The Assistant Principal
The Assistant Principal: Leadership Choices and Challenges by Catherine Marshall. Newbury Park, Calif.: Corwin Press, 1992.
The Assistant Principal provides a complete consideration of the much-maligned position of assistant principal, including an extensive bibliography.
Marshall effectively uses case studies and quantitative research in this volume, but she faced an obstacle in the lack of research and publications about the assistantship. She points out that The Encyclopedia of School Administration and Supervision does not mention the assistant principal at all. Consequently, she was limited to presenting research about the principalship in several sections of the book.
Marshall asserts that movement into the role of assistant seems to be based on an “old boys'” network and “sponsorship.” According to Marshall, this has had the effect of excluding minority candidates from the assistantship. She also states that “people who do get selected as administrators are likely to be those very much like previous administrators, people whose ways of thinking and acting coincide with tradition.”
Once in the position, many assistants are frustrated by the demands of the job, which very often includes primary responsibility for student discipline. Consequently, research indicates that job dissatisfaction among assistant principals is relatively high.
Marshall presents an agenda to produce a new and different assistant principal. She suggests radical change in the recruitment and training of candidates that would lead to assistants who are “critical humanists,” a term used to describe those “who constantly reflect on how the organization is working to expand human potential and transform society to eradicate racism, classism, and sexism.”
Available from Corwin Press, Inc., 2455 Teller Rd., Newbury Park, CA 91320, for $25.
—Reviewed by James Hutto, Franklin High School, Meadville, Mississippi.
