Don’t Fumble Feedback!

Posted on January 6, 2026 Written by

Principals must provide teachers and staff with feedback … but there are good ways and bad ways to approach this vital task. When feedback is delivered in the right way, it generates positive outcomes. But unfortunately, the opposite is true as well! That’s why mastering the art of good feedback is so important.

This article from the business world offers four tips for effective feedback. It emphasizes the importance of making feedback actionable, timely, sensitive and conversational. As Steven Levitt once said, “The key to learning is feedback. It is nearly impossible to learn anything without it.” 

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Four Ways to Improve School Culture

Posted on December 23, 2025 Written by

School leaders can significantly influence school culture through their daily habits and systems.

In late September, Edutopia compiled a list of several strategies and systems that highly-effective principals use regularly to strengthen their school culture. And these tips from respected school administrators across the nation can easily be applied to almost any school!

Intentional choices by the principal that emphasize visibility, support, consistency, and collaboration, will lead to a school culture where the core values of connection and growth enhance learning.

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The Power of Curiosity

Posted on December 9, 2025 Written by

Highly-effective principals can often transform challenges from a threat into an opportunity. One unique strategy is to use the power of curiosity. This has the potential to change a parent or teacher’s attitude by expressing a desire to learn instead of becoming argumentative.

As an FBI undercover agent for 24 years, LaRae Quy used this approach to defuse situations that were much more serious than the conflicts school principals face. As she points out, “It’s often not until someone asks us to explain a concept that we realize our limited understanding of it.”

Simply put, the effective use of this unique strategy has the potential to lead to reasonable conflict resolution.

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Five X Factors of Leadership

Posted on August 19, 2025 Written by

Here’s a fascinating article from the world of business that outlines five key factors that distinguish effective leaders. As the author points out, “Charisma and credentials aren’t enough. In the pressure cooker of leadership, it’s the subtle, often invisible factors that determine who lasts—and who doesn’t.”

To paraphrase his closing thoughts, you likely won’t see these Five Factors in a workshop or PD training. But they often define the difference between short-term control and long-term trust. And over time, they can help change you from simply being the “school boss” to becoming the kind of powerful leader that others choose to follow.

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