Leadership Lessons from Principal Sweeney

From Holly Springs to Amherst: Principles of Leadership Learned and Applied

Elise Tropiano

This summer I got to experience working with two different summer programs.  In the first part of my internship, I worked with Mississippi Teacher Corps’ Holly Springs Summer School.  The school serves middle and high school students who fail classes the prior year.  The summer school runs for two months and upon completion, students receive credit for their course and can graduate to the next grade.  Another central purpose of the MTC summer school is to prepare its new class of MTC teachers for their impending first year of teaching (as much as possible).  In the beginning, they work alongside second-year MTC teachers until gradually they take over and teach the class alone.  In addition to learning the fundamentals of teaching, they also become acquainted with the difficulties of teaching students from critical needs areas in Mississippi.  Many of the students attending the summer school come from low-income or impoverished households throughout Marshall County.  In addition to the turbulence of teenager-hood, students deal with an array of issues that come with living with very little means.  I certainly got a huge glimpse into the difficulties felt by these struggling students and every day I learned (in an often unsettling way) about the grave problems in education especially as they relate to Mississippi.

In my internship, I assisted, along with my fellow MTC interns, the Summer School Principal and MTC alumnus Joseph Sweeney.  By working alongside Principal Sweeney, I not only learned about education in Mississippi, but I was also able to observe (and learn) the effective leadership that supports and produces a properly-run school. Each day, Mr. Sweeney was responsible for an infinite number of issues.  Issues included those related to attendance, the collection of summer school funds, coordinating with the Holly Springs School district, busing, teachers’ needs, and student conduct.  Surprisingly, these are only a fraction of items to which demanded Mr. Sweeney’s attention.  In addition, Mr. Sweeney often resolved these issues not so much in a fleeting manner but with an amazingly careful thought process.

In the second part of my internship, I helped run a summer program called Amherst Pipeline Project.  Amherst Pipeline Project is a year-round afterschool and summer program funded by Amherst public schools and Amherst College.  Pipeline Project works with underprivileged students from Amherst public schools grades 6-10.  The purpose of the program is to prevent or mitigate the achievement gap that has been emerging in Amherst public school between low-income students, who are disproportionately students of color, and their more privileged peers.  The program is year-round with an afterschool component throughout the school year and a program for the summer.  The program emphasizes the continued membership of students with “class cohorts” (for each grade).  Each Pipeline cohort is meant to graduate from one grade to the next until they successfully traverse the “pipeline” into college.  There are approximately seventy Pipeline students who are attending the summer program.  There are three seventh grade classes, two eighth grade classes, and one ninth/tenth grade class.  Each class is taught by an ARPS teacher with an Amherst College student intern also contributing to teaching math, reading, and science skills.  Last year, I was one of the student interns and worked with the ninth and tenth grade cohort.  In my second year with the program (and the second part of my internship), I have been given a greater leadership role.  My role is basically the intern supervisor as well as assistant to the Summer Program Director.  I support the interns as they gradually teach more material throughout the summer session, but more so, I help Talib Sadiq, the Summer Director, with a lot of the managerial work the program demands.  I found this part of the internship, in considering my experience with the MTC summer school, has allowed me to learn and utilize the various aspects of effective leadership that I observed of Mr. Sweeney.  In addition, I have also been able to learn about different leadership styles, observing Mr. Sadiq as he managed the four-week summer program.  Because this entire internship has also had the aim of learning about education, my two experiences, working in Mississippi for the first part of my internship and then in Amherst for the second half of my internship, have allowed me to learn and compare the education problems that plague different areas of the country.  Specifically, my dual internship has allowed me to find similarities and differences between the educational matters of critical needs school districts in Mississippi (their students, their parents, teachers, the organization of the schools themselves and those that come with top-notch schools that nevertheless have a considerable population of students that are under-achieving and/or under-privileged. 

For me, learning occurs best through a series of experience and observation, repeated reflection, and application of lessons learned upon reflection in a useful and effective manner.  The following reflection describes the lessons I learned from Mr. Sweeney while in Mississippi and how those lessons were applied to my greater leadership position while at Amherst.  Although initially I planned to do a project on corporal punishment, I found that once I got to Amherst and began working hard (often working 10-11 hour days without even thinking about it), I was constantly trying to find ways to organize and systematize tasks in a way that was similar to Principal Sweeney’s leadership and organization at the MTC summer school.  I felt that having my writing assignment cover both experiences would ensure that I learned most from both experiences and gave justice to the unique opportunities that my self-designed internship allowed

At the summer school, Principal Sweeney had a range of responsibilities.  After trying to write these responsibilities in one sentence, I realized it would inevitably turn into a terribly long, run-on sentence.  I’m going to instead enumerate them.  Each day Mr. Sweeney had to make sure that…

