Administrators need better communication with teachers

At least once a quarter, teachers are forced to attend monotonous professional development trainings. These long bland courses are designed to coax teachers into finding new methods for teaching. Few actually listen to these talks, let alone benefit from them.

This is just one example of the disconnect between school administration and teachers. On average, these administrators only have 3 and a half years of classroom experience. This limited experience barely scratches the surface on the small technicalities on teaching. As a result, these administrators have virtually no idea what teachers need in the classroom. As a result, teachers are forced to endure boring teaching workshops about information that teachers will never use.

This disconnect between the administrators and staff are partially responsible for high turnover rate of superintendents. The average age of superintendent is 54 years old, and has been an administrator before becoming superintendent. Assuming that they taught for five years after college, that is twenty-six years away from their already-minimal classroom experience. As a result, their choices are often made based on their own archaic judgement or with the assistance of another administrator, who has almost equal archaic knowledge.

There is also demographic split between teachers and their administrators. Nearly seventy five percent of teachers are women, while roughly seventy percent of administrators were males. The majority of teachers are under forty-five, while superintendents are typically in their mid-fifties. These splits between school staff and administration contributed to their separation in ideals for teaching.

To improve the connection between teachers and administration, administrators need to reflect their staff. More administrators need to be younger women with more teaching experience than the minimum five years. The current superintendents need to be much more connected to the teaching staff by sitting in on their classes, meeting with them, and actually listening to teacher’s ideas.