Show Notes:

Episode 123 features Dr. Kreiness (@dr_kreiness) discuss his decision to resign from a role as an assistant principal after only a few months. In his most vulnerable episode yet, Dr. Kreiness shares what initially excited him about the role, reasons that led to his resignation, why both decisions were very difficult for him and his family, and what the future holds for him and the Leader of Learning brand.

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Why I Resigned as an Assistant Principal

When the my last podcast episode was published, I announced that I had taken a position as an assistant principal in one of the largest cities in New York State not named New York City. However, after only about 3 months, I actually resigned to reassume the role that I left over the summer as an instructional coach for digital learning back in Connecticut.

While I have been on a hiatus from the podcast and as we have experienced the first ¼ to ⅓ of the 2021-2022 school year, I have certainly noticed (and I’m sure you have noticed as well) that we are currently navigating through some of the toughest times we have ever experienced in education. I have seen through being connected to so many educators through social media, so many educators and leaders who are stressed out, burned out, and frankly some who are just feeling like they are done working in this field.

Now, I am not at a point at which I would leave education. However, at the end of the day, I knew that this opportunity was not the right one for me and probably not the right one for me at this time. So, I want to get a bit vulnerable and explain why I took the position in the first place and, of course, why I really decided to leave.

I took an AP job because I had sought that position for a long time. I knew that I wanted to become an administrator and I guess I thought that position is a gateway to almost any other school- or district-level administrative position. Plus, I love having a seat at the table with building leaders who get to plan and execute important decisions that will impact the success of the school. Initially, I was very excited to hear that I was being placed in one of the top schools in the district – a decision that I was told would make all of the other AP’s throughout the district jealous. Plus, I loved the idea of making an impact as an educational leader in the city where I first lived as a child and where my parents, grandparents, and extended family are from.

However, the first few months on the job and in the district just didn’t feel right for me. On paper, everything seems like it should have worked out well. We had a great administrative structure in place where 6 assistant principles would each oversee a grade level in the grades 6-12 building. There was a veteran presence on the administrative team where the principal and I were the only ones coming into this school year being new to the district.

After just a week or two, I even called my wife to tell her that I didn’t think things were working out and, at the time, I was grateful to her for talking me out of doing what I was thinking of doing which was actually to rescind my resignation in my previous district. She explained that what I was feeling could be chalked up to growing pains and that I would have to stick it out and basically pay my dues. But things never got much more comfortable for me.

People have said to me that I should have expected to have to deal a lot with student discipline because, well, that’s what assistant principals do. But I still maintain that the school did not have enough systems and supports in place for both staff and students when it came to student behaviors. It became very clear very quickly that most of my work each day was going to be devoted to dealing with students and their behaviors when, really, I feel most comfortable, given my extensive experience as an instructional coach, working with and supporting staff. This unfortunately became a very minimal part of the job.

This year has been harder than most with regard to students’ behaviors, coming off two prior school years which had to look very different given the global pandemic, remote teaching and learning, and quarantining. I probably don’t have to tell you that student behaviors have been arguably harder to deal with this year than ever before. I found myself meeting with students and calling parents about discipline issues constantly, ranging from your garden-variety behavioral outbursts in classrooms and common areas to skipping class to bullying, etc. That’s not to mention the dozen or so suspensions I had to dole out just in the months of September and October alone which ranged from bullying to fighting and even to drugs and weapons. I really missed the part of the job that I thought would allow me more opportunities to work with staff rather than dealing with these student issues so much.

It meant so much to me to hear the district’s superintendent tell the new administrators across the district that his expectation of us was that “improving instruction is your number-one goal” and to try and block out all of the other stuff that gets in the way of that, including student discipline. However, as I said already, it just seemed like my school didn’t have the systems to allow me to do that. In fact, my principal, who had us read the book The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, would often refer to these things as quicksand. He would tell the other assistant principals and me to try not to get caught in the sand or to stay away from it and focus on what he called the five big rocks which were the five non-negotiable instructional leadership goals that we were to focus on like visiting classrooms daily. In reality, the walkie-talkie system became the biggest grain of sand of them all. I was constantly summoned all over the building to find students, handle discipline issues, have meetings, and all sorts of things. Do you know how people who wear Fitbit devices or track their steps will shoot to take at least 10,000 steps a day? Well, there were many days when I hoped to take fewer than 10,000 but it just didn’t happen.