1)  Buses ran smoothly and both teachers and students arrived on time

2)  Students were attending class on time (not tardy as both attendance and tardiness affected whether students received credit for their class)

3) Students were behaving because disciplinary actions against students, detentions and suspensions, also jeopardized class credit

4)  The MTC summer school received payment from students

5)  Records of student attendance, tardiness, detentions, and behavior were maintained and updated daily

6)  The school schedule was properly adhered to, the bells rang at the right time, and schedule transitions went smoothly (from breakfast to class, class to lunch, class to afternoon activities, and afternoon activities to departure)

7)  First Year MTC teachers were entering the teaching world as best as they could and were receiving the proper mentorship and advice from second year MTC teachers

8)  School supplies, especially books and photocopier machines, borrowed from Holly Springs school district were sufficient for teachers

9)  Coordination with the Holly Springs school district was performed as necessary

10)  Afternoon activities had a balance of student preference for the activity options offered with also having enough structure/organization to know where students were at all times

11)  Teachers were communicated with about the different protocols, scheduling information, facilities of the summer school 

I have even more to mention but for brevity’s sake, I’ll stop the list here.  As you can see, Mr. Sweeney had many things to worry about each day.  I realized when I attended school I never sat back and realized that all of these things were overseen by the principals and executive personnel.  You just assume that they these things just fall into place, they happen without thought or prior planning.  The principal just shakes students’ hands as they get off the bus, but little else.  Boy was I wrong.  As Dr. Mullins said in a talk he gave to the MTC first year teachers and interns, the job of a principal, being responsible for so many decisions in one day is akin to the several decisions dealt with by a heart surgeon.  It really is one of the most demanding jobs I’ve ever witnessed.  The above list does not even give mention to all of the new one-time decisions that a principle also must handle with—these are solely the expected, daily to-do list he has in his hand every morning. 

Despite the task load, Mr. Sweeney, through his formation of efficient systems, was able to take care of all of these items every day.  For each item he had to take care of, he created an organized system which allowed those items to be taken care of in much shorter time.  In doing so, it allowed for time to be better spent on those unpredictable issues/problems/tasks that inevitably arose each day and for which no system could be developed.  These systems were set in place for almost every item on this list.  For the bell schedule, he assigned this task to fellow intern Philip.  Philip would be responsible for manually ringing the bells at set times each day.  For attendance, Ashton would distribute attendance sheets every morning and I would record each day’s absences and tardy’s into a google document, a useful piece of software that allowed for Mr. Sweeney to access the attendance records at any time during the day even as I inputted new data.  To maintain a peaceful lunchroom, he staggered classes’ lunch periods so that the middle school went to lunch first while the high school lunches came after thereby reducing the amount of traffic in the cafeteria and preventing long lines (as best as he could) for lunch pick up’s.  For afternoon activities, students chose voted for the activity in the beginning of the summer school session.  Students were then assigned to a single activity, location, and set of teachers for the duration of the session.  This organization allowed Mr. Sweeney to be able to know and find any student at any given moment during afternoon activities, which was essential considering that students had different means of transportation home (some took the bus and others were picked up). 

As Mr. Sweeney’s assignments to the interns show, delegation was an essential part of his leadership.   Although Mr. Sweeney was aware of everything that occurred in the school, he assigned responsibilities to interns and teachers.  Those things that he wanted to give his utmost control and attention to, he left for himself to personally handle.  For things that could easily be handled by others, he readily gave those duties to us interns.  I realize now that delegation afforded Mr. Sweeney two important things that principals and leaders always need a full supply of: time and greater energy.  If Mr. Sweeney had to put a ton of time into everything he was responsible for, he would not be able to promptly or effectively handle the unpredictable.  Delegation gave Mr. Sweeney more time to handle those unexpected urgencies that inevitably arose each day and needed to be handled solely by him.  It also prevented Mr. Sweeney from running out of energy or burning out.  While I have almost infinite confidence in Mr. Sweeney, it would have been impossible for even superman to take care of everything he was responsible for and then some.  Mr. Sweeney was aware of his limits and delegation was a tool for ensuring that those limits were not breached.  Although Mr. Sweeney often had little if no time to eat lunch, certainly he was not falling to the ground by the end of the day.      

