped me back to reality. Shortly into the conversation, the principal fell silent and moved the receiver away from his ear. I could hear what sounded like a hysterical chicken on the other end of the line. When the voice paused, the principal rumbled: “Madam, we seldom execute our students. You’re welcome.” He put the receiver down and allowed himself the luxury of a brief smile as he answered my unasked question. The outraged mother of a new student had been talking with her neighbour, who told her of the school’s policy of using the strap in cases requiring strict discipline. She didn’t want
capital punishment used on
her child. She had obviously confused
capital and
corporal. “I don’t know who her neighbour is,” the principal mused. “The strap has been out of use for 30 years.”
In all the years I taught with this principal, I only once saw him come close to losing his authority. It was during the Grade 3 students’ initiation to the
big playground. The principal took all 52 students up to the top of the sliding hill, where he spoke to them about the inadvisability of throwing snowballs. It was a speech he had given for years, and he had it letter-perfect. As he proceeded, underlining dire threats with fiery gestures, he began to slip backward down the hill. The only thing to do was carry on as if nothing had happened. He never missed a beat. The group at the top of the hill slowly faded into the distance as the principal made his way downward, but the students were paying close attention. Still on his feet, he reached bottom just as his speech ended. The students burst into wild applause.
All that winter, the favourite recess activity of Grade 3 students was a bizarre little activity called Sliding Down Backwards. As the principal philosophically observed, at least it kept them from throwing too many snowballs.
Mary Brackenbury taught for 10 years with the Parkland School Division. She lives in Victoria, B.C. The Spring 2010 issue of the ATA Magazine featured a short story by Brackenbury.
