To prepare for a launch year, there are a number of elements for school founders to discuss, care for, and organize into a cohesive plan. These elements, many of which are minute, taken individually may at times feel trivial, disconnected, and unimportant. The truth is, however, these factors and logistics combine to form not simply a plan, but a culture. If school cultures are made up of the habits and routines that together form a school’s identity, then these elements are nothing less than the invisible glue that holds the broader school culture together.

In this article, I am going to suggest five elements new schools want to get right regarding specifically their faculty culture on Day 1. While there are just about a million things founding school leaders could prioritize when building their team of faculty, these five elements will strategically position the school to cultivate a great faculty culture throughout its first year of operation.

1. General Expectations

This is the least inspiring of the elements, so I will address it first. The truth is that any functional work environment requires clarity and accountability regarding the basic expectations all employees will be held to fulfill. What is the dress code? What time should faculty arrive each morning? How long should they remain on campus after school is dismissed? What is proper email protocol for style, formatting, and response time?

These questions may feel mundane, but the truth is that ambiguity in these areas over time chips away at a cohesive culture. As Patrick Lencioni points out in Five Dysfunctions of a Team, a lack of clarity leads to a lack of commitment. While it is important to balance procedural clarity on the one hand with professional independence on the other, upfront communication regarding the general expectations that matter will prevent unnecessary confusion and a lack of commitment in the long-term.

2. Relationships

How are the various constituents of the school going to interact with one another? How will they speak about one another? Schools exist as a unique social conglomeration of children and adults, parents and teachers, with varying levels of authority. It is important for the school to provide clarity for faculty on Day 1 regarding how students will be permitted to speak to their teachers, how teachers will interact with parents, and how teachers will speak about parents.

The two leading values for a healthy relational culture are kindness and respect. Kindness is the disposition of goodwill we all desire to be exhibited toward us, and therefore should exhibit toward others. Kindness begins in the heart and is manifested through action: the words we say, the gestures we use, and the responses we have, especially in pressure-filled moments.

Respect is the due regard we owe one another. In a school setting, there are two general types of respect. The first type is the respect we owe all people based on their personhood and worth as divine image-bearers. In this sense, all members of the school, including children, should be recognized and treated as persons. The second type is the respect we owe various constituents of our community based on their role and position in authority. You can lay the groundwork for a strong faculty culture by taking time up front to talk about the ways different groups within the school will interact and providing specific examples for how kindness and respect should be modeled.

3. Parent Partnership

Parent partnership may sound like a carry-over from “relationships,” but the emphasis is different. Cultivating a faculty culture of parent partnership means forming teachers who understand that parents should be viewed as assets, not obstacles, in the educational journey. The reality is that teachers learn so much about a student in a single year, but this knowledge pales when compared to what the parents know about the child from years in the home. School leaders can promote a faculty culture of parent partnership by instilling good practices for keeping parents informed and inviting them to provide insight into a child’s needs and growth areas.

It is worth mentioning as well that a faculty culture of parent partnership will greatly assist with yearly retention. Parents will choose to re-enroll their children if and when they believe and trust that the school is delivering on its commitments. The primary vantage point parents possess for making this determination is through the relationship they have developed with their child’s teacher. This is all the more reason to prioritize parent partnership for teachers on Day 1.

4. Planning Ahead

This may sound obvious, but again, I return to the importance of details and building institutional habits. In the first year, it is important for schools to establish what kind of school it is going to be, particularly in the classroom. Will it be a school that flies by the seat of its pants, plagued by a lack of preparation, unpredictable decisions, and the tyranny of the urgent? Or it will take time to slow down and prepare, investing the extra time on the front end to sow seeds of preparation and calm?

School leaders, especially in the first year, will not have time to review with teachers every planning detail. My suggestion, therefore, is that they prioritize holding teachers accountable to writing and submitting good lesson plans. A good lesson plan provides the avenue for a teacher to think through the plan for the day, from time-bound procedures to teaching objectives to classroom assignments. Planning in advance will reduce the burden on a teacher’s working memory and allow her to be more present with her students. If a school can establish a faculty culture of planning ahead, particularly through good lesson planning, it will save itself from a plethora of issues down the road.

5. Text-Centered Learning

For a school just opening its doors, it needs to decide what will be the core values of the classroom. What matters most in the daily instruction of students? While there are lots of possibilities to choose from, I suggest that for classical schools specifically, it is important to instill a faculty culture of text-centered learning. Here I mean a form of learning in which the text, not the teacher and not the student, serves as the primary GPS for what will be taught and learned. This is not to suggest that the text is or should be infallible. Nor is it to imply that the teacher’s or student’s opinions do not matter. Rather it is to clarify that amidst all the opinions and ideas swirling around in a particular lesson, we are going to let the text, assuming it is well-chosen, be our chief object of inquiry. This is the surest way to implement the core elements of a liberal arts education.

One practical way to promote a text-centered culture is through narration. Narration, which we have written about extensively at Educational Renaissance, is a teaching method that exposes students to rich content and then gives them the opportunity to share in detail what they recall about the content. This practice instills in teachers and students alike an acute alertness to understanding the text before moving on to exercises in analysis and critique.

Conclusion

If school founders can instill these five elements in their faculty culture, they will be well on their way to not only a great inaugural year, but to a successful first chapter in the school’s short history. Amidst all there is to do and plan, the key is to prioritize what matters most and remain committed to these values. May the Lord lead and guide you as you seek to do the Lord’s work for the sake of your community and the next generation!

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This is a foundational question that demands an answer. Organizations are complex entities with moving and disparate parts. Schools are no exception. Facilities, insurance, safety, technology, admissions, marketing, communications, and development are all essential functions of school operations, and I have yet to even mention academics.

Each department of the school must be aligned toward a singular purpose, what we call the school’s mission. This mission must answer the question: What is the goal of school education?

To consider a response, let us turn to philosopher Nicholas Wolterstorff (b. 1932), whom I have interacted with in the past here. In 1992, Christian Schools International (CSI) invited Wolterstorff to deliver the keynote address at the organization’s inaugural international conference. Although the assigned topic for his session was curriculum, the philosopher made the case that in order to make good decisions about educational content, one must first be clear on the aim of the educational process. What are we trying to accomplish? Or, what is the goal of school education?

In this article, I will explore Nicholas Wolterstorff’s observation that there are four approaches to answering this question that are vying for first place in the American educational scene. Although he made this observation over thirty years ago, I believe there is relevance to his analysis today. In order to teach with an aim that is thoroughly Christian, we must be cognizant of competing approaches, and ultimately adopt a framework grounded in biblical theology and shaped by the classical Christian tradition.

The Socialization Approach

The first approach, according to Wolterstorff, is the socialization view, according to which “the fundamental goal of school education is to enable and dispose the student to occupy effectively some combination of approved social roles” (Educating for Life, Baker Academic, 2002, p. 260). These roles typically fall within the range of economical to political. The result is a graduate prepared to function and contribute as a member of society within these spheres.

One example of the economic socialization approach would be author Horatio Alger (1832-1899). An American fiction writer from the 19th century, Alger championed the “rags to riches” genre in which hard-working youths earned access to the security of the middle class. The vision of the good portrayed in Alger’s stories is economic stability. Alternatively, a political socialization approach is exemplified through the writings of Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826). Like his fellow Founding Fathers, Jefferson heralded democracy as the best political system and that this system could only prevail through an educated citizenry. 

In both examples, the goal of school education is to prepare the individual to successfully inhabit respectable social roles.

The Acculturation Approach

The acculturation approach to defining the goal of school education emphasizes the transmission of one’s cultural inheritance. Those who subscribe to this view assume that “immersing the student in the cultural heritage will imbue him or her with certain fundamental values” (260). For example, teaching Shakespearen plays will promote particular cultural values about the complexities of relationship, love, duty, and courage. Likewise, sharing with students the fascinating life story of Galileo will inspire them with values of scientific inquiry, observational discovery, and the courage to stand up for truth even in the face of punishment. 

A lead exponent of this approach would be Allan Bloom (1930-1992), a classicist and champion of Great Books from the University of Chicago. In The Closing of the American Mind (Simon and Schuster, 1987), Bloom argues that relativism in higher education was disabling students from thinking critically. His solution is to ground moral education in western civilization’s foundational texts, thereby shaping students with the ability to think critically and pursue objective truth.

The Individualization Approach

The third approach is the individualization view, which holds that the goal of school education is the development of the individual. The idea here is that the individual, not society and not one’s cultural heritage, is the ultimate good. Inspired by the Romanticism of the 19th century, the emphasis of the individualist approach is to equip each individual to express herself in a way that is true to who she is inside. 

It should be no surprise to anyone that this view is alive and well today. Though not featured as prominently in education circles per se, it is impossible to escape American culture’s emphasis on the individual. Flowing downstream from this emphasis, the goal of school education becomes to promote the growth of each individual student and steamroll inhibitions to this growth. 

Perhaps the preeminent figure of this approach is Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778), a precursor of Romanticism. In Emile, Rousseau spells out his views on education through the fictional upbringing of an aristocratic boy named Emile. Emile is raised in accordance with his developing mind rather than through a standard educational process. The idea here is that a child is basically good and perfected through nature. The chief obstacle to this development is society, which must therefore be kept at bay through a child’s developmental years. 

The Social Criticism Approach

The final approach to answering the question, “What is the goal of school education?”, is what Wolterstorff identifies as the social criticism approach, which holds that the goal is to teach students to be critics of society when it fails to live up to ethical ideals of justice, peace, love, compassion, and democracy. Now, with current news headlines about the ideologization of education through critical theory, it is interesting to note that Wolterstorff observed the emergence of this approach over 30 years ago.

While there is clearly a leftist bent to the social criticism aim of education, which primarily conceives of reality in terms of matrices of power, it is worth clarifying that social critique in itself is not inherently marxist. The British abolitionist William Wilberforce, for example, made it his life’s ambition to improve the moral climate of Victorian English society and bring the Trans-Atlantic slave trade to an end. Likewise, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., famously led the American civil rights movement, referring often to scripture in his efforts to correct the injustice and inequality present in American society in the mid 20th century. 

The difference between the beliefs of these two men and critical theorists today is fundamentally a clash in worldview. Whereas Wilberforce and King believed in objective truth grounded in God’s very existence, postmodern critical theory abandons the possibility of objective truth, reducing all developments in society to a struggle for power.

Which Approach? What Goal?

Interestingly, I see elements of all four approaches in classical Christian education circles today. The socialization approach is present when we hearken back to classical antiquity and the idea of preparing future citizens and statesmen. The acculturation approach is present when we speak about seeking to preserve and pass on the treasures of western civilization. The individualization approach is at work when we seek to cultivate wisdom, virtue, and a love of learning in each student, instilling them with habits and knowledge that will enable them to thrive as individuals. And the social criticism approach is at work when we talk as Christians about impacting the world for Christ, equipping our graduates to pursue professions that will enable them to promote a free and flourishing society. 

