PRINCIPALS OVERWHELMED YET DETERMINED
EXODUS OF EDUCATORS ONLY PART OF DAILY CHALLENGES
It’s 5:30 a.m. on a Wednesday, and Sonia Tosh’s iphone alarm eases her awake. Silver hair tousled, dark eyes bleary, Tosh grabs her phone from the nightstand, taps off the soft music and starts scrolling through her texts and emails.
Who has COVID-19? Who’s going to cover classes? Do we have any substitutes?
The 55-year-old principal of Hart Elementary School in Austin, Texas, sits up in bed and, still tucked under her patchwork quilt, starts plotting ways to get through the day.
Just like she did yesterday morning. And the morning before that. And every school morning for the past two years.
Such is the life of pandemic principals, struggling to keep their schools from becoming health, academic and social disasters.
Teacher shortage? It’s a principal problem. Not enough bus drivers, cafeteria workers or janitorial staff? Principal problem. Poor academic performance by kids who fell behind while learning online? Major principal problem.
“People just gotta remember that the principals are in the trenches with them,” said Ralph Aiello, principal of Cumberland Regional High School in Bridgeton, New Jersey. “You might not hear the complaints or frustration, but that’s because we’re there for the students and staff. We come last.”
There are 567,000 fewer educators in public schools than there were before COVID-19, according to the National Education Association.
In a survey of district leaders and principals conducted by Education Week in October 2021, 48% said they struggled to find full-time teachers.
That survey showed 77% had trouble finding substitute teachers, 68% were hurting for bus drivers and 55% needed instructional aides. Add a need for nurses, mental health counselors, cafeteria workers and custodians, and it’s been a tough haul for principals.
“It’s not just about teaching anymore,” Tosh said.
Principals scramble to cover for sick staffers or those who have to stay home to take care of ill family members. Some have served lunches and vacuumed hallways. A principal in Kentucky got her commercial driver’s license, so she could fill in as a bus driver.
“I absolutely love this job,” said Bill Ziegler, principal of Pottsgrove High School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania. “I can’t see myself doing anything else. It’s the best job in the world, serving these kids and the community.”
Mask mandates stir protests
Tosh stood in front of hundreds of students in Hart Elementary’s cafeteria, leading them through the Pledge of Allegiance, daily affirmations and reminders on how to treat people with respect.
Staring back at her were about 500 little faces half-covered in masks as students cheered loudly for the day’s lunch menu: hamburgers, veggie burgers and chef’s salad.
To them, the masks are nothing, just another appendage, Tosh said.
Even on the students’ self-portraits hanging in the hallway, at least half the kids have sketched themselves with masks.
“Kids are resilient,” said Tosh, the daughter of a teacher and a principal. “They’re flexible.”
Through the pandemic, many adults haven’t been. Furious parents have bombarded school boards with complaints about mask mandates.
Ziegler has been verbally attacked at public meetings and on Facebook, where posts included his photo and address. He’s been confronted outside school by angry parents.
“That’s the kind of raging fire that we’ve never seen before, and it just causes anxiety for principals,” he said. “It’s way beyond what principals signed up for.”
New guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention means many schools may drop their mask mandates – but that decision will carry its own controversy.
Tosh has tried to keep Hart Elementary in as much of a bubble as she can. Visitors are limited. There are no on-campus events, such as concerts or plays, for outsiders. Bottles of sanitizer are omnipresent, in the classrooms, the halls, the main office. Each classroom workstation is separated by plastic dividers, wipes are on every desk and students eat lunch in class instead of the cafeteria.
Some days, seven or eight teachers are out because they or their children are sick. The omicron variant of the coronavirus hit some students.
But the numbers are small compared with other campuses in the school district. From August to late last month, the school had 36 confirmed cases of COVID-19. Other schools had hundreds.
“It’s because of the safety protocols,” Tosh said. “We go above and beyond.”
Aiello never imagined doing contact tracing. But when the school nurse tells the New Jersey principal that a student has COVID-19, they need to move fast.
He prints off the seating chart for every class the teen attends. Who has been within 3 feet of the student over the past two or three days? Who sits nearby? Who has been vaccinated? Aiello comes up with a list of kids who probably had close contact with the infected student, and the nurse contacts families. Positive cases and other information must go to the health department every week.
“I’ve done contact tracing at 8 at night,” Aiello said. “I’ve done contact tracing eight hours on a Saturday or Sunday.”
Keeping kids and staffers safe is principals’ top priority, but educating students is why they’re at school in the first place, and that has become a greater challenge.
They all know virtual learning has put them in a hole they’re fighting to climb out of.
“Online, for 98%, at least for my kids, does not work,” Aiello said.
Holding a student’s attention in person is hard enough. Keeping kids on track virtually was an arduous task. They wanted to show off their teddy bears or bedrooms. They wandered away for a snack and never came back.
“That TV is right there,” Aiello said. “Or their bed is right there, and it’s like: ‘Ahhh, I think I’ll take a nap.’ ”
Principals had to figure out how to get enough technology to their students. Hart Elementary gave kids laptops and Wi-fi hot spots, only to realize that one hot spot wasn’t enough for families with three or four kids. It had to provide families with two or three hot spots.
In New Jersey, parts of Aiello’s school covers such rural areas that one kid told him he had to go to a neighbor’s field to download documents.
‘Oh my God, I’m not coming back’
On his worst days, Aiello walks out of school and says, “Oh my God, I’m not coming back.”
He doesn’t mean it. He loves his school. He loves being a principal.
Still, the stress is so heavy, the exhaustion never-ending, the frustration unnerving. He lives on coffee and Mountain Dew. No matter how bad it gets, he puts on his game face. He knows his demeanor affects everyone around him.
“It doesn’t matter what mood we’re in,” he said. “I could be in the worst mood. Nope. Everything is great.”
To decompress, Aiello spends his weekends watching zombie movies. Tosh crafts, sews and hangs out with family. Ziegler reads the Bible, goes fly-fishing and exercises.
Sometimes support comes when principals least expect it. By the end of the 2021 school year, Tosh was mentally exhausted.
Am I doing any good here? she thought. Am I making things better?
Then she discovered staff secretly had painted a wall in the break room with messages of love and support.
“Thank you for being AWESOME!”
“You are the HART of our school.”
Stunned and teary-eyed, Tosh was humbled. After all the stress and fear, they still loved her.
Oh my gosh, she thought. I am making a difference.