RUNNING TITLE: Case Study: Old School Culture and a New Principal
McLean,
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What is a principal? Merriam-Webster defines it as “a person who has controlling
authority or is in a leading position: as a: a chief or head man or woman b: the chief executive
officer of an educational institution c: one who engages another to act as an agent subject to
general control and instruction.” Principal John Lattimore has become a well-respected educator
over 31 years (21 years as principal). He has built McKinley Elementary School into arguably
the best elementary school in the division, so when a principal vacancy became open at Oliver
Wendell Holmes Elementary School John’s fellow principals were baffled and asked why he
applied for the position.
Principal Lattimore knew about the problem of suspending students for disciplinary
reasons and retaining students in first grade. Mr. Lattimore attempted to fix these two problems
in a manner that involved the teachers and other faculty members. However, after three years of
trying to get the teachers on board with him and support change, he found out that none of the
teachers were in favor of changing those two problems. Since the teachers were not concerned
about fixing the problems, Mr. Lattimore decided to act unilaterally by sending a letter to the
teachers detailing the new changes regarding out-of-school suspension and student retention. His
decision to send the letter has led to bigger problems within his school and current position.
After teachers have received the letter, many of them continued to disagree with Mr.
Lattimore and started to criticize him publically by saying he was misguided and dictatorial. This
lead to some teachers meeting informally about him while still having dissatisfaction after the
school year started. Dr. Roshanda Danton, assistant superintendent for elementary education, had
Mr. Lattimore come to her office for a meeting to explain she received a petition and letter with
concerns about his leadership. Mr. Lattimore became very angry while adding “the teachers
acted unethical and there is a small group of teachers that has been running this school for a long
RUNNING TITLE: Case Study: Old School Culture and a New Principal
McLean,
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time. No principal is going to be successful as long as they remain more powerful than the
administrator.” Dr. Ernest Gray, superintendent, and Dr. Danton agreed to have Principal
Lattimore consider another assignment that can be rearranged for him to be in the central office.
The main issue that occurred was Principal Lattimore sending out the letter without any
support from his superintendents. By doing this, it caused a reactive problem from his teachers
sending the petition and letter to his elementary education superintendent, Dr. Danton. The
desired state would be Mr. Lattimore having his written letter approved by the superintendents’
before sending it out, then he would know he already has their support in case a problem would
have risen up.
The difficulty in eliminating the gap would be pretty high since the school has an old
school culture. According to Kowalski, principals are influential to building and maintaining
school cultures conducive to organizational learning while leadership styles that stress
collaboration, facilitation, and professionalism and reflects deeply help personal or
organizational values. The gap would need to be eliminated over time by taking small steps. The
small steps could include the superintendents, teachers, and community members who agreed
with the change Principal Lattimore wanted to make. It is difficult to transition from an old
school culture to a new culture focused on the students. When an organization wants to move
forward in a different direction there will be some conflicts, however, the principal or leader
need to do their best to predict them so they can plan to eliminate the conflicts in their
implementation process. “What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters
compared to what lives within us.”
RUNNING TITLE: Case Study: Old School Culture and a New Principal
Reference
Kowalski, T. J. (2008). Case studies on educational administration (5th ed.). Boston:
Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.
McLean,
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