Leadership Lite
School Administrator, February 2020
A Pupil’s Push for Promotion
Nancy Wagner, superintendent of River Trails School District in Mount Prospect, Ill., received a most unusual letter from a middle school student just before the end of the school year last June — with the student advocating for a promotion for his teacher. The reproduction of his e-mail below includes the original spelling but omits the 7th-grader’s surname.
Sleepy Supes
In what must qualify as one of the more unusual doctoral dissertations on school leadership, an Ed.D. candidate at Arkansas State University in 2017 studied “The Prevalence of Insomnia on School Principals and Superintendents in Missouri.”
Regina Williams’ 165-page work, based on an electronic survey completed by 874 leaders, concluded principals between 41 and 50 years of age had significantly higher insomnia scores than older leaders and urban principals had much higher insomnia scores than rural principals. She found little difference between superintendents and principals.
Off Key But On Target
If you want to look relevant to kids, you better sing their music.
Jeffrey Alstadt adopted that approach when he introduced himself as the new district administrator, or superintendent, of the Randall School District in Burlington, Wis., by creating a rap music video just before the start of the school year. Posted on the district’s website and accessible on YouTube, the video contained these lyrics: “I’m the new DA. I will stick by ya. You’re a Wildcat yeah.”
Alstadt conceded to the Kenosha News: “I didn’t even know my superintendent growing up.”
Short, humorous anecdotes, quips, quotations and malapropisms for this column relating to school district administration should be addressed to: Editor,
School Administrator, 1615 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314. Fax: 703-841-1543. E-mail:
magazine@aasa.org. Upon request, names may be withheld in print.