Education Week - November 23, 2022 - 14

Middle School Is Tough, But These Principals
Like It Best of All
By Denisa R. Superville
Kyle Nix, the principal of Christiana
Middle School in Christiana, Tenn.,
describes her role as a middle school
principal as " the community connector, "
providing that crucial link
between elementary and high school.
For Ashley Bowling, an assistant
principal at Florence Middle School
in Florence, Ala., whatever reservations
she had about working in a
stand-alone middle school soon disappeared
when she got there.
" I love it, " said Bowling, now in her
eighth year as a middle school AP.
" It is unique. Every day is different.
[The students] are innocent and still
wanting to question how they fit in the
world. It's an awkward age, but it's a
fun age. You really feel like you make
an impact at this age. "
" You have to remember: We have
some students who still very much
believe in superheroes-that they
are real, and Spider-Man can come, "
Bowling said. " But, in the same sense,
you have some who are broaching
other topics: dating, their first heartbreak,
they are dealing with some
adult issues too early. And you have
to be able to respect both views and
appreciate what those students are
bringing to the table. "
Middle school is where it can
all come together-or start to fall
apart-for students who are on the
edge of childhood and the cusp of
adolescence. Principals running
those schools say those grades (they
vary from district to district, but can
include 5th through 8th grades) are
important transition years when students
undergo a range of emotional
and hormonal changes while dealing
with more-rigorous academic classroom
content.
School leaders require a reserve
of patience, splashed with a dose of
humor and humility, to work with
those students. But they also have to
be focused on spotting students-all
converging on one middle school
from several elementary schools-
with gaps in their knowledge who
need immediate support to ensure
they don't fall further behind. Leaders
also play a huge role in helping
students develop good habits and
character traits.
The transition from elementary to
middle school can be tough for some
students whose social lives are being
reordered, said Wes Kanawyer, the
former principal of Woodgate Intermediate
School in Waco, Texas.
" They are trying to navigate things
socially, " he said. " They are interacting
with kids they have not grown up
with, kids from different campuses.
They have to reinvent their social
group. They are trying to figure out
who they are, how they are going
to survive social networking with a
bunch of, quite frankly, very immature
individuals who are also trying
to figure out the same things. It's
messy. "
Pandemic effects
Those coming of age during the
pandemic, whose traditional elementary
schooling experience was interrupted
by lockdowns or shifting instructional
modes, had another layer
of uncertainty to figure out.
Middle and combined school principals
were more likely than their peers
in elementary and high schools to say
that they saw an increase in fights,
threats of physical attacks, and classroom
disruptions, according to a survey
of principals conducted this spring
and released in July by the federal Institute
of Education Sciences.
" I think the biggest thing that we
saw in middle school was just having
to reteach them how to socialize with
each other, " Nix, the Tennessee principal,
said. " When they were in the
pandemic, the way to socialize was
through social media, or email, or
FaceTime, and they just weren't used
to talking to each other face to face. "
Bowling, the Alabama middle
school assistant principal, said educators
had to " renorm " students-essentially
teach them appropriate inschool
behavior-from learning how
to walk past each other in the hallway
to participating in group discussions.
The school held small group assemblies,
with a third of the 7th grade
class at a time, to model and practice
how to do so. No running, no tagging,
keep your hands to yourselves, Bowl14
| EDUCATION WEEK | November 23, 2022 | www.edweek.org
ing said.
" It was like when they got back together,
they just needed to touch each
other, " Bowling said. " It was like, 'No,
no, no. That's never been OK to just
hug everybody.' "
Students also needed a nudge for
classroom discussions after nearly
two years of communicating primarily
through screens. Teachers provided
prompts to help and also ensured that
everyone at the table had a role during
discussions.
" We had to get them out of texting
language because that's all they had
done, " said Bowling, whose school
closed for the initial shutdown in
spring 2020, but reopened that fall
with a hybrid schedule and other
safety precautions. " We had to go
back and talk about how to have full
conversations. "
Felipé Jackson, the principal of Bear
Creek Middle School in Fairburn, Ga.,
found himself having to respond to
an increase in fights, which he attributed
to social media that provided
an audience for students to post the
altercations.
Jackson created a conflict resolution
course for students, hired a support
staffer for each of the three grade
bands, and met with parents to discuss
the challenges staff and students were
facing. The school also has a responseto-intervention
program-a series of
tiered supports-where a staff member
works with students in groups.
" All of our students had a layer
of support to help them cope, teach
them how to cope and then coexist,
and then focus on instruction, "
Jackson said.
But one of the biggest things he did
was to ban cell phones on campus, removing
students' ability to record and
disseminate the altercations.
The school also created a culture
and climate committee, which surveyed
staff members, students, and
the school community about oncampus
issues and provided recommendations
for improvement. That
formed the basis of an action plan,
Jackson said.
" What we have noticed now is a difference
between night and day in our
school climate, " Jackson said.
The draw of middle school
In a number of ways, middle school
has returned to the daily rhythms that
closely approximate middle school
life in the fall of 2019, before the pandemic
changed the world.
" I think we've evolved into a very
good, new normal, " said Nix, the Tennessee
principal.
It was stories of former elementary
students veering off track once they got
to middle school that inspired Jackson
to leave his elementary school principalship
and head to middle school.
" They were getting caught up in
gangs; they were getting caught up in
using drugs; or they weren't going to
school, " said Jackson, now in his fifth
year at Bear Creek. " I wanted to put
myself in the position where I could
make a difference and model that for
others. "
A student gives middle school
Principal Felipé Jackson a hug
in the cafeteria at Bear Creek
Middle School in Fairburn, Ga.
"
Every day is
different. [The
students] are
innocent and
still wanting
to question how
they fit in the world.
It's an awkward age,
but it's a fun age.
You really feel like
you make an
impact at this age. "
KYLE NIX
Principal, Christiana Middle School
in Christiana, Tenn.
Dustin Chambers for Education Week
http://www.edweek.org
Education Week - November 23, 2022

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