A Teachable Moment

I just received a copy of the Suffolk County School Superintendents Association’s Advocacy Agenda for 2012. Reading it reminded me of a fundamental law of leadership which too many of today’s school leaders have never been taught: Loyalty has to flow down before it can flow up!

Hundreds of times each week, these superintendents tell their staffs how wonderful their work is, how central to the mission of their districts they are, how hard working and productive they are and how their superintendents and their boards of education appreciate their commitment to the children of their communities. I’m even prepared to believe that in most cases they believe what they are saying. Yet I also know that their concern for and loyalty to the people who work for them never goes beyond what is easy and convenient. It rarely goes beyond the verbal stage to real concern and support.

Each of the Suffolk superintendents who signed on to the Advocacy Agenda (a peculiar name for the document) after lamenting the loss of 1455 positions over the last two school years goes on to call for the legislature to enact laws that would surely cause more layoffs in addition to significantly reducing the terms and conditions of employment of those who remain. Thus, we have a call for the expanded use of teaching assistants which the superintendents have to know will further reduce teaching positions. It will secondarily ensure that those who are cut from teaching positions will be forced to accept teaching assistant work at a much lower rate of pay. The superintendents also call for regional collective bargaining agreements, capping employer contributions to healthcare in addition to further eroding the state’s pension benefit by creating a Tier VI.

I submit to you that leaders like this are not worthy of being followed and that the loyalty they receive from those under them is directly proportional to the perception of their loyalty to the people who serve them. It’s part of the reason why the longevity of school superintendents in this country is about three years. I note, too, that nowhere in the document does it talk about reducing superintendent benefits.

I’m thinking of proposing to our state teachers union that we support legislation that would pay superintendents one dollar more than the highest paid teacher in each district adjusted for the extra month that superintendents work. I strongly suspect that such a law would give us a better caliber of school leaders than I fear we have today. Let’s also cap their cars, 403b payments, rights to speaking engagements, severance pay and all of the other princely accoutrements that come with these jobs.