Teachers' Perspectives on Principal Mistreatment

Findings: A Model of Principal Mistreatment

When I came back one day after lunch, the warehouse people had axed the reading loft [on the principalís orders]. . . . This was only the beginning. . . . He stripped away everything that made my room unique, that makes teachers special, sets one teacher apart from another. A package that says to children here I am, examine me, question me, shake, rattle, and roll me and I will open up for you and reveal everything. What happens when a teacher is stripped of her style, when, year after year, her brightly colored package is picked at? Off come the ribbons, the bows, the brightly colored paper. What is left is a shell, an empty box. I was a teacher who had a special style of teaching. But everything that made me special has been done away with. . . . I have lost so much of myself. The more bookwork, page work, and blackboard work that I do, the less alive the students see; I can see a change. The light went out of their eyes. I was told I needed to control them rather than make learning a joint venture. I became a teaching boxófilling up heads with information so that they could pass the testÖ. . I want out. (A veteran teacher)

The principal behaviors drawn from our data have been organized according to level of aggression: Level 1 Principal Mistreatment (indirect, moderately aggressive), Level 2 Principal Mistreatment (direct, escalating aggression), and Level 3 Principal Mistreatment (direct, severely aggressive) (see Figure 1). Please note, we do not suggest that individual Level 1 principal mistreatment behaviors always produced less harm to teachers when compared to Level 2 or Level 3 behaviors; in point of fact, as one would expect, the degree of harm related to any single aggressive behavior varied from one victimized teacher to another. Moreover, because we studied long-term mistreatment (6 months to 9 years), teachers discussed the ìcumulative effectsÎ of their principalsí continued, systematic mistreatment/abuse.

Level 1 Principal Mistreatment: Indirect and Moderately Aggressive

Indirect forms of principal mistreatment, as described by teachers in our study, included nonverbal and verbal principal behaviors. This category of principal behaviors was considered generally less abusive as compared to Level 2 and Level 3 behaviors, and this finding is consistent with studies conducted with the general workplace population (e.g., Keashly et al., 1994; Neuman & Baron, 1998; Ryan & Oestreich, 1991). Such behaviors were always a part of a more extensive pattern of mistreatment/abuse. Level 1 behaviors discussed by teachers were:

* Discounting teachers' thoughts, needs, and feelings: Principals ignored and snubbed teachers, exhibited insensitivity to personal matters (e.g., death in the teacherís family), and engaged in stonewalling (e.g., failed to respond to written requests).

* Nonsupport of teachers: Abusive principals failed to support teachers in conflicts with students and/or parents, were ìshamelessly unfair,Î failed to investigate problems, blamed teachers for problems, and frequently reprimanded teachers for problems in the presence of students and/or parents.