            In addition to these effective systems and delegation, effective communication was also a key part of Mr. Sweeney’s leadership and management.  Mr. Sweeney’s manner of communication was continuous, prompt, informative, and concise.  As a form of daily communication, Mr. Sweeney sent e-mails every day with the simple but funny subject line “Summer School E-mail #_.”  They contained reminders, items that teachers and interns needed to be aware of for the day ahead, and other miscellaneous things that needed to be communicated to their students (procedural protocols, school policies, etc.).  It was an efficient chain of communication which followed from the head (Mr. Sweeney) down to the student via teacher or intern.  Other forms of communication occurred through daily and weekly meetings.  Every day Mr. Sweeney had “Intern wrap-up’s,” in which the interns met with Mr. Sweeney for five minutes to recap on what went on that day and what lay ahead.  Every week or as circumstances warranted, Mr. Sweeney also held meetings for both teachers and interns.  These meetings were for items that needed to be communicated in a direct way as opposed to e-mail whose communication reception was uncertain (we actually incidentally came across a teacher who had not been opening any of Mr. Sweeney’s e-mails as a result of him leaving his e-mail account open on a library computer).  One last form of communication occurred through Mr. Sweeney and MTC teachers’ use of google software.  As I learned this summer, google e-mail is not the simple e-mail account that I thought it was.  Instead, all Gmail account members can also use its e-mail software and this summer, “google documents” is one that Mr. Sweeney and MTC teachers and staff quite effectively used.  Basically, google documents is a word processor that google e-mail account holders to use.  The special thing is that it allows for google account members to share documents with one another.  Those members that “share” and/or “collaborate” on certain documents are able to view or change the same word documents or spreadsheets at any time.  Document “collaborators” are even able to change the same document concurrently, seeing one another’s modifications and even “discussing” the document if necessary.  With google documents, documents could be changed or updated without having to send that document out to teachers and interns each time so update was made.  This was especially helpful when inputting attendance or detention information into a single spreadsheet.  Thus, anytime a student got another detention, any “collaborator” (or teacher) could access the document and input that detention into a shared spreadsheet without having to e-mail someone beforehand to retrieve that document or having to e-mail that document out after entering that new item of information.  Although some have question Google’s seemingly cyberspace monopoly, google nevertheless allows for unique and expedient communications and in my opinion, should be readily embraced.

Putting Learning and Theory into Practice: Using what I learned from Mr. Sweeney in Managing Pipeline This Summer

            Before returning to Amherst to work with Pipeline Project’s summer program, I knew it would be a lot of work and was ready to toil away.  As soon as the first minute into Pipeline, I realized, just as my observations of Mr. Sweeney should have warned me of, that I had to be aware and take care of many more things than I originally foresaw.  The first day I was running around like a maniac.  From the classrooms, to the office, to Valentine, to the gym, and then a few more loops, I felt like all my limbs were disconnected from my body.  I then started to feel overwhelmed.  I had to communicate all different things to the students, the teachers, and the interns and I began to make errors, forget messages, assume certain things were communicated when they weren’t, and then really started to become exhausted.  Every day would end at 2:00 p.m., but I wouldn’t stop working until six or seven at night.  After the first four days, I had calluses all over my feet and blue-black crescents under my eyes.  I really did not know how to make my job easier and more efficient, but then I thought—wait a second, I did just work at a summer school—what am I doing?  I started thinking about how Mr. Sweeney operated and used his techniques of delegation and communication to do more with less.

            Within a few days, I refocused and changed the way I was doing everything.  I started with delegation.  I looked at the many tasks I had to complete each day and thought of ways I could delegate these tasks to the interns I was supervising.  I thought of the way Mr. Sweeney delegated—he did so in a way that was fair and allowed for us to have some creative input into completing the tasks at hand.  However, he also delegated tasks that he could rely others to complete in a way that he would if had the time to do it.  So, I kept this in mind.  I wrote down everything that needed to be done each day and each week.  For things that were meant more for me to do, things having to do with event planning or parent contacts, I left that up to me to do alone.  Things like attendance or Amherst College facility reservations I gave to the interns.  I communicated some of my expectations for the task at hand, but gave them the freedom to fulfill those expectations in a way they felt was personally best.  So, for example, I told them that Talib, the Summer Program Director, needed to have the attendance of every student each day.  At first, I tried taking attendance every morning during breakfast.  However, students arriving late or eating in a location away from everyone else made this system not work.  I sat down with the interns and suggested that we have weekly attendance sheets with individual day columns.  I suggested that I give those sheets to them each day, they would take attendance in their respective classes, and then I would somehow get those back before the end of the day.  They really liked that idea and then suggested that I give the attendance sheets to them each morning at breakfast, they would take attendance within the first hour of class and put those attendance sheets on the back of the door so I would not have to come into class (and inevitably distract the students), and then I could input the information into a spreadsheet and return the attendance sheets the following morning.  The system worked and no attendance errors were made.  It also freed up my time so I could handle things that made more sense for me to handle alone.  I could really help the student interns as they started to teach more and had the time to make sure events, activities, trips, and valentine meals were well prepared for and went smoothly.    