Wolterstorff himself admits that Christian education is not a species of any of the approaches above (261). He writes,

The Christian vision, by contrast, sees the human good as achieved only by the right ordering of our relationships–with God, with society, with nature, with the legacy of human culture, and yes, with oneself…Christian education is inspired by the vision of development, healing, and delight in all these relationships.

Educating for Life (Baker Academic, 2002), 262.

Education for a New Community

In the Bible, we see relationships at the center of God’s creative act as well as the primary victim in humanity’s Fall. In the early chapters of Genesis, God commands both plants and animals alike to be fruitful and multiply on the earth. When we read “Let the earth sprout,” “Let the waters swarm,” and “Let the earth bring forth,” we get the sense that God’s newly created world is intended to be a home for life, relationship, and community. Like a family on moving day, there is a sense of joyful urgency to move in and fill the place up, as family members look forward to making new memories together.

When we read about the creation of humanity, we see a similar mandate to be fruitful and multiply with the added instructions to exercise dominion over creation, both creatures and plant life. Adam himself is given the task of naming the animals, that is, to implement meaningful differentiation between the creatures to make it possible to live in community. God even uses His own breath to give life to Adam, an intimate move to be sure, as he becomes a living creature. Soon after, God creates Eve from Adam for “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Gen. 2:18). Simply put, activity of relationship and community is all over the place in the earliest days of God’s newly created world.

Soon after, however, the Fall dismantles this community, disrupting relationships between God, humanity, and creation. Adam and Eve are commanded to leave the garden, the home within the home, signifying a new post-fall era of broken relationship and homelessness. The remaining corpus of scripture points to this post-fall reality and the redemptive intervention of God through the person and work of Jesus Christ to repair this ruin and restore these relationships. The first step of repair occurs between God and humanity as atonement and forgiveness of sin is provided, followed by a subsequent movement of repair regarding human relationships and a renewed sense of caring for creation. The church is the seedling of this new community, a small glimpse of what life under God’s rule is like, albeit only a foretaste of the perfection to come.

Conclusion

This all leads me to suggest that the proper goal of school education, from a classical Christian education perspective, is to support the church in its calling to live out its identity as the people of God, seeking to bring healing and restoration to broken relationships through the gospel of Jesus Christ. To achieve this goal, society must be governed and well-supported (the socialization approach), the best of cultural heritages must be carried forward (the acculturation approach), individuals must receive intentional discipling (the individualization approach), and society ills must be combated (the social criticism approach). 

This pluriform goal of school education requires educators to make use of all resources available to them, both in terms of breadth of curriculum and scope in historical development. Modern education’s prioritization on the practical for future job security simply will not suffice in the light of the aims above. Nor will its preoccupation with the here and now at the expense of teaching the great wisdom of the past. Thus, my thesis: a truly Christian goal of school education will be cognizant of the varying approaches described in this article, while utilizing a framework grounded in biblical theology and shaped by Christian tradition.

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If you are new to this blog, you will notice that we typically focus on wisdom and modern research for the classroom or homeschool. As classical Christian educators who have been profoundly influenced by the educational philosophy of Charlotte Mason, we believe that children are born whole persons and their schooling should reflect this reality. 

Unfortunately, so often today, precisely the opposite occurs. In our post-industrial revolution world, modern education has become a training ground for our children as mere test-takers and future wage-earners. Siren songs of college readiness, job preparation, and high-wage incomes have replaced the classical vision for a formative education in the good, true, and beautiful.

Interestingly, the classroom is not the only area of education that has been negatively impacted by industrialist assumptions. Likewise, children are not the only victims of this mindset. Educational institutions are complex entities with multiple departments and a variety of constituents. The underlying philosophy of an institution will inform and shape the parts through the whole, and in turn, the whole through the parts. It is therefore of upmost importance for school leaders to regularly take inventory of these parts, evaluating the missional alignment of what is said and done across departments and roles.

In this article, I want to hone in specifically on practices relating to fundraising, what is sometimes called the development shop of a school. Whether the funds are used to meet an operational gap or strategic initiative, schools rely on the generosity of donors to advance their missions and achieve their future visions. While the classroom is, and must remain, the central focus of any educational institution, it is the contention of this author that the development shop, too, is in need of an educational renaissance.

Philanthropy on the Rise

What kind of a renaissance is needed?

Interestingly, it is not a rebirth in generosity, at least for now. Despite economic challenges caused by the pandemic and rising inflation, giving is up more than ever before, especially in the United States. In a recent Forbes article, the author observes three particularly positive trends in philanthropy.

First, charitable gifts increased to $471 billion in 2020, a 5% increase from 2019, despite a 2.3% decrease in GDP. This upward trend has not changed since the nation transitioned out of the pandemic. Second, donors are growing more sophisticated in how they give. More and more Americans are using private foundations, charitable trusts, and donor-advised funds as giving vehicles. This sophistication has elevated the overall generosity, tax savings, and specificity of giving for donors. In other words, donors are not just giving bigger gifts; they are giving better gifts. Finally, there is a demographic mindset shift in the next generation. On average, more millennials than boomers view themselves as philanthropists, leading them to make decisions about their time, money, and resources through a charitable lens.

Nevertheless, our culture continues to face challenges generated from ideologies of individualism and consumerism. As religious belief remains on the decline in the West, the focus shifts more and more to the self-actualization of the individual. This leads to an inward focus and dependence on one’s self for finding lasting happiness rather than viewing God as our greatest source of happiness and meaning. In addition, the consumeristic mindset continues to place things before people, leading society to objectify humans as mere sellers and buyers in a transactional process.

With these societal shifts in view, let me suggest that an educational renaissance in the development shop will have three prominent features, relating to:

1. God’s Provision
2. Donor Engagement
3. Leadership Transparency

God’s Provision

In Giving and Getting in the Kingdom (Moody Publishers, 2012), R. Mark Dillon suggests there are two prevailing attitudes about God’s financial provision.

The first attitude is a pietist waiting upon the Lord with no practical action. This approach is famously illustrated by George Mueller, a German-born pastor who later moved to Bristol, England, and opened an orphanage. Mueller would regularly pray for his orphanage’s needs but refused to share them publicly, waiting instead for the Lord to provide miraculously (which He did time and time again).

The second attitude, illustrated by Chicago evangelist D.L. Moody, is a business-savvy call to action. Ever the entrepreneur, Moody would identify an evangelistic or societal need, cast vision, and enlist financial support. Through this approach, Moody inspired countless to give to the kingdom and, in doing so, support the saving of a multitude of souls.

Summarizing these two attitudes, Dillon writes,

The danger of Mueller’s approach is that what seems to be childlike faith in God for His provision may be missing an opportunity to call God’s people to obedience and generosity. The inherent danger in creating a vision and boldly calling God’s people to fund it, as in Moody’s approach, is the human tendency to stray from discerning God’s leading into merely fulfilling personal or corporate ambition and perhaps missing the elements of dependent prayer and humble gratitude (44).

To avoid these two pitfalls, schools must adopt a biblical mindset of God’s provision, which embraces the paradox of divine action and human responsibility. Development officers must begin, saturate, and culminate their fundraising efforts in prayer, while faithfully taking steps to see what doors God might open. The reality is that neither Mueller nor Moody receives the credit for the gifts that came in to bless their ministries during their years of service. God does. We can prayerfully depend upon the Lord and faithfully share publicly our schools’ needs when we realize that God is the ultimate source of every gift.

Donor Engagement

It is common to approach fundraising as a game of numbers. Maximize the number of mailed letters, email campaigns, golf outings, and first time gifts, and you have a successful development shop. 

But what Jason Lewis argues in The War for Fundraising Talent and How Small Shops Can Win (Gatekeeper Press, 2017) is that deep relationships and meaningful partnerships are the key to successful fundraising. And yet, so many development shops are reluctant to do this. It is easier to keep donors at arm-length and ask through impersonal methods. But what talented and seasoned fundraisers have learned through years of practice is that it is all about relationships and shared passion for a vision. Through intentional engagement with donors, having meaningful conversations, and communicating with respect and gratitude, the partnership can go deeper, become more meaningful, and last for a lifetime.

As schools engage donors in a meaningful way, the goal is to prevent these relationships from becoming merely transactional. An authentic partnership occurs when both schools and donors believe they can give and receive from one another. Here I think of Paul’s gratitude for Phoebe at the church in Rome. Paul refers to Phoebe as a “sister,” “deacon,” and “benefactor” (Rom. 16:1-2). It is clear that the relationship Phoebe experienced with the church, including the apostle Paul, went beyond the financials. It was spiritually uplifting, relationally deep, and mutually beneficial.

Leadership Transparency

Finally, an educational renaissance in the development shop must include leadership transparency. School leaders need to cast a compelling vision for the future and be honest about current challenges. R. Mark Dillon writes,

Sometimes people assume that being the messenger on behalf of the organization to the giver requires knowing all the answers and defending your institution at every turn. Nothing could be more antithetical to a genuine relationship than refusal to acknowledge shortcomings or gaps in our knowledge.

R. Mark Dillon, Giving and Getting in the Kingdom (Moody Publishers, 2012), 95

Certainly there are times when one must explain with fortitude certain institutional decisions. It is important to help donors understand the complexity of particular issues as well as the thought process that went into reaching a decision. At the same time, no institution is immune from criticism. No leader has all the answers. School leaders can build trust with donors by being honest, preparing informative reports, and admitting when there are weaknesses. If a donor brings up a criticism, explore it together. Find it out what reality of the school it likely touches. If a donor asks a question and you do not have a response, acknowledge the fact and commit to finding the answer.

Conclusion

While there is much more to be said about an educational renaissance for the development shop, I hope this article can be the start of a new conversation. We are all recipients of the generosity of others, and the principles of God’s provision, engagement, and transparency are applicable. As school leaders, we can push back against the reigning ideologies of individualism and consumerism by adopting a biblical view of God’s provision and understanding that how we are interact with all people in our organizations reflects what we truly believe about them as persons made in the image of God.

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Most teachers, of course, do not enter education because of their passion to partner with parents. However, it does not take long for a new teacher to realize that one key factor for a successful year is going to be this relationship. Philosophically, this is natural because parents are the primary stewards of their children and possess key insights about their development. And, at a more pragmatic level, independent school parents are paying a premium for their child’s education and expect to be informed and, to some extent, involved throughout the year.

To end the year well, master teachers provide closure with parents regarding their child’s growth and development. Whether this happens formally at an end-of-year parent-teacher conference or through a different form of intentional conversation, teachers can leave parents feeling grateful and deeply appreciative. In this article I will offer three particular ways teachers can build upon the partnership they have cultivated through the year with parents, so that everyone can leave for the summer on a positive note.

1. Demonstrate your understanding of the parents’ hopes and fears for their child.

In Understanding Independent School Parents (Wise Teacher Press, 2012), psychologist Michael G. Thompson and teacher Alison Fox Mazzola map out the core principles of a successful family school relationship. This relationship, the authors note, is complex. But with some foresight and planning, teachers can build strong alliances with parents.

