This newsletter outreach to principals started when COVID hit in 2020 and so it was called Keeping in Touch in Tough Times. Well, it’s more than four years later and times are undoubtedly still tough. We still need massive personal and professional support, and the...

How many senior managers do municipalities or government departments appoint in a year? Many hundreds, I’m sure. What percentage of these will prove to be above average performers? About 50%, I suppose. And how many will become super effective leaders? South Africa...

As an experienced principal I have always regarded high expectations as one of the drivers of successful teaching and learning. Things don’t happen just because of expectations, though. No, expectation is something set through high quality example, daily practice and...

Do you remember your very first day as a principal? I remember walking into a staffroom filled with women I did not know. It was a girls’ high school, and I was not only the first man to lead the 112 year old school (it celebrates 150 next year) but the only man in...

It’s a Latin phrase, meaning ‘faster, higher, stronger’ which the founder of the modern Olympic Games, Baron de Coubertin, borrowed from the headmaster of a school in Paris. All of us can relate to why a school leader would love the phrase. Coubertin loved to...

As a retired school principal in the Principals Academy, I get to visit eleven schools every fortnight. That’s my community of practice. The warm and sincere greeting experienced at each gate, reception window and principal's office is both inspirational to a lifelong...

I have always been fascinated by an effective teacher’s presence; not just being present, but successfully holding learners’ attention and creating a classroom atmosphere which makes engagement, focus and inspiration possible. Nothing pleases a principal more than...

We naturally associate holidays with summer. A three-week winter break is a much-needed blessing for teachers and learners. Now the challenge is to reboot a positive teaching and learning mindset. It doesn’t happen automatically; like your surgeon you have to have a...

Every glossy magazine is full of self-help articles aimed at getting you healthier, thinner and fitter. We've all tried each of these degrees of comparison and what stands out is just how hard it is to get better at whatever. Getting better as a principal or teacher...

Do you know what makes me a happy pensioner? I’m teachable. I’m not done learning. Being a principal meant that learning was my daily currency, but, when that ended, I wanted to use nearly three decades of experience as a head to delve deeper into school leadership...