If you are a teacher who has dreams of one day heading up your own school, you have a long road ahead but it is one that is most definitely possible to reach the end of. Great leaders in schools like Peter Benedict St Andrew’s principal and highly regarded educator, had plans in their mind from a young age that they wanted to be principal and they worked hard on reach their goals.
The benefit of being a school principal is that you can educate those students in the way that you believe in and you can shape the school in the image of how you believe educational institutions should be. In order to reach this position, here are some of the things that you must do throughout your teaching career.
Results Driven
Teaching is very much a results-driven industry and if you want to stand out as someone who could one day become a leader, this is where you should start. Great results as a teacher are measured on your ability to get the most out of your students. This is not to say that all of your students must have the greatest grades in the world, often this is not possible, but as a teacher you should be getting the absolute most out of your pupils.
Taking Responsibility
You need to be able to show your colleagues and peers that you are ready to take responsibility and in the school setting there are many ways in which you can do this. School trips, year groups and in-school activities will all give you opportunities to show that you are responsible and you need to make sure that you are putting yourself forward for such activities and events. If you indicate that you can be relied upon in this way, you will be given many more chances to take on a leadership role throughout your career.
Working with Parents
Most schools are ran by parents and key stakeholders and if you have true ambitions of one day becoming the head of the school, you need to get these people on board. There is nothing drastic which you need to do here but you must come across as likeable and trustworthy at the very least. Once again, results will very much determine how these people see you and if you can consistently deliver strong results, and have the interpersonal skills to get them on board, then you could be in the running to become a great principal.
Change Schools
Staying at the same school for your entire career looks as though you got into your comfort zone and refused to budge. Changing schools once or twice throughout your career however, gives the appearance of someone who is looking to challenge and improve themselves and if you have been at the same place for a long time, then perhaps it is time to consider moving on to pastures new in order to strengthen your case.