One suggestion is, at the beginning of the year, to ask parents about their hopes and fears for their children. It is common for teachers to feel the pressure to perform in their interactions with parents. Whether it is demonstrating their knowledge of the curriculum or sharing insights about their students, teachers often err on the side of dominating the parent partnership with their own voice. But Dr. Thompson suggests that the key to a productive relationship of any kind is to first build trust by seeking to understand what the person is hoping for or worried about. Taking time to listen, and listening well, is the key to forging a strong partnership from the beginning.

Then, at the end of the year, a teacher can reference these desires in her conversation to wrap up the year. For example, a teacher might share with a parent, “At the beginning of the year, you mentioned a concern that your son would continue to struggle in math. Well, as you know, there have been some bumps this year. But there have also been some real victories that I would like to remind us about. This is worth celebrating together.”

When parents feel heard and understood, they are much more likely to trust and respect their child’s teacher throughout the year. Then, at the end of the year, the partnership can conclude with shared appreciation and gratitude for the journey together.

2. Debrief the plan you implemented in collaboration with parents to help the child grow.

It is a common mantra in the business world to underpromise and overdeliver. This insight can, to some degree, be applied in the parent-teacher partnership. It is important to not hubristically claim that any one teacher can “fix” a child or solve a learning problem after years of struggle. There are no guarantees when dealing with humans, no sure-fire way to guarantee a particular outcome, whether it be a particular grade, college acceptance, or habit development. Teachers are therefore wise to not overpromise what they cannot deliver with certainty.

At the same time, at the beginning of the year, teachers can instill confidence with parents through crafting a specific plan to help a child grow in a key area. Identify a root obstacle in the way of a child’s growth and then share a proposed strategy for collaborative implementation. This is what Dr. Thompson calls “claiming a child.” After all, parents partner with schools because they want their children to be known, loved, and educated. While “educated” is a vague term, as classical educators we can think of all the ways we support whole-person growth: habit formation, character and spiritual development, the cultivation of friendships, skill mastery, knowledge acquisition, and more.

Teachers can end the year on a strong note with parents by revisiting the plan they agreed upon at the beginning of the year. This communicates to parents, first, consistency in the teacher’s plan for the year, and second, that the teacher has been thoroughly committed to helping the child grow. By debriefing the plan at the end of the year, both teacher and parents can conclude the partnership with a sense of clarity and accomplishment about everyone’s hard work throughout the year.

3. Demonstrate professionalism and respect through the last day of school.

It may be impossible to go back in time and do over again a particular parent-teacher conference that did not go as planned. But it is never too late to step up one’s professionalism when interacting with parents.

Like it or not, independent schools are service organizations. Terms are clarified, the enrollment agreement is signed, tuition is collected, and the service is provided over the course of the school year. Parents pay a particular amount and expect a value in proportion to what they have paid. And while there are no guarantees in education–teachers do not have full control over whether a child passes math or overcomes a particular character flaw–parents can and should expect their interactions with teachers to be professional and respectful.

One way teachers can demonstrate their professionalism is through having effective and respectful conversations with parents. For parent-teacher conferences, this includes keeping track of the time, having an agenda prepared in advance, sharing student work in an organized and confident manner, and listening to parent opinions respectfully. Similarly, in phone conversations, teachers should strive to listen well, communicate the agenda up front, and be sensitive to the direction the conversation is going.

At the end of the year, teachers can conclude the parent partnership on a strong note by asking, “How have you seen your child grow this year? Do you have any concerns or questions as we wrap up this year? How can I help you and your child leave for the summer feeling at peace about the year?” Asking these sorts of questions helps parents process the year, including the victories, challenges, and perhaps unresolved questions. This processing then leads to clarity and an inner sense of gratitude about their relationship with the teacher.

Conclusion

There are many joys of working in education, but in my experience, the greatest joy of all is the myriad of relationships that are formed over the course of the year. While for many teachers the parent partnership can be a source of stress, it does not have to be. By implementing the guidance outlined in this article, both teachers and parents can depart for the summer with a sense of gratitude and deep appreciation for how the Lord worked in and through the partnership, and ultimately, in the life of the child.

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In this article, we will develop a framework for the classroom centered around the idea that each class is a team. This framework revolves around two general concepts: strong relationships and strategic routines. These might seem either obvious or overly general. But we shall see how essential both are if we want to foster a successful culture in the classroom.

A Good Apple: Cultivating Relational Safety

In his book The Culture Code, Daniel Coyle describes how organizations can create cultures that flourish based on studies of various teams such as the Navy SEALs, the San Antonio Spurs and the Brain Trust at Pixar, to name a few. Coyle structures his book around three skills essential to culture creation: build safety, share vulnerability, and establish purpose. Each of these skills address ways individuals connect to a shared culture, which can be expressed in several diagnostic questions.

When we are aiming to build safety, we can ask a few important questions. Does every individual feel safe to share?  Is there a bond of connection that everyone feels? Is there a sense of identity individuals sense by belonging to this group? Perhaps the most important of the three skills is creating relational connection.

In his chapter entitled, “The Good Apples,” Coyle describes how an experiment was run in Australia studying group dynamics. Planted inside a number of four-person groups was an individual who was intentionally supposed to sabotage the group. This person was a bad apple, attempting—and usually succeeding—in reducing the quality of each group’s performance. Yet, in one instance, a group involved an individual named Jonathan, who effectively checked the attempts of the bad apple. Jonathan—dubbed the good apple—exhibited subtle characteristics that made everyone in the group feel welcomed and valued. Every gesture and statement made by Jonathan enabled the group to feel a connection with the others in the group.

Coyle lists a number of patterns that Jonathan—and other connectors like him—practiced that cause this feeling of safety and connection. He notes “close physical proximity, often in circles” as well as “profuse amounts of eye contact.” There are “lots of short, energetic exchanges (no long speeches)” along with “lots of questions” and “humor, laughter” (Coyle 8). These patterns make a group “sticky.” Members of these groups come to feel a sense of belonging through many reinforcing patterns and practices. While it can be difficult to manufacture such cultures, we can note these patterns and implement them strategically. For instance, when I want to initiate a project, I will call a class to huddle up. American football has made this such a recognizable practice, that my student immediately circle up in a hunched over position. I can give simple pointed instructions and generate excitement, connection and buy in by this “close physical proximity, often in circles” pattern. “Okay, guys, we need to put away all the chairs from assembly. What’s our strategy?” In the huddle, I let them share their ideas and then we get down to work. Moments like this create a culture of belonging and connection. Find simple ways to incorporate patterns like this into your day.

Later in the same chapter, Coyle dives into the work of Pentland to break down five factors of optimal team performance. Like the list of patterns above, these can be implemented to cultivate a sense of teamwork and build culture. Coyle writes:

“1. Everyone in the group talks and listens in roughly equal measure, keeping contributions short.

2. Members maintain high levels of eye contact, and their conversations and gestures are energetic.

3. Members communicate directly with one another, not just with the team leader.

4. Members carry on back-channel or side conversations within the team.

5. Members periodically break, go exploring outside the team, and bring information back to share with the others.”

Daniel Coyle, The Culture Code (Random House, 2018), 14-15.

Notice how much culture is built around quick moments of conversation. As teachers, we are often inclined to stop side conversations. These can be distracting and show a lack of attention towards the subject at hand. Yet, when our goal is building culture, we actually want a good amount of intra-group dialogue to occur. What this means is that we ought to train our students to shift between focused attention and then side-to-side group engagement. Coach students in topic-driven discussion. Provide feedback on roundtable debates and dialogue. This entails that our classrooms are not dominated by mono-directional instruction, such as lectures. Instead, we must become effective at practices like dialogue, debate and discussion.

Another feature of these factors is what we could call distributed leadership. Sure, as teachers we are the leaders of the classroom, often giving orders and instructions and always guiding the class throughout their learning. However, there are ways we can empower students to become champions of the culture we are building. This can occur by training them in how to lead discussions. We can give them rules for effective debate and argumentation. Break down the big group into platoons of teams, assigning different groupings and team leaders each time. These moments of empowerment get the students invested in the creation of a culture that has the stamp of their personalities. While it might feel like this detracts from the teacher’s leadership and authority, when done correctly, the teacher actually accumulates more leadership capital through guiding, coaching and correcting these young, emerging leaders.

The concept of “go exploring” can also feel risky. But notice how that is likewise a major contributor to empowerment and buy-in. The teacher as leader gives clear instructions as to what ought to be explored and what information would be worth sharing. This can be done in the classroom by having students scan back through the chapter for identify beautiful word choices of an author. Students can be assigned the task of coming up with discussion questions for the next chapter. Young students love exploring and finding specimens in nature study. They come back to the teacher and the group with a joyful, “Look what I found!”

I highly recommend reading through all of Coyle’s book whether you are a teacher or administrator. Learning the tools to guide and shape culture enable you to have intentionality in what is built but also a “stickiness” that makes your culture hard to resist. My thesis here as I interacted with Coyle’s first chapter is that we as leaders in our classrooms and schools can be the “good apples” promoting the safety and connection that makes culture possible.

A Champion Culture: Principles and Practices

Here at Educational Renaissance, we really like Doug Lemov’s Teach Like a Champion. Now that he has come out with a new edition, we need to navigate a world where there are great qualities that are the domain of his 2.0 edition as well as new insights published in his 3.0 version. One of the greatest frameworks he provided in the 2.0 version was a write-up of “Five Principles of Classroom Culture”: Discipline, Management, Control, Influence, and Engagement (342-347). Here we’ll walk through a few of these principles and spell out some key practices to implement to build a thriving culture.

Lemov is spot on when it comes to a description of discipline. I am reminded of the classical sense that Latin root discipulina means instruction (much as the Greek word for disciple, μαθητής, means “learner” or “pupil”). Discipline is not about punishment, but about inculcating what Lemov calls “self-discipline.” Charlotte Mason connect this idea to habit training. “There is no habit or power so useful to man or woman as that of personal initiative,” Mason claims (Home Education 192). True freedom comes when we are able to hold ourselves accountable to what we know to be true, good and just.

The second principle Lemov elucidates is management. Unlike what many might expect, he does not promote a system of rewards and punishments. Instead, he equates management to relationship building. He writes:

“To truly succeed, you must be able to control students—that is, get them to do things regardless of consequence, and inspire and engage them in positive work. You also are building relationships with students that are nontransactional; they don’t involve rewards or consequences, and they demonstrate that you care enough to know your students as individuals.”

Doug Lemov, Teach Like a Champion 2.0 (Jossey-Bass, 2015), 344.

This really is Leadership 101. If your class is going to have a healthy culture, there must be a strong relational connection between student and teacher. This relationship serves as a bridge that must hold the weight of coaching, training, instructing and counseling.

Third is control, with Lemov describes as “your capacity to cause someone to choose to do what you ask, regardless of consequences.” Notice how this overlaps with management. There must be a safe and connected group dynamic such as Coyle describes where the teacher can call students up firmly and confidently. This comes from what Lemov expresses as “faith in students’ ability to meet expectation” (Lemov 345). We are not lowering expectations to make it “easy” on the students. Instead, the teacher supports students to reach high and offers support to get there.

