East Aurora High School has been searching for a new principal since early this year, after Robert Barwa announced that he would resign in June. Though there were several applicants, none have been suitable, said John Struck, associate superintendent of East Aurora School District 131. The school has an interim principal while the district continues the search.
In northwest suburban Township High School District 214, however, two principal openings in the last two years drew 30 applicants–many of whom were qualified–before they were filled, said Darlene Larson, associate superintendent for human resources for the district.
“We were encouraged by that number because there’s a shortage across the country and a paucity of interest among educators,” she said.
Larson was citing a widely accepted belief that there is a growing shortage of principals, particularly at the high school level. A study released in April, however, concluded that such a shortage doesn’t exist everywhere–only in certain places. The study, by the University of Washington’s Center on Reinventing Public Education, said that many principals are not applying for jobs in rural areas and in urban or urbanlike settings where there is higher poverty and salaries often are lower.
Marguerite Roza, the author of the study, surveyed 83 school districts in 10 regions of the country, including the Chicago, Atlanta, San Diego and Philadelphia areas. She found an average of 17 candidates per principal vacancy, only two fewer than seven years ago, which she found surprising.
“The anecdotal evidence is so widespread that there’s a shortage,” she said. “I thought when we picked high-growth areas we’d see a greater decline in the number of applicants, and we found not much of a change at all.”
Roza did find a disparity between wealthy and poorer districts, however, and that disparity is growing, she said.
“There are high-needs districts where it’s hard to lure principals to work,” she said. “But it’s not because there aren’t enough [applicants] in the labor market. There are plenty just down the street” in districts with fewer problems.
Lower pay and more stressful working conditions keep the number of applicants down in some districts, she said. She added that an inner-city school district in Los Angeles has had success luring principals in the last couple of years by offering salaries commensurate with those in higher-paying districts.
The American Association for Employment in Education, based in Columbus, Ohio, conducts annual surveys on employment trends for teachers and administrators. Its figures show the shortage of principals is slightly more severe in the Midwest than nationally, and a little worse for secondary school principals than for elementary school principals, said B.J. Bryant, executive director.
“If you go Downstate, you’ll find a shortage of fully qualified principals at every level,” he said. “If you go to Evanston or Wilmette or Barrington, you’ll find a surplus of candidates.”
In the East Aurora district, the pay being offered is lower than in some other suburban districts, and that contributes to high turnover, Struck said.
“We seem to be a good training ground for other districts,” Struck said. “Our administrative turnover is sizable.”
Many schools, particularly in rural areas, hire from within when they anticipate they won’t attract much interest from outsiders, Bryant said.
East Aurora had no internal candidates with more than a year or two of administrative experience, and the district was looking for more than that, Struck said. External candidates who applied also didn’t have enough of the right kind of experience, he said.
Experience matters
“If you’re a large, urban-type high school and you get a principal [candidate] with one year of experience from [a small town], that might not be what you consider qualified,” Struck said.
East Aurora hired former Elgin High School Principal Ron O’Neal to be interim principal this year, but O’Neal can work only 120 days or he will lose his retirement benefits.
“He’s spreading the days out to February,” Struck said. “If we’re unable to attract someone else by then, we’ll have to go to an alternate plan. I’m not sure what that would be.”
Lyons Township High School is losing its principal, John Young, at the end of this school year. Young, 65, is retiring after 10 years in the position.
Like many high school principals, Young spends numerous evenings and weekends at school, watching extracurricular activities and attending meetings.
The long hours, the difficulty of meeting underfunded mandates such as the No Child Left Behind Act and the growing complexities of running a high school are contributing to the waning interest in the job, several principals said.
“You’re at the top of the totem pole by yourself,” Young said. “You direct kids to do things, and they decide if they want to do it. They come back with their parents, or more than their parents–they get lawyers. People don’t want to be bothered with that. Teachers in our district get paid very well, so they say, `Why do I want that headache? I can make just as much or even more as a teacher.’ Some teachers in our district make more than I do.”
Young doesn’t mind the long hours spent with the students–it’s the other time-consuming tasks he won’t miss, he said.
“It’s not that the job takes time,” he said. “It’s that it takes time doing things you don’t want to be doing: state reports and things. We all want to give time to kids, but too much time is spent away from the kids.”
Chicago’s situation
The Chicago Public Schools started this year with 22 principal vacancies and 43 interim principals, according to the communications office. Principals in Chicago are hired by local school councils at each school and approved by the Board of Education.
Schools without contract principals are assigned acting principals to fill vacancies expected to last less than 100 days, said Nancy Laho, chief officer in the schools’ office of principal preparation and development. When vacancies are expected to last more than 100 days, schools are assigned interim principals. In other cases, principals are considered interim when they have been selected by a local school council but are awaiting board approval.
Laho said the number of vacancies and interim principals in Chicago is not because of pay or working conditions.
“I’d sooner say it has to do with retirements announced in the summer, and then it takes time for the [council] to come together,” she said. “Some [councils] don’t meet in the summer. That can create a lag.”
At Hirsch Metropolitan High School, the council selected Melverlene Parker as principal more than a year ago. She is still considered interim because the school is awaiting her approval from the board, local school council member Ceasor Crawford said.
The search for a new principal at Hirsch, 7740 S. Ingleside Ave., yielded 12 candidates, but not all of them were qualified, Crawford said. Some didn’t have the Type 75 master’s degree certificate required in Illinois to be a principal. The council interviewed three candidates who each had experience as assistant principals but had never been a principal.
“We would have liked more applicants … but we didn’t do too badly,” Crawford said.
Many retirements ahead
Though officials disagree on whether a principal shortage exists, most seem to agree on one point: Large numbers of principals are planning to retire in the next 5 to 10 years, so finding enough successors will become more difficult.
Based on a 2002 survey, the Illinois Principals Association in Springfield expects 41 percent of Illinois’ principals to retire or become superintendents by 2008. The situation is similar around the country, according to the National Association of Secondary School Principals.
“There’s this big number of Baby Boomers who are currently principals, and they’re starting to retire,” said Michael Carr, spokesman for the national association. “There’s a huge number of positions to fill.”
David Turner, executive director of the Illinois association, said the early retirement option that went into effect in the early 1990s is motivating principals to retire as soon as they have the maximum number of years for which they will receive credit.
Principals also leave the job early “because the job consumes you,” Turner said. “It’s a tough job at any age, but it’s tougher when you’re older. Also, they are eminently employable, and they’re snapped up by business and industry.
“And in Illinois, a significant number take early retirement in their mid-50s, travel to the Sunbelt and work five, six, seven more years ” while still drawing retirement benefits from Illinois.
All those factors contribute to a growing shortage, he said.
Qualified people more scarce
“Are there schools that started the year without a principal? No,” he said. “Are there schools that started with interims because they couldn’t find one they liked? Yes.
“When you talk to superintendents, they’ll tell you they’re having a harder time finding qualified people to head their buildings.
“Principals are on the front line, and their feet are being held to the fire to increase student performance. There’s also a keen awareness of safety issues, and you have increasing numbers of [English as a Second Language] students.
“Every place you look there’s one more little problem for building principals to be responsible for.”
