Scaling the mountain to principalship: The barriers and the enablers of a female first time principal’s journey - chapter 9 ENABLERS IN JANET’S CLIMB TO PRINCIPALSHIP - professional learning

Chapter Nine: Professional learning

Some professional learning was a booster for Janet in her quest to the top but she questioned the validity of all of it.

9.1 “Some of the best teachers I had were the ones with no qualifications” (Janet)

Janet did find some of her formal professional learning useful but when she employs people she states “I look to see that they’ve got a qualification but it is not the important thing to me.”  She believes this because “when I think of my own schooling, some of the best teachers I had were the ones with no qualifications and the ones who had all the qualifications under the sun, I learnt nothing from them.”

Janet left her teacher training course before she had completed her degree in education because at that time “years of experience was more important than your qualifications.”  It wasn’t until she was a deputy principal that she took six months study leave to finish the four papers and acquire “the little qualification” to put after her name.  Janet has doubts about the current system as the university lecturers in her degree course would say to the second and third year teachers “you just need to have curriculum, then you can have the kids eating out of the palm of your hand. Never mind classroom management, you don’t need to worry about it.”  Janet questioned this and asked them “when were you last in the classroom?” She continued by saying “I am not trained in maths or science but I tell you what I can manage kids.” Janet maintains that if the universities are telling the student teachers this then they can “kiss them goodbye” as “relationship is the key.” 

9.2 Primary trained “Primary teachers teach children [where] secondary teachers teach subjects” (Janet)

Janet was primary trained which caused some issues as discussed earlier but it did give her many advantages, especially around relationships with students, as she said “I’ve always believed primary teachers teach children [whereas] secondary teachers teach subjects.”  This professional learning is a key influence in her high school’s vision where she leads as principal.  She aspires to “create a holistic student” who has “all-round well-being” which is currently more associated with primary schools in New Zealand not high schools. 

9.3 Janet’s experience was always “on the pastoral care side of the school”

Relationships are Janet’s strength and therefore she was the most obvious choice for organising the “pastoral care side of the school” which matches with Coleman’s (2009) findings that this is often the women’s role.  Janet was fortunate to plan a lot of professional learning for staff as well, and this alongside leading the pastoral team was beneficial for Janet as Coleman (2009) noted that being in charge of pastoral care alone does not prepare people for principalship.  According to both Patuawa (2006) and Wiendling and Dimmock (2006) the most effective way to prepare members of the senior leadership team for principalship is to have a wide variety of flexible experiences but Janet did not “have the mathematical brain for timetables and curriculum” and was lucky that the other deputy principals “slotted naturally into those types of positions.” Janet also articulated that she needed financial planning skills because she can “balance my cheque book but that’s about my limit and I’m thinking I’ve got this government money, this is money for the kids” and would have found these skills useful in the First Time Principals’ Programme

9.4 Professional development for leaders: “This course inspired me.  OK I could do this” (Janet)

Pettit (1999, as cited in Bush & Glover, 2004) stated “no one can simply train for the position of leadership…he or she must do the job to know the job” (p.9).  A major and essential part of learning to be a principal is through living the experience and the most valuable learning is in role (Weindling & Dimmock, 2006). Janet remarked that “there is so much they (principals) don’t share with you, one, they can’t and two, you’ve got your own job to do as a deputy principal and you can’t be worrying about those things the principal is dealing with.”   However, specific professional learning is important and Janet’s mentor Tim encouraged her to take the Unitec Diploma in School Management travelling up to Auckland every holiday as there was no internet at the time she was studying.  This course included “personnel management, dealing with open to learning conversations (Robinson, 2009), conflicts in staffing” and Janet speaks very highly of it.

9.5 Acting head: “it wasn’t a reality, I was only baby-sitting… I wasn’t carrying the can for anything” (Janet)

Taking on the acting principal role is one of the most valuable ways to prepare for a principal position (Weindling & Dimmock, 2006) and it gave Janet the confidence to think that she could become a principal in the future.  She did not apply the first time her principal went on sabbatical but it came up again and Janet thought “hmm shall I give it a go? It was only for a term and I thought I couldn’t stuff up too much for one term.”  She added “it wasn’t a reality, I was only baby-sitting… I wasn’t carrying the can for anything;” she was just “keeping the seat warm.”

Nevertheless, this experience was central for Janet’s confidence which increased when her principal and mentor Tim believed that she could do the job.  Secondly, she had to deal with a major staff issue on day one in post and although it was stressful it was a great learning experience.  Thirdly, two staunch members of staff who did not always get on well with Janet when she was a deputy principal told her that “they really enjoyed working with me” as principal and this was the moment where she thought “well maybe I could do this.”