HEAR US OUT
Advice from students for school leaders

"My first impression was that he was a good principal, because the first day he already knew half of the people in the school's names, and in the hallways he would joke around with you. He takes time to talk to you and ask how you're doing" — Karina
If you are a high school principal, your students want to have a word with you. They'd like to talk about those metal detectors, which suggest at the door that administrators expect teens to be armed. They'd like to explain how their course schedules seem to make assumptions about their futures, or how their clothing choices help them assert their cultural identities. They might simply want to have a conversation in which you recognize them by name.

Last year, WKCD writer Kathleen Cushman spent six months collecting perspectives on school leadership from 65 high school students nationwide. In a new book, Sent to the Principal: Students Talk About Making High Schools Better (Next Generation Press, May 2005), Cushman shares their insights on a range of issues that exert a largely unnoticed effect on how they learn and thrive.

The students describe small signals that tell them whether their school expects them to succeed. They suggest ways to include their peers in routine decisions adults often make-about security, food, transportation, discipline-which affect their school experience. When they speak of matters that may seem purely practical, they link these back to the crucial issues of relationships between adults and young people. Students speak eloquently of the sense of investment and trust that follows when those relationships are strong and inclusive.

"If students knew when they woke up in the morning that what they had to say really mattered in what changes were made in the school-they would really come," says RaShawn, 17, who attends an overcrowded urban high school his district has labeled as failing. "It wouldn't just be an education that processes them, but one that they could affect and shape to benefit the student body."

These students also put forth a fresh angle on school improvement: They want adults to regard them as investment partners in their schooling, and treat them accordingly.

"The kid is a thread and the school is like a fabric, and you want to weave that kid into the fabric," says Adit, a senior at a large public high school in New York City. "You want to make it so that he has a vested interest in the dynamic of the school, and make him interested in, make him respect, the workings of the school, rather than see it as just another opportunity to show his defiance."

Here we present some of what students told us, when asked what school leaders can do to make high schools better, along with a PDF of excerpts from the book.
Our bargain in the classroom

"Angela's tenth-grade biology teacher started out on the wrong foot with the class, and by midterm Angela calls the course 'completely useless.' One day the teachers will launch into a tirade at the students, she says, the next day he will let them goof off during a lab exercise. And although almost nobody understands the material, students have given up asking questions because the teacher's mood is so unpredictable. All the sophomores hate the class and spend the period doing anything but paying attention. They've written off the course, says Angela, but nobody expects any change.

"Angela thinks the principal should do something about it, but she says that when kids complain about a teacher, it can get them into a lot of trouble. 'People with power can use it to get back at you,' she says. 'When there's a problem with teachers, it should be recorded exactly what happened and when, and it should also be kept between the student and the principal.'"

— Sent to the Principal: Students Talk About Making High Schools Better, Introduction to Chapter Seven: "Our Bargain in the Classroom"

Click below

Student advice to school leaders on: knowing us, working things out, keeping us safe, letting us express ourselves, making school interesting, and supporting good teaching.

Table of Contents, Introduction, and sample "Homework for Principals" from Sent to the Principal. Download PDF.




Click here to order a copy of Sent to the Principal: Students Talk About Making High Schools Better by Kathleen Cushman and the youth of What Kids Can Do.
(Next Generation Press, May 2005)