The relationship building inherent in management and control leads to the fourth principle, influence. “Influence gets them to want to internalize the things you suggest” (Lemov 346). The control principle is all about the teacher believing in a student’s potential to reach high. Influence now gets the student to believe in herself. This comes through celebrating victories, reflecting on challenges overcome, and setting new goals to reach even higher.

Finally, the principle of engagement centers on compelling lessons. We must be careful here to avoid mere entertainment. A teacher might be gifted in sparking laughter or eloquently delivering lectures. But if the material itself is not appreciated for its intrinsic value, the whole culture can crumble. Exciting lessons are often associated with challenge and complexity. It is fascinating to see how children enjoy trying to solve interesting problems. Reading great books, writing effortfully, and calculating complex problems can be a pathway to flow for students. Engaging students in meaningful work is how to build a culture of excellence.

This philosophical introduction to the late chapters of Teach Like a Champion 2.0 lead to numerous techniques that help build classroom culture. Here I will highlight a few that can maximize your leadership as a teacher. We begin with “Strategic investment” combined with “Do it again.” In both of these you lead rehearsals of the routines, procedures and practices of the classroom. Here you can show exactly how things get done in the classroom, and then repeat the practice until it meets expectations. Consider how this framework leads to organized desks, clear routes for classroom traffic, homework steno checks, hand-raising, or rules for proper discussion.

You as a teacher project something of your personality and authority into the classroom. These next techniques leverage that presence you have in the classroom. From “Be seen looking” to “Firm calm finesse” and “Strong voice,” you convey to the classroom that you are in control of the environment—creating a safe and connected culture—through your ability to notice when students are doing what is expected and calling them up when they fall below standards. Being at peace in the presence of your students lets them know that you are both happy to be with them, but also not ruffled when things get a little out of control. You can bring them back with your strong voice. Now this is not yelling or raising your voice. Instead, you are clear, pointed, and confident in what you have to say.

The words we use make such an impact on the culture we are building. The techniques “Precise praise” and “Joy factor” go a long way towards building up a culture of excellence. With both of these techniques, we avoid phrases such as “good job” or “well done,” instead preferring to specify exactly what was praiseworthy. “Great job raising hands to share your thoughts, class.” “I really appreciated how you supported your claim with evidence.” By being precise, you clearly identify actions that are praiseworthy. This removes mere affirmation of the individual while demonstrating your watchfulness for the excellent standards that are central to your culture. Hard work and new understandings ought to be celebrated, not as a reward but as the natural consequence of the joy intrinsic is such things. Make these moments tangible for your students and provide a framework for taking satisfaction in their work.

As the leader in the classroom, you become the champion of the excellence that will mark your culture. We can be the good apples that create the safe and connected culture where students can thrive. By applying the principles and techniques outlined here, you can create a classroom culture that is a delight.

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A vision, as you might expect, is purposefully general. It can be so broad, in fact, that it can entail a number of pathways to achieve it. This is where an organizational mission comes in. A mission is a purpose statement for how one specific organization is going to fulfill a vision.

For example, imagine you live in a town where you notice that a growing number of young people in their 20’s and 30’s report lacking purpose in life. Having passed through the modern education industrial complex, they lack the thoughtfulness and tools to think about what it would be like to craft a life built on enduring values. They have been trained to think that life is about maximizing income, not living for a higher purpose.

What’s more, these young adults in your town display a noticeable lack of creativity. They do not read, build, explore, serve, or sing for fun. They have graduated college and landed decent paying jobs, but their leisure is short-circuiting as free time is routinely consumed through tech addiction passing as “catching up on shows.”

As life’s big challenges begin to set in, these young people realize they do not know what they think about complex political issues. They are left paralyzed by the suffering that comes from the illness of a loved one. They are not sure whether God is actually good and really involved in their day to day lives. 

Upon noticing such a problem in your town looking out, you further observe looking in that a version of yourself shares some of these deficiencies. Meanwhile, an aspirational picture begins to emerge in your mind of a young person who lives and looks decidedly different. “What if I drove down the street and saw a young man or woman living like…this?” you ask yourself. “How would this happen?” 

Thus begins your journey toward Christian, classical education and perhaps even starting a school toward this end.

In this article, I will explore how schools can strengthen their mission statements and then align their communities with this overarching purpose. The goal is that through achieving strong organizational clarity, schools in the Christian classical education renewal movement can better deliver on what they have set out to achieve and then be faithful to this work for the longterm.

Many Missions, One Vision

There are hundreds of Christian, classical schools in the United States. I recently heard that there were 140 of such schools in 2010 and now there are over 700. This is amazing progress for the movement in just 13 years. For each one of these schools, there is a distinct mission or purpose, stating why it exists. Consider this small sampling, which exemplifies the variety:

• We exist to glorify God by cultivating students of wisdom and virtue through a Christ-centered, academically robust classical education.
• We exist to assist parents in their duty of biblically training their children by offering distinctly Christ-centered and Classical academic instruction.
• We exist to glorify God by equipping students with the tools necessary to pursue a lifetime of learning so that they may discern, reason and defend truth in service to our Lord, Jesus Christ.
• We exist to inspire students with an education founded on a Christian worldview, informed by the classical tradition, and approached with diligence and joy. 
• We exist to support families and churches by providing an academically excellent classical Christian education that cultivates knowledge, wisdom, eloquence, and godly character and equips students with the tools of learning that will last a lifetime.

What you may notice above is that each of these missions emphasizes a different aspect of the Christian, classical education renewal movement. Some underscore the importance of partnership between church, family, and school. Others emphasize that bringing glory to God ought to be the “why” of the mission no matter what kind of Christian organization. But what all these schools have in common if we were to press them is a shared vision about the sort of alumni they seek to develop through their programs.

The Eight-Word Mission Statement

Interestingly, in the organizational development world, there is growing interest in what has been called the “eight-word mission statement.” (or even seven words). It is exactly what it sounds like: a brief concise purpose statement that captures the “why” of an organization with stunning simplicity.

Here’s the formula: A verb, a target population, and an outcome that implies something to measure. As Kevin Starr, a though leader in social entrepreneurship, puts it,

Save kids’ lives in Uganda. Rehabilitate coral reefs in the Western Pacific. Prevent maternal-child transmission of HIV in Africa. Get Zambian farmers out of poverty. These statements tell us exactly what the organization has set out to accomplish. Once we’ve got it, we know whether they are working on something that fits our own mission, and we have a useful starting point for any subsequent conversations.

Stanford Social Innovation Review (https://ssir.org/articles/entry/the_eight_word_mission_statement#)

Starr identifies two specific strengths of this approach to crafting mission statements. First, it focuses on concrete results, thereby avoiding vague language. Second, it spotlights the “what,” not the “how.”

I suspect that one reason mission statements at Christian, classical schools can arguably be too long, such as in the examples above, is that proponents of this type of education cannot help themselves but include the “how.” Notice how many of the mission statements above include the specifics of the education they offer. They are drifting into the way they will accomplish their mission, rather than focusing on the central purpose.

If we take Starr’s advice, here might be a compelling alternative: “Cultivate students of wisdom and virtue.” Now, this may feel overly general. After all, it fails to to say anything about classical or Christian education. Is this a problem? Not necessarily. If you are committed to keeping your school’s mission focused solely on the “what,” then you must resist the temptation to detail method and instead be ultra clear on the chief purpose, which for our schools is about the formation of a particular kind of student.

Readers may not fully buy into the idea of an eight-word mission statement. For one, it can feel at times like it fuses vision and mission, future state and pathway, in a way that conflicts with the traditional distinction described above. Regardless of where you land, the point is that, when crafting a mission statement, you want to achieve maximal clarity on why your school exists. The more clarity you gain, the more you can align your school community with this core focus.

Creating Missional Alignment

Once a school has its core focus articulated via a mission statement, it can be to think about how this mission is to serve as the aligning rails for all activity within the organization. In Wisdom and Eloquence (Crossway, 2006), Robert LittleJohn and Chuck Evans define alignment as “like-mindedness about the essential qualities of the school and a common understanding that everything that happens under the school’s banner is informed or required by its core mission. We often use the term ‘vertical alignment,’ or the insistence that every activity, every decision, flows figuratively downhill from the school’s mission.” (203).

Admittedly, I have been puzzled by this concept at times. It has not always been clear to me how all the various activities of the school are “informed” or “required” by its core mission. For some activities, of course, it is obvious. Logic class, for example, flows downhill from a classical mission in that logic, or dialectic, is one of the three language arts of the classical trivium. A Shakespeare performance is informed by the mission insofar as Shakespearean drama holds a major place in the annals of western literature.

But what about curriculum nights? School picnics? Admissions welcome packets? Capital campaigns? Employee benefits packages? It is not obvious that these flow downhill from a distinctively Christian classical mission. After all, these activities exist in other schools. So what is the difference?

The Aligned Community

Here it is important to underscore the distinction between “required” and “informed.” To “require” is to need for a particular purpose while to “inform” is to give shape to. Every activity at a school must either be necessary to the school’s core mission or be shaped by it. Let us consider a few examples for each of these categories.

I can think of a number of necessities, required ingredients, for a classical school to achieve its mission. The school must have a wide and varied curriculum of classical literature, art, music, and history. Additionally, it must focus its instruction on training students in the liberal arts, the complex skills of reading, thinking, speaking, calculating, and creating. And it must include in its objectives an emphasis on the character formation of its students rather than solely going for more head knowledge. These examples, we might say, exist in the center core of the mission. Take away one of these qualities and you risk achieving the purpose you have set out to accomplish.

Then there are the activities of the school that are not required by the school’s mission, but must at the very least be significantly shaped by it. Take a capital campaign, for example. Schools cost money to operate, and strategic decisions to take the school to the next level often require significant funds. To raise this capital, one must share with potential donors a compelling vision for how their gifts will advance the school’s mission. What will make up the content of this vision? Whatever is decided, the explicit connection must be made to the school’s mission of cultivating students of wisdom and virtue. Otherwise you are raising money for something else.

Let us look at another example and drill a little deeper: the girls volleyball team. How can we align this program with the school’s core mission? We begin by putting the mission in front of us: cultivating students of wisdom and virtue. We then begin thinking about what wisdom and virtue look like for student athletes in the volleyball program. Wisdom may have to do with their approach to competition on the court as followers of Christ. Or it could connect to how students interact with one another during practice. A focus on virtue could influence how much effort students put into practice each day or deciding as a team they will never give up no matter the odds.

By evaluating each program or activity in your school against the rubric of your school’s mission, you can align your entire community to this core focus. This keeps all constituents on the same page and rowing in the same direction. As LittleJohn and Evans sum it up nicely: “A vertically aligned school can be confident that each member of the community understands the school’s mission and his or her role in helping to achieve that mission” (203).

