Comparing Principals’ Leadership
by Myriam Pichon

For my Masters in education at the University of Bordeaux in France, I visited several high schools in New York City. I observed that the principal’s leadership greatly influenced the behavior of the students.

A principal at a public high school in a low-income neighborhood in Queens, who is committed to fighting the gangs inside the school, spends every morning outside on the sidewalk, paying attention to the students coming to school. Inside, during class time, students who are not in class are required to carry a piece of wood on which is written the reason they are absent. On this piece of wood is the time, the name of the teacher who allowed the student to leave the room and the room number. When I was at this school I never felt unsafe.

In another public high school in Manhattan, discipline was not important for the principal, and I felt like I had to be careful for my own safety. There were no gangs in this school (not yet) but the students’ behavior was not channeled at all. In the halls and stairs they pushed, bumped against me. This never happened in the school in Queens.

It is important for teachers who are trying to teach to feel supported by their principals. If the principal disagrees with a teacher when he or she is attempting to command respect, students know and can take advantage of the confused situation. A lack of unified authority seems to me to be an open door to students’ deviant behavior. The coherence between the leadership—principal and assistant principal—and the teacher team is essential, not only in structuring the student’s life in high school, but also in presenting themselves as credible role models that students can respect and look up to.

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