Page 38 - EdViewptsSpring2021

Social-Emotional Health:

Community Impacts and the

Role of District Administration

By Susan Wardell, Principal/Curriculum Coordinator in Holland Township
School

President Theodore compassion. My two mentors, Mrs. I look back and “sort of” hide my
Roosevelt stated over a Mary Jane Tierney and Mrs. Diane face thinking that when we closed on
Pandolfi, respectively, would stress
Friday, March 13th (the irony of the
century ago: “People don’t the following: “It’s not the job; it is the date is not lost on me) I believed we
care how much you know people.” “Lead with your heart first. would be back in session after spring
break. How naive and wrong I was! In
The rest will come.”
until they know how much It seems like a rather simplistic defense, most believed we would have
you care.” approach to being a school leader. an extended break and return before
the end of the school year.
Aren’t we programmed to be driven
My first administrative positions were to raise test scores? To hire and As mid-March turned to late April and
in Wayne, New Jersey. I didn’t know retain the best of the best? To unpack early May, it was evident school would
it at the time, but working in such a standards, differentiate instruction, and remain virtual for the foreseeable
progressive district taught me that my keep to timelines and deadlines? Of future. So where did that leave us and
first responsibility as an educational course. Our students are worthy of a what were the takeaways?
leader was to lead with care and quality education. Period.

Educational Viewpoints -36- Spring 2021