Conclusion

Schools are complex operations. They consist of many types of constituents: board members, parents, faculty and staff, students, and alumni. They are also comprised of all sorts of activities, ranging from hot lunch to curriculum development to facilities management to the actual instruction in the classroom. Consequently, keeping the school united is a crucial task and it all begins with a clear mission statement. Once this purpose statement is articulated clearly and points toward an aspirational future state, the vision, comprehensive alignment must be carried out. By taking inventory of every activity and decision at the school and determining alignment with the mission, school leaders can bring unity and direction to their communities that will spark momentum and a sense of confidence for what the future holds.

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For example, a teacher responsible for teaching The Great Gatsby must consider how the book will be taught, what she will focus on, and how she intends for students to develop and grow through the study. Each day, she walks into a room full of students in need of direction for approaching the text. This requires leadership.

In modern educational circles, we often speak, not of leadership, but of “classroom management.” Unfortunately, this phrase is embedded with faulty assumptions about who students are, what the purpose of learning is, and how we are to manage them toward some desirable end. As a result, classroom management techniques are problematic in two key ways.

First, classroom management techniques are often behavioristic. In other words, they seek to address the behavior of students through systems of external rewards and consequences, rather than aiming to form the whole person of the child, especially the heart. Strategies are deployed to artificially motivate behaviors of respect, obedience, service, and even kindness in a way disconnected from the child’s internal moral development. Is this child growing in a love and understanding of the idea of respect for authority? How is the child becoming more servant-hearted in her disposition? These questions are not usually asked in typical classroom management conversations.

Second, classroom management techniques are often task-oriented rather than people-oriented. This makes sense since the phrase emerged during the post-industrial revolution in which the effective and efficient completion of tasks was prized above all else. Now, at its best, modern business management theory is people-oriented, but most managers too easily slip into the mindset of “How do I get this employee to perform this task?” rather than “How do I lead this employee on a path toward growth and increasing expertise?” The latter focuses on the development of the talent and skill of people, not simply whether they are hitting the deadlines. 

To equip teachers to grow as true leaders of their students, in this article I will recommend three recently published leadership books that contain relevant ideas for classroom leadership. These resources will help teachers see their true leadership role and therefore embrace the responsibility for them to invest deeply in the lives of their students. While teachers will need to push through some of the business-focused examples of these resources, the underlying ideas are both relevant and applicable for classroom leadership today.

Multipliers by Liz Wiseman 

The first book I want to recommend is Multipliers (HarperCollins, 2017) by researcher Liz Wiseman. In this book, Wiseman sets out to show how leaders can make people under their supervision smarter, rather than targeting mere compliance. Early on, she differentiates between two managers, the Genius Maker and the Genius (9). The genius maker grows people’s intelligence by “extracting the smarts and maximum effort from each member on the team.” This type of leader talks only about 10% of the time, thereby making space for others to grow through active participation in coming up with solutions to a problem. 

In contrast, the genius is self-oriented. He is smart and successful, and everyone in the room knows who has the best ideas. He may facilitate “conversations” but soon these turn into opportunities for him to share his correct views with others. After all, he is the genius. Why not just listen to him? The result is that people do not have the permission to think for themselves or the legitimate responsibility to make decisions. It all goes back to what the genius thinks is right. 

For Wiseman, the genius maker is a multiplier of of intelligence while the genius is actually a diminisher. At heart, multipliers “invoke each person’s unique intelligence and create an atmosphere of genius–innovation, productive effort, and collective intelligence” (10). The upshot is that these leaders not only access people’s current capability, they stretch it. People actually report getting smarter under the supervision of multipliers. The fundamental assumption of a multiplier is “People are smart and will figure this out” whereas the assumption of the diminisher is “They will never figure this out without me” (20). 

Teachers can become multipliers of intelligence in their classrooms by resisting the urge to be the residential genius. Although they are older, smarter, and more experienced, these assets can be leveraged to empower their students toward growing their own abilities, rather than making it all about the teacher.

Diagnostic Questions for Teachers:

• Do you empower students in your classroom to make major contributions to class culture, discussions, learning, and skill demonstration? 
• Is there room in your classroom for students to make mistakes as you stretch them to attempt difficult assignments?
• Do you ask your students to explain complex concepts to their peers rather than yourself?
• Does your approach to grading grow student intellectual confidence or does it foster dependence on your own intelligence?

Boundaries for Leaders by Dr. Henry Cloud

Boundaries for Leaders (HarperCollins, 2013) is written by clinical psychologist Dr. Henry Cloud, an author recognized for his work on cultivating healthy relationships. In Chapter 1, he writes, “This book is about what leaders need to do in order for people to accomplish a vision” (2). The key word here for Cloud is people. He will go on to argue that people perform their best work in healthy work cultures that take into consideration the psychological well-being of both employer and employee. By setting good boundaries in place and leading in a way that people’s brains can follow, Cloud contends, good results will come. 

Cloud writes that boundaries are made up of two things: what you create and what you allow (15). A boundary is a property line, marking out who is responsible and for what. When someone is given real ownership of something, anything that happens under their supervision only happens because they created it or allowed it. 

In top-performing classrooms, teachers teach in a way that makes it possible for their students’ brains to function as they were designed (25). This happens through setting good boundaries. Cloud writes, “Show me a person, team, or a company that gets results, and I will show you the leadership boundaries that make it possible” (26).

As a psychologist, the author is aware of how the human brain works and what leaders can do to maximize brain health and productivity. In turn, teachers can use these insights as they seek to pass on knowledge, skills, and virtues to their students.

For example, it is helpful for a teacher to understand that the brain relies on three essential properties to achieve a particular task, be it the following of a classroom procedure or the completion of an assignment:

1. Attention: the ability to focus on relevant stimuli, and block out what is not relevant (“Do this”)
2. Inhibition: the ability to “not do” certain actions that could be distracting, irrelevant, or eve destructive (“Don’t do this”)
3. Working Memory: the ability to retain and access relevant information for reasoning, decision-making, and taking future actions (“Remember and build on this relevant information”)

As teachers design their lessons and think through what they want their students to accomplish for the day, it is beneficial to think through these three neurological elements for the completion of a task. When we ignore one or more of these elements, we risk short-circuiting our students optimal use of the way God designed their brains.

Diagnostic Questions for Teachers:

• What student behaviors in your classroom have you created or allowed?
• How do your lessons promote student attention on what is most important for the curricular objective?
• What procedures and expectations have you established and maintained to ensure that what is not important or destructive is not allowed in?
• How are you building your students’ working memory of key information to help them complete assignments with greater success? 

The Motive by Patrick Lencioni 

The Motive (Wiley, 2020), written especially for CEOs, explores the underlying motivation of a good leader. Author Patrick Lencioni, well-known for his book Five Dysfunctions of a Team, illustrates through a leadership parable that one’s motivation for leading will dictate what one prioritizes and how he or she spends her time.

In the parable, two types of leadership motivation are at play (135). Reward-centered leadership rests on the fundamental assumption that the leader, having been selected for the role, has arrived and therefore possesses the freedom to design her job around what she most enjoys. It is the belief that the leader’s work should be pleasant and enjoyable because the leadership position is the reward. She therefore has the freedom to avoid mundane, unpleasant, or uncomfortable work if she so pleases, which she does.

In contrast, responsibility-centered leadership assumes that leadership is all about responsibility and service. It is the belief that being a leader is responsible; therefore, the experience of leading should be difficult and challenging (though certainly not without elements of gratification). 

To be clear, Lencioni writes that no leader perfectly embodies one form of motivation or the other. But one of these motives will be predominant and leaders need to be self-aware of what drives them. Reward-centered leaders often resist and avoid doing the difficult things that only they can do for the team they are leading. As a result, the whole organization suffers.

When it comes to leading a classroom, there are all sorts of things that a teacher would prefer not to do: address difficult student behavior, call a parent with bad news to share, have “family talks” with the whole class about negative classroom culture issues, or give a low grade on an assignment. But to be the best leaders they can, teachers need to lean into these responsibilities and thereby discharge their role teacher well.

Diagnostic Questions for Teachers

• What is your motivation for becoming a teacher?
• What are the 3-5 things you can do for your class that no one else can do? 
• How are you caring for your class culture, especially rooting out dysfunctional behavior and forming healthy interpersonal dynamics?
• What kind of feedback do you give your students on their behavior and work? 
• When was the last time you had a difficult conversation with a student in which you addressed unhealthy behavior?
• When was the last time you complained about a student’s or parent’s behavior? What steps do you need to take to address it?
• How often are you reminding your students of the big picture of their education, your particular curriculum, and the core values of your classroom?

Conclusion

Teachers are the leaders of their classrooms, responsible for casting vision for their students, supporting them in their work, and cultivating healthy classroom cultures. Rather than deploying classroom management techniques which can be overly behavioristic and task-oriented, teachers should embrace their role as leaders and focus on developing their people. By helping teachers become better leaders, we will see dynamic classrooms, better learning results, and, most importantly, thriving students.

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This hearty plant can survive the harsh conditions of different locations such as Sweden, Japan, and Montana. In my own Illinois it thrives in a region known for hot summers and cold winters. Compare this profile to the Zinnia, which is also known for its heartiness, but cannot survive the deep cold of Illinois.

I recently pulled up a patch of Lily of the Valley with a view of keeping it indoors. And while this is a hearty plant, it will be necessary for me to be careful to establish a healthy culture for this plant in ways I wouldn’t have to when it is outdoors. For plant tissue to grow well indoors, there needs to be slightly high humidity, the temperature needs to be stable, the light conditions must be rigorously attended to, and the plant must be fed nutrients on a regular basis. The very same plant which cares not whether I tend to it all year round, once brought inside becomes very particular about its environment. For it to grow well, I must tend to the culture of my house.

Tending to our culture to optimize growth for individuals in an organization or students in a classroom is analogous to the care I must take with my Lily of the Valley cutting. Like it or not, every classroom and every school has a culture. The question is not whether we have a culture, it is rather what we do about it. There are better and worse cultures, so the goal is to be able to understand what kind of culture we have and then be able to apply tools to help improve the culture of our classroom or school.

Analyze the Culture

The first step in optimizing our culture has to do with deep learning and focused attention on the culture as it currently stands. You can accomplish this through simple observation and description. I recommend taking a notebook and capturing every moment of the day. What are students like when they arrive? How do I feel when I leave for work each day? Is there a moment of the day that I dread? What are the transitions like during the day? Are students responsive and engaged in their work? What are the best moments of the day? The approach here is to get at both the problems or issues in the day as well as the best or most productive parts of the day. Even a few days of observing and noting will spell out the differences between the ideal culture you are going for and the ways it is falling short of that ideal.

Another step to take is to survey your people. This can be done in a formal way by using a tool like Survey Monkey, Google Forms or some other tool. If you choose to use a formal survey, be sure to keep the survey of a manageable length. Survey Monkey recommends using less than 30 questions, or to put it in terms of time, that it should take someone 10 minutes or less to complete the survey.

