Roots and foundations.

At our last school board meeting, some of the people on my Fife Mr. Rushmore of educators and educational leaders were in attendance. Namely Dave Britton and Jeff Short. Both were well into their careers when I started as a barely 22 year old teacher.

Jeff’s oldest daughter was in 7th grade when I started teaching. His 2nd daughter, whom I had in class, is now a teacher in our district. And has been for some time. Both of these guys represent the foundation of my career. There are a lot of people involved in raising up a new teacher. The process continues with our educators now. Either on purpose or vicariously, people are raised up in the profession.

Here’s are two stories about Dave and Jeff. After I had been teaching for 16 years, I was ready to make the move to administration. I literally took Dave’s position at our high school, as an assistant principal. Dave met with John McCrossin and me, as the two new APs at FHS. It was two younger guys meeting with a sage advisor. He said, “Ok guys. You need to think of this place as a rock. Your job is to keep things from chipping away at the rock. Little things make a big difference. Don’t let the little things go. You guys are next up and you have a job to do to keep the place going. Keep it great. Pay attention.” Dave was passing along expectations for us as the next line of leaders. I will never forget that conversation. It had a huge impact on me.

Jeff was named as the principal at FHS and John and I were his assistant principals. After being a teacher for a long time, I was used to being a good guy. Kids liked me, liked my classes, it was all great. I was worried about the change to AP. APs deal with a lot of challenging things. Discipline being one. Jeff’s direct comment was, “Remember. They’re still just kids. The job will be what you make it.” And he was right. I had the choice of how I wanted to be as an AP. And I wanted to be a fair, reasonable, and supportive AP. The job taught me about the ‘tough call’. It taught me to pay attention to the process. And it reinforced for me Dave’s insistence on paying attention to the little things.

So it was great to see these two again. And thank them for their profound impact on thousands and thousands of people, stretching over decades, rippling outward still.

And for impacting me. Gave me my roots and my foundation.