View/Open - Drake University

le]ieved it very difficult for people to fill" wc urne 10 do ellerythlne they'd like 10 get aone.
The ~rincipal, who also served as the dictrict athletic director, talked about the time he must
put inlo hiring officials. scheduling athletic and fine arts dates, and simply the day to day
~nning of a 7-12 building. He said. "YOU know, it's just tough for me to put the energy and
inle in for what I really got trained to do. I wish I had the time to impact student learning
nore and work with the teachers. You just mn out of hours and time. You have peat
thou~hts in the middle of the nieht, but it never gets put on paper. It really doesn't." This
principal also recognized the challenge for teachers to balance all of their many course
extra curricular assignments, school improvement involvement, and still have
some semblance of a family life.
Teachers expressed appreciation for the time the district had set aside for staff
development activities and the efforts to write grants that they saw as generally going to pay
teachers for extra work. The most common concern of teaching staff was with their
ollcague'\ ht.\itancy ro accept change. A high school teacher offered. "Our faculty has
al\4*a!.s been [hi\ u.av. N'hen ir's time for a change, 1r.e all grunt and poan a little bit. But we
do it. And once \ye ~ ct ctaned. everybody seems to come on hoard. And those that don't.
rI1t.y ha\^ lo do it any\i.ay." An elementary staff member believed that some people just don't
:lccept change vcr!p \rsell. She cited some staff members who had a difficult time lookinp
dom9n rhc road rn reriremen~ just r\vo years away. and those teachers sayinp. "You aren't poinp
10 make mc do any more." me peneral belief expressed by teaching panicipanls was that
adn~inislr;~rion and staff \vorked lorether very well in their efforts to implement the mandates
of HF 2172. The di.;tric['s data specinlist also actnon~ledged minor resistance from 3 few
Ic:lchcrs. ~ L Iexprcsscd. I
'*Rv far [he majoritv ore really startinp to believe it. Somelimes !nu
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