Questions should be open-ended and fair, allowing the respondent to provide an accurate answer. Allowing the respondent to use a sliding scale or Likert scale (strongly agree, agree, neutral, disagree, strongly disagree) helps mitigate survey bias. Here are a few questions that you could use in a student culture survey:

Students in my school treat one another with respect: strongly agree, agree, neutral, disagree, strongly disagree.

I and the other students in my class care about learning: strongly agree, agree, neutral, disagree, strongly disagree.

Now, you can survey your people less formally. Having a bank of questions that you can ask students, parents, colleagues in conversations can help you get amble feedback as you try to analyze the culture of your classroom or school. At parent-teacher conferences, for instance, you can ask parents to share stories their child has shared about school. Be listening for clues about the cultural values you are trying to build. Some parents or students will be very free, even to the point of offense, when they share their thoughts about the culture of your class. Try to listen for the kernel of truth even if you find it difficult to receive someone’s thoughts.

Having put in the work to describe the culture and survey your people, you are now in a position to determine some of the key factors that are driving the culture of your classroom. You may determine that despite students feeling safe and cared for, they still exhibit lots of anxiety. Or you might find that the culture of enthusiastic learning that you are trying to cultivate is hindered by things like the arrangement of the desks or distractions in the classroom. The ultimate goal is to get to a place of clarity about different levers you might be able to pull to begin influencing culture in a certain direction.

A Vision for Culture

Having described the current culture and surveyed your people to determine the factors that are driving the culture of your classroom or school, you are better positioned to get down to the work changing the culture for the better. Yet, we cannot enact positive changes without a clear vision of where you are heading. Work must be done to get clarity about your highest values and the goals you will be striving towards. I am quick to point out that casting vision is work that can be done simultaneously or even before assessing your current culture, even though I’ve placed point after doing the work of analysis.

Jim Collins in Built to Last articulates how core values are inherent, almost sacred, principles or traits that can never be compromised. We can identify some of these through the analysis exercise above. What is it that we are already doing based on high-value principles. For instance, your students might be going after good grades because there’s already a value placed on excellence. Identifying these core values takes reflection on what might already be in place.

Patrick Lencioni in his HBR article “Make Your Values Mean Something” differentiates core values and aspirational values. He defines aspirational values as “those that a company needs to succeed in the future but currently lacks.” As you consider driving the culture of your classroom or school forward or upward, you will need a combination of core values and aspirational values working together. For instance, if your class is already driven by excellence, but they are completely stressed out, you may find that an aspirational value such as joyful learning needs to be incorporated.

To get at these values, you will actually need to detach from your classroom or school for reflection and deliberation. I think of this as similar to the moment Moses goes up the mountain, communes with God, and then returns to his people with a set of high-value principles, ten to be specific. Getting at core and aspirational values is very much a spiritual exercise, because what you are trying to get clarity on is the set of inspiring ideas that will capture the hearts and minds of those you are leading. The work here is to find a way of articulating something that is both meaningful and abstract. Keep in mind, that there really should only a few of these inspiring ideas.

Once these inspiring values are spelled out, you are ready to begin connecting these up with a plan. How do we live out these values? This entails goal setting. For example, if we are compelled by a vision of joyful learning, I can set a goal of giving one expression of joy every day for the next month. Notice how there are specific and measurable details in this goal. George Doran in his 1981 article in Management Review entitled, “There’s a S.M.A.R.T. way to write management’s goals and objectives” lays out the now-famous acronym for goals that are specific, measurable, assignable, realistic, and time-based. Setting out goals in such a way provides a means for measuring what really matters when it comes to building the culture you are striving towards.

The Habit of Practice

Creating a culture is the ultimate practice of habit training. I believe this is what Charlotte Mason meant by atmosphere. She is very clear that atmosphere is the not the creation of some artificial space where “a child should be isolated in what may be called a ‘child environment’ specially adapted and prepared.” (Philosophy of Education, 94) What she describes positively about atmosphere is quite inspiring:

“The bracing atmosphere of truth and sincerity should be perceived in every School; and here again the common pursuit of knowledge by teacher and class comes to our aid and creates a Current of fresh air perceptible even to the chance visitor, who sees the glow of intellectual life and moral health on the faces of teachers and children alike.”

Charlotte Mason, Philosophy of Education, pg. 97

We might restate this as a culture of truth and sincerity where the fresh air we breathe is initiated by core and aspirational values carried out with clear goals in mind touching on intellectual life and moral health. And in this atmosphere or culture the child very naturally pursues the goals or objectives set forth. It is not as though they are forced to be kind by the environment, but there is clearly a sense that “that’s the way we do things around here.” The child does not mechanically become intellectually stimulated because we have put particular paintings and plants in the classroom, but it is obvious when you look around that “people like us get really excited by what we learn.” A well-considered culture begins to generate habits in keeping with our values. Mason writes, “We may not leave off the attempt to form good habits with tact and care, to suggest fruitful ideas, without too much insistence, and to make wise use of circumstances.” (School Education, 185) The circumstances of our classroom form the opportunities to train in orderliness, thoughtfulness, kindness and so forth.

In this mode of thinking, we can create routines that establish our cultural values. These might be as simple as a handshake upon entering the room in the morning, a process for handing out texts, or a class job that is a delight to all. You might find yourself compelled by this vision, but doubtful that you can create the change necessary to guide your classroom or school toward your inspiring vision. Yet, you can create rapid change through rehearsals. For instance, let’s say you want to create a culture of tidiness. You begin with an inspiring vision of the satisfaction and utility of a clean space. Then you have everyone practice every morning, potentially multiple times, organizing their cubbies, lockers, desks, room, etc. You share a mantra, “a place for everything and everything in its place.” Day after day, the routine is practiced. The culture of tidiness takes root, and you can see on everyone’s faces a sense of pride in the classroom, in their work and even perhaps in their homes.

In modern research, habits have been boiled down to three basic components, a cue, a response and a reward. This approach to modifying our behaviors has a good deal of neurological basis to it. The area of sophistication I would add to this basic model is that the nature of the reward makes a big difference. A simple or trite reward such as a piece of candy, a star on a paper or a letter grade can be effective in enacting change, but usually not lasting change. This has to do with issues encountered in the dopaminergic system. Simple stimuli have diminishing returns because low-level stimuli are simply not that motivating because at a fundamental level basic rewards are not meaningful to us. The better framework for rewards is a feeling of satisfaction such as completing a long-term project, working at something difficult, or accomplishing a goal. These are associated not with dopamine but with the neurotransmitter seratonin, which results in higher levels of positive mood, such as satisfaction, happiness and optimism. (see “Happiness & Health: The Biological Factors- Systematic Review Article,” Iran J Public Health 43 (2014): 1468–1477.) One of the ways I’ve expressed this is that “the habit is the reward.” What this means is that when we create a culture imbued with inspiring values, the reward we are working toward is the serotonergic effect of a happier, calmer, more stable set of emotions.

Now in light of this sense of the reward we are working toward, it is worth celebrating the cultural breakthroughs we achieve. To the extend we are measuring what matters, as expressed in the previous section, we want to celebrate what matters. Once again, the inspiring values guide us to ways we can celebrate. If we have been developing a culture of kindness, perhaps the way we celebrate is to devote a Friday afternoon to sharing personal stories with one another. If we are working on a culture of deliberate practice, we can celebrate by sharing our accumulated skills with one another.

Practical Tools to Build a Culture

To close out this topic, there are five practical tools you can build an inspiring culture in your classroom or school. First, use a mimetic approach. It is frequently the case that we need to model what we are asking our students to do. I can demonstrate how I use kind words, or I can show the steps I use when I am organizing my desk. The mimetic method shows how and then asks the students to imitate.

Second, get others involved. Bring in visitors. Tell parents ways they can be reinforcing these values at home. Partner with another class to build the culture together. This approach builds some synergy and accountability to support the efforts you have in mind.

Third, have strategic conversations. You may have heard of the 80/20 principle or the Pareto distribution, which indicates that roughly 20 percent of the individuals in your class are going to have an outsized influence on the culture of the classroom or school. So be strategic to get these individuals on board with the program, simply because you know that most other will follow suite if they lead the charge.

Fourth, get the group talking. This can be a bit tricky, because you aren’t looking to engage in a debate about whether the value you are putting forward is actually a value. Instead, you want to stimulate their interest and enthusiasm by having them voice ways they could contribute to the culture by embracing this value. If I am cultivating kindness, I could ask the group a question, what could we do to be the class with the reputation for kindness?

Finally, praise is more powerful that chastisement. Immediately upon seeing evidence for the value your are leading, praise the class for exhibiting this so well. Make your praise specific and descriptive. Instead of a general “good job” it would be better to say “way to go class for keeping your desks so organized.”

Add some great books to your personal library with recommendations from the carefully curated list in The Educational Renaissance Bookstore.

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• Unclogging toilets and mopping up sewage in the restrooms of your new facility
• Setting up hundreds of chairs for an event on your own because you know you can’t ask any more of your teachers or volunteers
• Subbing for Calculus one day and Kindergarten the next, outside of your comfort zone and with unclear lesson plans
• Kindly mediating an hour and a half long meeting with a teacher and an unhappy set of parents who will likely leave the school
• Trying to keep track of complicated budgets for various areas of the school, when you’ve got no background in accounting
• Picking up a screaming and flailing child from the hall and carrying him into your office, providing counseling to calm the child down, then calling the parents to follow up on a strategy for discipline
• Planning events and coordinating the speaking roles of many different parties: teachers, board members, parents and your own boss, the Head of School
• Calmly and gratefully receiving constant criticisms and proposed “solutions” from well-meaning teachers, parents, board members and colleagues, who only see part of the picture you see and who don’t understand the time and resource constraints the school is under
• Calling sets of parents who have applied to your school to navigate a tricky conversation sharing feedback from admission testing for their child who is not prepared to enter on grade level
• Feeling the need to innovate new programs even while you know you don’t have enough time to do everything you’ve already committed to doing well
• Experiencing the pressure to be an expert in 50 different areas of academics and the business of running a school, and knowing you actually have expertise in just a handful
• Dealing with the frustrations of people not following your rules or instructions, whether it’s students, parents, or even teachers, meaning you have to take time out of your schedule to tackle another potentially challenging interpersonal conversation
• Never knowing exactly what sort of crisis you’re headed for today when you turn the keys in the ignition and drive off to school in the morning, but knowing from experience that some sort of crisis is more than likely

Serving as a Principal at a classical Christian school is not for the faint of heart. 

In the list above, I’ve tried to highlight some of the elements of a principal’s regular duties that are often left off of your typical job description. If you’re skeptical about the above list, I can assure you that these are all autobiographical to one extent or another, and that I could have gone on with other categories of tasks, equally as difficult, unexpected, stressful and emotionally fraught.

A few years into my tenure as a school administrator I remember attending a session at a private school conference where the presenter shared that the increase in salary and benefits accorded mid-level leaders at private schools often does not match up well with the increased stresses, challenges, time commitment and responsibilities. 

