Tips+For+Principals

This page is for our collective wisdom: What pearls of good ideas do we have for each other as Principals? What tricky situations have we had and what did we do? What good ideas have we come across that have helped us in our schools? Etc, etc...

One of the best ideas for principals that have been newly-appointed was to go into the new school before officially taking up the position with a notebook and pen (might be an iPhone nowadays?). Do a walk around of the boundary fence, then fields, ancillary buildings and finally the classrooms and admin areas. Note down all the things you would want to change, tidy, remove, combine, throw away. Doing it at that time means you have fresh eyes, fresh ideas. Doing it when you take up the job means you have less time and can be captured by lack of time and being less-fresh. I've used it every principal job I've had.

Here's a series of tips from an 'expert':