A Year in the Life of a High School Administrator

by Richard Lasley

am a retired educator of 32 years, of which the past 20 years were spent as a HS administrator. I started a journal on Day 1 of this past school year as a means of ‘therapy’ to help me process the conditions we were working through.

It wasn’t until my closest education confidants encouraged me to publish my work that I contacted a publisher. I now have two books published, Humanity in Peril - Current Conditions in Education Through the Eyes of a HS Principal and Glimmer of Hope - Book 2, that chronicle this past school year from beginning to end. In Book 2, I offer solutions to ‘fix’ the issues that are most troublesome for education today...

My sole purpose for publishing the books is to bring AWARENESS to the conditions that exist in education, with hope that readers will agree that support for education and a CHANGE is very much needed by the hands of our elected officials.

This book was published as an afterthought but is based on a compilation of journal entries of a veteran high school principal working through the Coronavirus Pandemic... I made the decision while venting to my wife that this would be my last year in education (making a total of 32 years). I also decided that I would write this journal and make entries as often as I felt the need to reflect on experiences that unfolded for that day, or, just VENT... So, the journal took a life of its own and soon became more than just ‘therapy’ to get me through the year. After trends became apparent regarding student behavior and ‘rock star’ teachers feeling more overwhelmed than I had ever witnessed, it seemed that this journal may actually have a higher purpose than to simply provide me therapy. After tragic events had taken place at Apollo HS, after continued concerns with student absenteeism and the trouble we were having with our youngest students engaging in learning, I reached out to some of my most trusted educator confidants for advice and I sent them the 1st quarter journal entries to read.

This book was published based on a journal written by high school principal Rick Lasley during his final year of a 32-year tenure in public education. Glimmer of Hope (Book 2), chronicles the spring semester 2022 journal entries and follows Humanity in Peril (Book 1, published May 2022), which is based on the fall semester 2021 journal. Education is in dire straits while teachers are working through the pandemic with student apathy at an all-time high, student misbehavior on the rise, concerns with mental health/ emotional well-being reaching unprecedented manifestation, and the decrease in certified candidates for teaching approaching never seen before vacancies. Glimmer of Hope focuses more on the positive aspects that still remain, giving hope for the future of education. It also represents the rallying call to communities, parents of schoolaged children, legislators, district administrators, principals, and teachers for what each group can do to help bring the appeal and respect that it so profoundly deserves BACK to education. This advice given by Rick Lasley, retired HS principal, can only lead to more respect given to education and more certified teacher applicants in the pipeline over the next five to ten years...