I have to admit that part of the fact that working with staff became minimized was because I was still waiting for my administrative certification to be renewed and so I was not yet able to observe and meet with teachers as part of their evaluation process. To be honest, the whole certification thing became one of the biggest reasons why I left. Out of respect to the district, I don’t want to go into too much detail here but basically, there is a policy in place that caused me to be extremely underpaid during the months that I worked there. I am sure that, had I stayed even a month longer, that situation would have worked itself out but, to be honest, I panicked. Somehow, I couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel which would lead to my certification being renewed or being able to get paid what someone with 15-plus years of experience and a doctorate degree should be.

So, there became many “what if” questions around both why I took the job in the first place and definitely when I left. Initially, I wondered things like What if I were placed in a different grade level or even a different school? What if we had others who could help lighten the discipline load like a Dean of Students or even guidance counselors? But then I started wondering things like What if things get better soon and the students start to calm down? What if I am able to finally start spending more of my time on doing things related to instruction? What if I just wait until my certification renews? What if I just stick it out for a while to gain experience before finding another administrative experience somewhere else? I guess I just felt like those things weren’t worth the risk when the opportunity for me to return to a job that I really loved had become available again and I didn’t know if I would ever get that chance again.

Ultimately, I just knew that I wanted to stay grounded in my own ideals and the advice I give listeners at the end of each and every episode of the podcast which is to realize that you are a leader no matter who you are or where you are. I still hold strong to my belief that leaders can lead regardless of their role or title, and that that style of lableless leadership is truly transformational, inspirational, and powerful.

So I decided to jump back into a role that allows me to focus all of my energy and efforts on truly improving instruction, supporting teachers, and finding innovative solutions to challenges related to teaching and learning.

I don’t regret the time I spent in the New York district as an assistant principal. I really feel like it was a very valuable experience for me and I have not ruled out being an assistant principal again in the future. I also still think that so much of what has happened to me over the past several months is a case of bad timing combined with important lessons about careful decision-making and prioritization. I actually want to publicly thank the superintendent, assistant superintendent and other administrators from the district who showed tremendous care and concern for me and did try to support me while I was there. As a matter of fact, the superintendent was so supportive that once he found out that I had resigned, he called me in for a meeting. In the meeting, he told me that he already saw what I was capable of and he offered to find me another opportunity in the district that would make me happier and get me to want to stay, including transferring me to another school – for that, I am extremely grateful. It made my decision to leave much more difficult.

What I learned the most from my experience is that I was actually starting to get pretty good at the job. Although there were many things that I was learning and still needed to learn, the fact was that I was receiving so much positive feedback from staff, students, and their parents. It really started to hit me that the interactions I was having with them were really making a difference and it does make me sad to think that I was beginning to make an impact but that I was still not enjoying what I was doing. I really just didn’t feel like it was fulfilling enough to me. A question that almost haunts me still is “Does that mean I was too selfish?”

At the end of the day, it all came down to what would be best for me and my family and I still feel like I made the right choice, however difficult it might have been. I gave up the potential to make a lot more money and, depending on how you look at it, a bigger impact. But what I returned to is a life with less stress and accountability and one in which I can wake up an hour later in the morning to see at least one of my kids and my wife before they go to school and work and spend a considerably less amount of time in the car and sitting in heavy traffic.

I also need to address another aspect of my life that should improve. Back in September when I went for a mandatory physical exam that was needed as part of the onboarding process in my new district, I expected to hear the doctor tell me that I was a little too overweight, but blood work for the second time in three years showed that my blood sugar is still at a level that indicates pre-Diabetes and that my Cholesterol level is too high. Part of my decision-making process had to include not just mental health but my own physical health as well. Diabetes definitely runs in the family and having turned 40 earlier this year, I figure I’m at a point in my life when I can’t run away from these things anymore. So, I am taking my doctor’s orders to seek the help of a nutritionist and work on improving my diet and exercise and I am trying to listen to my conscience which tells me I should probably get away from things in life that may prevent me from becoming happy and healthy.

So, where do I go from here? Well, as far as my career goes, it should be obvious that I am very happy to be back as an instructional coach in my Connecticut district. I’m pretty sure that at some point I will get the urge again to test the waters and try to climb back up the ladder of leadership and administrative opportunities but for now, I am happy being a non-administrative instructional leader in my district.

I am also happy to get some time back in my life to create content like this and to get back to something else I love – inspiring growth and innovation in educators everywhere. So, I vow to revive the podcast and everything that the Leader of Learning brand has to offer. We will get back to more regular podcast episodes and more content going out across all social media channels, especially YouTube. I would love to even hear from you. If you have thoughts about what kind of content should be shared on Leader of Learning, what guests you would like for me to talk to, ways that you think I can improve the quality of the content or anything that you think I should know, please reach out to me via email and/or any social media.

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