Headmaster Deborah Holman plans to advance slowly in her new position at Brookline High School this year.
“My choice coming in as new headmaster is to take very seriously this change in leadership,” said Holman. “Many principals come into schools, and they have what’s called a ‘jump reflex.’ They act quickly because they feel the need to demonstrate leadership capability and they tend to make snap decisions without knowing the culture of the school. If you slow down your entry process, if you gather lots of information and if you have lots of conversations with people, you start to understand the culture and undercurrents of a school.”
Holman’s data points come, by in large, from an eight-question survey that she distributed to faculty, students and community members last spring. The survey focuses broadly on the strengths and weaknesses of the school.
A sample question: “In what ways does BHS fulfill its goal of serving all students? In what ways does it fall short?”
After collecting information for the first four months of the school year, Holman plans to accumulate, analyze and then share her findings with the Brookline community.
“What I ask at that point in January or February to the community, including the students, is ‘Am I hearing you correctly?’ ‘Did I understand your concerns and advice when I was speaking with you or while I read your survey?’” Holman said. “If the answer is ‘yes,’ then the faculty administrators and I will craft a larger vision in terms of immediate next steps for moving forward.”
Because feedback is incomplete at this point, any discussion of the survey results is largely hypothetical. Holman offered one potential response to an imagined scenario.
“If faculty from a particular department, for example, the UA building, said they had little contact with previous headmasters then that would make me realize, ‘Ah. The architecture here is difficult,’” Holman said. “’I would want to get over there so I could be more of a presence to those teachers.’”
Or if the surveys indicated that certain classes did not serve all students adequately, that would prompt a different response.
“That would suggest necessary changes in our academic program of offerings,” Holman said. “Is it broad enough? Does it need to be twisted a little?”
Although important, survey results will not be the sole factor in Holman’s upcoming decisions. In a recent interview with “News and Views,” a Brookline PTO-sponsored monthly newsletter, Holman describes three key values that serve as the impetus for many of her actions: excellence, equality and learning communities.
These values have shaped an administrative strategy involving clarity and open dialogue, one that Holman plans to employ in her first year as headmaster.
“My leadership style is to have many key people at the table in decision-making, to have a process, and to be transparent,” said Holman in an interview with “News and Views.” “On the one hand, the headmaster has to make many decisions on her own. However, in a large and dynamic organization like BHS, for the big decisions that pack a lot of impact, leveraging multiple minds and opinions usually generates better thinking.”
Holman said there are actions she plans to pursue regardless of survey results.
“I think adolescents and teenagers are an underutilized and untapped source of creativity and innovation in high schools,” she said. “I’m very interested in how we can mold the program here at Brookline High School to tap into and to support student innovation. What teacher projects can be funded that will allow for maximum student innovation?”
Nate Birch can be contacted at [email protected].
