SMS Principal Blog

Unity is strength... when there is teamwork and collaboration, wonderful things can be achieved. -Mattie Stepanek I will have teacher pages pop up on my Facebook feed from time to time. They are always links to articles about topics related to education and being a teacher. Sometimes the articles are really good. Other times, not so much. What I find most interesting, though, are the comments. They almost always reflect the worst possible version of a toxic teacher's lounge. I scroll and scroll trying to find someone saying something positive, but it just isn't there, at least not nearly strong enough or frequently enough to drown out all of the negative, and I can't help but feel sadness for our profession. I wonder what kind of interactions these teachers are having with students and parents when they carry so much animosity about their career.  The most recent article that I came across was from a new principal sharing all of the things she has learned since b...

More often than not, educators find themselves discovering a child's trauma after a discipline referral or academic failure because the process in place is reactive rather than proactive. ~Rhonda Neal Waltman I was overwhelmed by the feedback I received from teachers throughout our district following the presentations by our guest speakers on Friday. So many teachers expressed an interest to hear more, learn more. I was asked if they could come back for a full day. I was asked if we could start doing book studies. I was asked what we are going to do next. It was awesome to see so many educators get so fired up about a topic, especially because a portion of the message challenges how we currently do some things, which normally isn't so easily embraced. I think it speaks to the universality of what we have all been seeing. We may not have had the language to describe it, but we could feel that something wasn't working and that there was some understanding beyond our re...