Musical Chairs

If memory serves me somewhat correctly, musical chairs is something we played when we attended kindergarten, 1st grade or 2nd grade. I may be off but those sound about right. Yes, everyone scrambled for a chair (more like a mad crush) when the music ended.

A version, sadly, of musical chairs too often takes place in terms of moving principals around. They are here one day, gone the next. Here one year then they disappear. It's as if the music has ended and so has their worth and employment.

Just the other day, as reported in today's Chicago Sun Times, the Principal of Marshall High School was terminated. That's right. Some two weeks into the new school year and she is gone. If you are going to change leaders why do it part way through the year? Has she done something so egregious in the first two weeks of the semester to warrant removal? Hmmm...I doubt it.

This brings up a larger point. As our charity goes into many of the same schools year after year I too often see the above trend. I know of one school that has had three principals in each of the past three years. That is not an uncommon occurrence at a number of CPS schools. The last thing struggling students and schools need is a lack of stability.

I don't care how it is spun, constantly changing principals, asst. principals and other staff just isn't in the best interests of the students.

Dick