Now I’m not writing this article to dissuade aspiring academic leaders at classical Christian schools. We are in desperate need of more men and women who are competent and willing to embrace the role. Nor even am I writing for the indulgence of a good, old-fashioned pity party for us principals (as tempting as that is…). 

Instead, at the instigation of my current Head of School, I think it’s valuable to explore some of the costs of being a principal or other mid-level academic leader at a small to midsize classical Christian school (say, under 250 students), or else a Head of School at a small school (under 125). This role has a unique set of challenges, and just as Jesus warned of the costs of discipleship, it is my hope that by clarifying the costs of principal leadership at a classical Christian school, more aspiring leaders will be able to willingly take up this specific cross with eyes wide-open and the mental and emotional resources to do so successfully. 

Before we begin, I would note a caveat. Your mileage may vary: not all school situations are alike, and so some of the aspects I mentioned above might be successfully carried by someone else on staff. But at the same time there might be other job requirements I won’t mention. I have used specifics to paint a general picture, not to detail an actual job description. 

So, you think you want to be a principal… Have you considered that being a principal is…

1) a dirty, messy and physically exhausting job,

2) an emotionally draining job that requires you to maintain a relentless optimism and joyful mood in the midst of disheartening circumstances,

3) a multifaceted job requiring a range of competencies and a dizzying variety of challenges,

4) a leadership nightmare because you are always navigating several different audiences, and

5) an ideal job for a teacher and philosopher who can maintain equanimity in an active life? 

Let’s tackle each of these five aspects of the job of principal in term. Hopefully, this list will deter the faint of heart and those who are not suited to the demands of the position. But more than that, hopefully, it will help other aspiring principals prepare themselves for such a noble task. As Paul says of the role of overseer in 1 Timothy 3:1, so I say, “If anyone aspires to the office of principal, he desires a noble task. But not one for the faint of heart or unqualified. Let each one test himself to see whether he has what it takes.”

If you’re still reading this article and you are neither a principal nor an aspiring principal, I would encourage you to read on. Parents and teachers can benefit from understanding better the demands that are placed on those who are leading them. This can give them compassion when their administrator (inevitably) fails them in some way. I know that I have been helped and encouraged to shoulder the challenges of my role by kind and thoughtful teachers and parents who looked beyond their own concerns and showed appreciation for me and an understanding of my circumstances.

In a similar way, board members and heads of school might be sobered to recognize the complexities and day-to-day realities of the mid-level administrator. Inspired and multi-competent leadership at this level might not be the only inciting factor in a school’s improvement and growth to maturity, but it’s a major one. A principal who can successfully tackle the physical, emotional, many-hat-wearing, and philosophical leadership demands of the role can propel a school on to excellence. This implies that such persons should be appropriately trained, sought out, empowered and supported.

All of us at Educational Renaissance have served in mid-level principal or academic leadership roles at schools, so we have a special concern for how this role can function as a lever for genuine classical renewal and excellence at a school. Without further ado, we count the costs of principal leadership.

So, you think you want to be a principal…

1) Have you considered that being a principal is a dirty, messy and physically demanding job?

If you think going into school administration might release you from the demands of teaching and give you the luxury of a desk job, think again. 

While it may seem like teaching keeps you on your feet all day, and the principal can sit behind her desk for hours on end, this image doesn’t adequately reflect the role at a small classical Christian school. 

The fact is that many, if not most, classical Christian schools cannot afford the full custodial staff of established schools. This makes the principal’s job dirtier and messier than your typical office job. There may be exceptions where the church a school is renting from has a competent and well-run custodial and facilities staff. But in general, aspiring principals should expect that addressing toilet issues and vomit cleanup are part of the J-O-B. 

Event set up and tear-down also require moving chairs and tables, purchasing food and drinks, napkins and plasticware. Even if you engage other employees and volunteers, principals often have the privilege and the responsibility to lead the way in this sort of manual labor and cleanup. 

In addition, a principal’s day should be active if she is to be successful in her role of leading teachers, parents, students and staff. The sheer weight of meetings can take a physical toll, if you’re doing your job right. I schedule bi-weekly check in meetings with every teacher or staff member who reports to me, and I think this meeting cadence is necessary for keeping everyone engaged and coaching them to their full potential. Likewise, if your school is growing, you should be interviewing every set of new parents before you admit them to your school. You should also connect with every set of parents once a year before re-enrollment, either through in person meetings or on the phone if you want to proactively engage parents and solve issues before they become a family’s reason for leaving the school. 

Then consider all the ad hoc meetings, meetings with coaches, fine arts directors, club leaders, community leaders and vendors for various services the school needs. The principal needs physical stamina simply to keep up with the pace of meetings. 

In addition to these meetings, the principal should be regularly walking around the school and visiting the classrooms of teachers. A rigorous schedule of observing teachers is the quickest and most effective way to increase the quality of teaching and learning that I know of. I am regularly held accountable for a certain number of observations a week. This discipline more than any other contributes to classical Christian excellence in a school. 

The energy demands of this sort of role alone are considerable. If you are currently a principal or are considering becoming one in the near future, make it a priority to care for your physical wellbeing through a healthy diet, a full night’s sleep and regular exercise. And as you face the temptation to cave on any of these due to the pressures and stresses of the role, refuse to give in and play the long game on your effectiveness. 

2) Have you considered that being a principal is an emotionally draining job that requires you to maintain a relentless optimism and joyful mood in the midst of disheartening circumstances?

If your school is anything like the schools I have worked at, it is full of human beings. And the fact of the matter is that human beings sin. They talk behind one another’s backs. They grumble and complain. They don’t always live up the high ideals of classical virtue and communal cooperation. 

And many of these problems will come knocking on your door if you are the principal. Even if you don’t have to solve every issue that rears its ugly head, you will know about more problems in your school than you care to. You must bear the weight of disappointment and, to a certain extent, anxiety for the possible negative effects of these issues on the future of your school. You may not be suffering persecution like the apostle Paul, but sometimes being a principal makes me think of the end of Paul’s rant in 2nd Corinthians 11 about his sufferings, 

“And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?” (2 Cor 11:28-29 ESV)

A mentor of mine once compared school leadership to the role of a priest in the Old Testament. You must be able to bear the sins and heartaches of the community and lift them up to God, not spit back at the community the hurt and pain and disappointment. You must find a way to be joyful and optimistic, even in those moments when it feels like the institution that you’ve been pouring out blood, sweat and tears to build is tearing itself apart. You need to be able to maintain your equilibrium with student discipline problems, teachers crying in your office, and background drama about this or that initiative or decision. 

A few tips for doing this well include having clear boundaries as a school leader. Have a regular practice of what Cal Newport calls Shutdown Complete. Close your laptop at the end of the day and stop responding to email unless there is a real emergency. And no, that issue that a parent emailed you about late at night is not a real emergency. Seriously consider not getting your work email on your phone, as I do. Don’t try to solve every issue or problem. Know what you can control and what you can’t. Have realistic expectations. 

Your classical Christian school is not going to be a utopia that brings Christ’s kingdom fully to earth before Jesus comes again. Don’t put all your hope in the institution. I believe in institution-building and the power of classical Christian schools, but we must remember that arguably no Christian institution has stayed faithful to its calling for more than several generations. Human institutions, no matter how fine, do not last forever. 

On the other hand, the human beings you work with each day, the students and parents, teachers and fellow staff, are eternal beings. C.S. Lewis’ description in “Weight of Glory” helps me keep my perspective in the midst of these emotional demands:

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.”

3) Have you considered that being a principal is a multifaceted job requiring a range of competencies and a dizzying variety of challenges?

The principal at a small classical Christian school must be a generalist. There are too many aspects of the business of running a school that will neglected, if you focus most of your attention on any one. Spend all your time on improving the curriculum, and you will blow out the budget AND your teachers will have problems with student discipline. Spend all your time on classroom discipline and order, and the lack of extracurriculars and sports will hamper your growth. Spend all your time on planning events for parents, and your teachers will be worn out and disengaged. Take my advice and spread your time wisely between the things I mentioned, and your school still may struggle because you have no marketing and admissions strategy.

In order to function well as a principal, you must be ready and willing to learn about aspects of the business of running a school. Whether it’s heading up the marketing and admissions of the school, as I do, or tackling budgeting and payroll, insurance, fundraising, or event planning, you’re likely going to have to figure out how to be competent at other major functions of the business of a modern school. It’s pointless to protest and say, “Medieval schoolmasters didn’t have to learn how to manage a website and run online ads for Open Houses.” We’re not in the Middle Ages anymore and running a school in our society is complex.

It may help to think of a flourishing classical Christian school on the analogy of a symphony rather than a solo performance. School communities have many aspects that must be in harmony and must grow and develop in harmony. The principal (and head of school) are not solo musicians who light up the stage in their area of competence and skill. They are more like conductors who keep time for everyone and bring different sections of instrument in at the right time for their special moment. Schools grow and improve because many things are going well in many different areas of the school. 

Principals can’t just play to their strengths. They must operate in their weaknesses until the school has grown to the point that they can raise up other leaders who will outshine them. When you don’t have a marketing director, you still have to do marketing. And in fact, you will never be able to afford a marketing director, until you have done improved your marketing to a certain point. It’s a painful but true irony that these core functions of the school need attention most, when you have the least resources to give them. 

The best analogy for this that I have treasured over the years is the plate spinning routine of Henrik Bothe. Watch the whole video if you are an administrator at a small school, and everything about the experience of the school year will suddenly make sense.

4) Have you considered that being a principal is a leadership nightmare because you are always navigating several different audiences?

Let me explain what I mean. In most businesses, it’s clear who the customer is and the product is fairly simple. In the business of private schools, the parent is the customer, but your chief relationship is with their child. The child’s education is the product but it’s a challenging project with a long time horizon and inevitable ups and downs that you can’t entirely control. This creates a unique communication dynamic to say the least. Add to this the ethos of a Christian school, and many of the leadership challenges that churches have suddenly enter into the mix. Add in the specifics of classical education with all the variety of expectations that parents will have of that term, and now most of the things you can say are liable to misunderstanding from a number of fronts. Lastly, consider that your customers are paying a price tag for their children’s education, when most parents pay nothing to send their kids to government schools. They are understandably going to be pickier and more demanding about all aspects of the school.

As my Head of School often says at prospective parent interviews, “We deal with people’s money, their religion and their kids.” If that isn’t a situation fraught with rhetorical peril, I don’t know what is. Emphasize too much a particular denominational distinctive at your Christian school and half your audience might grow concerned. Talk up the discipline and rigor of classical education, and some parents may ask where the joy and love of learning have gone. Tell them about the joy and play-learning, the discovery centers and discussions, and some will ask why their child’s test scores aren’t high enough and why they keep hearing about this other student misbehaving in class.

One of the main lessons I learned in my first few years as an administrator is the need to understand and sympathize with the parent’s perspective. When I was just a teacher, I was so focused on exploring the philosophy of classical education and on my own experiences of teaching that I couldn’t envision things through a parent’s eyes. A principal must be able to toggle back and forth between his teacher hat and his parent hat. 