            In addition to delegation, I also focused on communication.  After the first few days, I realized that the channels of communication between Talib, the interns, teachers, students, and myself were clogged.  Talib and I would know something that the teachers did not know of or the interns were aware of some activity planning and the teachers were totally out of the loop.  In many ways, it had to do with the fact that Pipeline project is a collaboration of two educational institutions—Amherst College and Amherst public schools.  The interns and I often knew how something worked because of our roles as Amherst College students and the same was true with the teachers and Talib as employees of Amherst public schools.  In the first week, especially, the teachers, interns, Talib, and I had multiple moments of, “Oh, I had no idea that… or I didn’t know we had to do that beforehand...”  I remembered Mr. Sweeney’s daily e-mails and got right to it.  Although I neglected to use Mr. Sweeney’s subject lines, I started sending e-mails every day.  The e-mails were sent to everyone—Talib, the interns, teachers, and other staff—and contained reminders for the following day, questions, updates, and things to look ahead to in the upcoming weeks.  They were in a bulleted format similar to Mr. Sweeney’s e-mails and I tried to make them as brief as possible.  Although google accounts were not able to be set up (some teachers and students were resistant), the effective communication through daily e-mails was still able to be completed (though not in their best possible google form!).  I’m currently creating a list of improvements for next year’s summer program and I will be sure to put “Set up google e-mail accounts for all interns, teachers, and staff” on there!

In addition, Talib, the interns, and I had “end of the day” wrap-ups similar to those that Mr. Sweeney conducted.  Teachers would also be included every few days as their schedules demanded (due to their required work hours in their contracts).  Every day, we all discussed what went well that day, what needed to be changed, and what to look forward to in the next week.  Teachers were also included in these discussions when necessary.  Usually, the interns and teachers discussed some of their questions/concerns related to the summer programming and scheduling while Talib and I would discuss some of the more logistical or administrative issues we needed to resolve.  A lot of the communication kinks that were arising were being ironed out at these meetings.  From my sense, everyone felt their input was being heard and at the conclusion of these meetings, we were all on the same page.  As a result, there was a smooth flow of communication from the administration side of the program, Talib and me, to the teachers and interns, and then finally to the students.    You saw that it made a difference to the students.  The students appreciated the feeling of structure by being better communicated with and felt like they had a voice when teachers and interns could better address their needs.

Conclusion

This summer I learned that running summer programs or more generally, educational administration and leadership, requires a whole lot more work than I ever expected.  As a student, you never see what goes on in the background-- all of the planning and coordination that goes into running a school.  It starts from the very beginning of the school day—the buses, down to attendance, class schedules, lunch, trips, recess and activities, and then an extra margin left for each day’s list of unpredictable issues that need to be sorted out. 

During the MTC Summer School, I quickly learned the great if not absolutely exhausting demands of being a school administrator.  Busing of both students and MTC teachers, meals, summer school payment, attendance, disciplinary action were just a fraction of the things that needed to be taken care of at the MTC Summer School.  However, these demands were able to be met as Principal Sweeney demonstrated.  In my observations of Principal Sweeney, I learned just how a principal or any school administrator is able to handle the numerous responsibilities that go into running a school all in one day with also having time to take care of the unexpected.  Principal Sweeney’s use of delegation and communication led to the impressive, thorough, and efficient management of MTC’s summer school.  Each day, he was able to do so much in such a smaller amount of time because of these management tools and he made it look so easy and painless.  In fact, his effortlessness in running the summer school allowed me to experience a sort of leadership shock when I went to Amherst and had to help run a summer program myself.  For the first few days, I was overwhelmed.  I was running all over the Pipeline campus, delivering and relaying messages, calling parents, talking to teachers, and more.  By the end of the day, I could do little more than lie down on a couch and hope the humidity of the Amherst heat would go away.  I then thought of what Principal Sweeney did to make things go so smoothly at Holly Springs.  Upon reflection, I soon adopted Principal Sweeney’s tools of delegation and communication to increase the utility of Pipeline’s teachers, interns, and staff.  I started sending out daily e-mails and running brief wrap-up meetings to improve communication.  I then systematized daily tasks like attendance, meal scheduling, and room reservations in a way that incorporated more delegation.  As a result of the improved communication, all Pipeline teachers and interns started to be more on the same page and could provide insights on what needed to be done in a way that considered students’ needs.  The administrative duties that Talib and I needed to perform were more swiftly completed when we could meet with everyone more frequently.  Delegation also became useful by allowing Talib and I more time to deal with the unpredictable or other long-term planning. 

In the end, Pipeline went much more smoothly when essential tools of leadership were employed.  I thank Mr. Sweeney, Ben Guest, and the experience of working with Mississippi Teacher Corps to give me the tools to more efficiently running Pipeline Project.  After I returned from Mississippi, I thought I was entirely sated even overwhelmed by what I learned in my four week internship.  I didn’t think my experience with Mississippi would carry over so extensively into my internship in Amherst and I am so grateful it did.  If I learned this much in four weeks while in Mississippi, I cannot even imagine what I can possibly learn in two years!  I’m hoping this will be just one of the many chapters that will come in the future.