I’ve also been really helped by the statement of Keith Nix, Head of School at Veritas in Richmond, that school leaders should emphasize more what they are for, rather than what they are against. Polemics have their place, but speaking in terms of what you are for enables you to strike the right note for multiple concerned parties. You can pair together seemingly contradictory goals like ‘joy’ in the classroom and ‘order’, high standards and high support, excellence and intentional care. It’s also important to remember that when you speak at events, you are being heard both by teachers and by parents, by board members and by fellow staff. In some ways the role of a principal is mediator in chief. In another sense you must have the conviction to stake out a direction and say hard truths that neither party may be particularly happy to hear. 

5) Lastly, have you considered that being a principal is an ideal job for a teacher and philosopher who can maintain equanimity in an active life? 

If you’ve read all that I’ve shared so far and are still undeterred, the role of a principal might just be the noble task for you. So, I want to end on a positive note. The particular beauty of a role like principal is how it combines several exciting and challenging tasks. The role begs for a leader with some level of philosophical bent, especially at a classical Christian school. If you are to stake out a direction for the academic programs of the whole school, you should ideally do so from a deep well. But you must also be conversant with practical concerns. You should be idealistic enough to challenge the status quo of modern education and realistic enough to work improvements out gradually with real people in real time. 

You should be a competent teacher, not only because you may need to substitute for kindergarten or seniors, but also because you must teach teachers the art of teaching, the art of resolving conflict well, the practical details of lunchroom expectations, and the grand philosophy of education.

The ideal principal has a hunger to learn and grow and half wishes for a life of contemplation and study but loves the activity of people and planning too much to fully embrace scholarship alone. For the principal the active life of school leadership is cast with a contemplative hue. Practical application and philosophical consideration must be blended well. The principal must love pedagogy and people, building programs and performance evaluations. 

So, you think you want to be a principal? It’s a noble task if you have what it takes!

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Classical Christian education is not merely the domain of the US, but is taking root throughout the world. In this article I want to chronicle some of the exciting locations where some form of classical education and/or Charlotte Mason education is taking shape.

The first two locations happen to be in England, the place of origin of both Charlotte Mason and the classical renewal movement instigated by essays from Dorothy Sayers and C. S. Lewis. It is ironic that the former colonies would take up the mantle of educational renewal. But now we are seeing the emergence of new locales on every habitable continent. From England we will travel to the heart of Africa, the far East, South America, Central Europe and down under in Australia.

Heritage School (England)

The first location to chronicle is Heritage School in Cambridge, England. It opened its doors in the 2007-2008 school year with a handful of students and has grown ever since. The school is solidly within the Charlotte Mason tradition, with one of its founders, Fiona Macaulay-Fletcher, having attended a Charlotte Mason school in her childhood. Starting an alternative school in the UK is not altogether different than what one might expect in the US. They share on their history page:

“In early 2006, they visited schools operating intentionally along Charlotte Mason lines and a small number of PNEU schools still operating in England. During the remainder of 2006 they developed a business plan, which they began circulating in January 2007, to see if there would be sufficient interest from prospective families, and to try and raise the necessary start-up funding.

In the eight months prior to September 2007, all the necessary pieces came together: a small number of committed families, start-up funding, a small staff team, premises, a unique curriculum, registration with the Department for Education, an initial Ofsted inspection, preparation of classrooms, purchasing resources, and so on, and Heritage School was able to get started.”

“History of the School”

While Heritage is not explicitly classical, it is clearly informed by the classical tradition. They offer classical languages and utilize a great books approach to literature.

I have been a big fan of Heritage for well over a decade, and thoroughly enjoy following their Facebook feed. Having lived in Cambridge previously, I sometimes get glimpses of the campus and surrounding countryside, which warms my heart. But what I find truly inspiring is seeing the implementation of Charlotte Mason in photo after photo.

The King Alfred School (England)

Founded by Tom and Hayley Bowen, The King Alfred School was officially registered with Ofsted in July of 2021. Located near Birmingham in the West Midlands, The King Alfred School is the first member of the ACCS in Britain.

The story of their founding was reported by Jonathan Hodge at the Circe Institute blog back in August 2021. In this article you get a sense of the need for classical education as the Bowens share their heart for educational renewal. They describe the state educational system as “a factory production line, but the products were not good.” (Circe, “The First (Modern) Classical School in England”)

On their website, the Bowens casts a vision for classical Christian education in England:

“Like King Alfred in his own day we would like to see a revival of Christian education in England. We wish to serve local families by offering affordable, high quality education to prepare children to live virtuous lives.

We strive to offer a small and friendly environment where students’ talents can be nurtured. We wish to pass on to our children the rich cultural heritage of the Christian West.

We aspire to graduate students who are knowledgeable individuals with the ability to think logically and independently. Our goal is to help raise up young men and women who are well rounded and equipped to succeed in the wider world.”

The King Alfred School, “Our Vision”

Alfred reigned from 871-899 as King of the Anglo-Saxons, defending the kingdom against repeated Viking attacks. During his reign, he oversaw a number of legal, religious and educational reforms. Alfred translated the volume The Book of Pastoral Rule, written by Gregory the Great around the year 590, into (old) English. In his preface, Alfred expresses the decline in education that resulted from years of neglect due to warfare with the Vikings. “Learning had declined so thoroughly in England that there were very few men on this side of the Humber who could understand their divine services in English or even translate a single letter from Latin into English.” (Simon Keynes and Michael Lapidge, Alfred the Great, Harmondsworth: Penguin (1983), 101-102) The King Alfred School now stands in that same tradition of defending the faith against the forces that assail it through educational renewal.

Rafiki Foundation (Africa)

The Rafiki Foundation is part of an initiative to establish classical Christian school across Africa. Beginning as a mission to Africa in 1929, over the past two decades the Rafiki Foundation has brought classical Christian education to numerous locations across Africa from Ethiopia in the east to Liberia in the west. In 2015 a training college was founded called the Rafiki Institute of Classical Education (RICE) with the aim of providing well-trained classical educators for schools in Africa.

One of the beautiful projects The Rafiki Foundation is undertaking is the creation of classical curriculum that is written with African village schools in view. They write, “Names, places, and stories used to teach universal truths are decidedly African by design.” (“Rafiki Foundation Curriculum”) The art curriculum for Grade Level 1, for instance, is illustrated with images of desert sands, palm fronds and zebras, all of which ground the reader within an African context.

There are many ways individuals and groups can support the efforts to provide classical Christian education in Africa. The Education Fund raises support for village schools as well as providing educational resources. There are many opportunities to serve in teaching roles as a short-term missionary.

Seoul International Christian Academy (Korea)

Located in South Korea, Seoul International Christian Academy (SICA) is a member of the ACCS, blending classical education with a Charlotte Mason educational philosophy. It is fascinating to see classical Christian education planted in the East, but this demonstrates the point that living ideas – especially our Christian faith – transcends cultural differences.

The founders describe their search for an educational methodology, choosing classical education, “which has produced historically outstanding thinkers and leaders.” Paired with Charlotte Mason pedagogy, they are forming not only great thinkers but enable children to form character through habit training. The Christian foundation at SICA is beautifully expressed as they aim “to nurture students who are wise and godly.” (“SICA Education Advantages”)

They spell out what has often been a point of contention, the way the great books tradition is embedded in Western civilization. For a school in Korea, they utilize the great books tradition, but don’t they see the differences between East and West as an insurmountable cultural divide. “The Humanities Classics Great Books are books that have had an important influence on the formation of society and culture historically.” They go on to state that great books have had “a strong ideological influence on the formation of world civilizations including the East and the West.” They also see how the great books express “great ideas that have been practiced and accumulated since ancient times.”

Trinitas Escola Cristã Clássica (Brazil)

Our next location takes us to just south of São Paulo in Brazil. Trinitas aims to provide an educational alternative in the region based on “the rediscovery of the classical method.” They follow the trivium as stages of child-development approach, incorporating tools “tools such as imitation, recitation, Socratic discussions, content integration, debates” among others.

What I like about this school is that they ground their approach in the long story of classical education. In the Q&A section of their homepage they write, “The pedagogical approach based on the classical Christian model is a way of teaching created by the Greeks, adapted by the Romans and fully developed by Christians throughout the Middle Ages.” The grounding of classical education in several historical settings gives the sense that our educational renewal movement is dynamic, able to be applied in new eras and in different locations (an idea that has inspired this exploration of locations outside North America.)

Trinitas is a multilingual school with students literate (alfabetizados) in English and Portuguese while also learning Latin. This school seeks “an inner transformation of the student, cultivating virtue in them and enabling them to train (disciplinar) their affections in all that is true, good and beautiful, so that they desire God and follow his ways.” Trinitas seems like a lovely school doing great work in South America.

Die Lerche (Linz, Austria)

A Charlotte Mason school within the Ambleside International network of schools opened in the 2018 school year and now serves elementary and middle school students. Linz, about a two-hour drive west from Vienna, is located in northern Austria. Die Lerche, or the Lark, symbolizes “the striving for a learning atmosphere that is characterized by joy, interest and appreciation.” (Die Lerche, “Was wir von der Lerche lernen”) The lark is ever climbing in flight without ever ceasing to sing.

As an Ambleside school, there is a rigorous curriculum approached with attention and joy that contains instruction in religion, math, science, German, English, music, the visual arts, and technical skills (pre-vocational). In the middle school they add Spanish and follow the biology, chemistry, physics sequence in science. One of the ways Ambleside schools resonate with classical education is that they emphasize the great books. Die Lerche expresses how they implement interdisciplinary teaching (Fächerübergreifender Unterricht), which is similar to what we might call integrated humanities. (Die Lerche, “Lehrplan und Stundentafeln”)

Coram Deo Micro-Schools (Perth, Australia)

Classical Christian education is on the rise in Australia. Last April, Circe Institute sponsored the Classical Renewal Conference simulcast in Australia and the US. The recently established Australian Classical Education Society placed a marker down as to the wellspring of interest in classical education down under.

One location that classical education is taking root is in Western Australia where a group of micro schools in the Perth area are providing an educational alternative. The Coram Deo Micro-School have three locations around Perth, partnering with area churches “to provide an alternative academic outlet for parents looking for quality Christian education in Perth.” (“About Us”)

Despite launching during Covid, the Coram Deo schools are gaining traction and having an impact. With several parent testimonials pointing out the warm and caring environment they are creating at their schools, I can imagine a growing number of families in Western Australia being blessed by the visionary team guiding these schools.

Educational Renewal, A Global Movement

It is instructive to observe the extent to which our educational renewal movement spans the globe. Far from being an American enterprise, we see how an authentic liberal arts tradition finds its home in any language and in any culture. Great ideas are by nature transcendent, so we should not be surprised to see shared educational values bridging East and West, North and South. The seven locations enumerated here are only a fraction of the schools furthering the cause. With our shared vision and purpose, hopefully we can find ways to support and promote one another on a global scale to see a rich educational heritage renewed in even more diverse locations.

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