How can teachers hold a school director accountable? I don’t see any way to do that! Teachers want a good recommendation from the director, so there is a tendency to go along with unethical behavior as long as it isn’t pointed directly at you. We can’t blame teachers for looking the other way. As soon as a teacher makes a peep about being aggrieved in any way, LOOK OUT! One little hint of dissatisfaction becomes the beginning of the end of your career at international schools. It can also be the beginning of a nightmare as you continue to honor your contract. I don’t see any way to hold them accountable as long as there are people remaining quiet. And you can’t blame them, especially if they have children at the school. It’s not worth the nightmare that your life becomes.
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Directors should be accountable to the stakeholders – parents, students, teachers and board members. The problem is there are few mechanisms in place to hold the director accountable. Often, a director creates systems that leave them seemingly untouchable. Everyone is kept at arm’s length so the stakeholders never really know what is happening in the school until it is too late. Few directors are subject to performance appraisals; those schools that do conduct appraisals of directors do not seem to take them seriously. The stakeholder groups are rarely provided opportunities to speak to each other in any kind of forum other than offhanded remarks which are no more valid than gossip. Teachers are left powerless because they have no means in which to provide decision makers (owners and boards) with feedback on director performance. Boards are not present for day to day operations and since their contacts are through the director, they usually get only the director’s perspective, which is so filtered and skewed in favor of themselves that the board members think they are making decisions based on facts when they are not. In two of the schools I have worked in, teachers were not allowed to address members of the board. I also think that the professional organizations that place directors in schools need to shoulder some of the responsibility. Directors can easily threaten the careers of teachers with no recourse for the teacher; all it takes are some comments made from one director to another that have no evidence or documentation and the teacher in question becomes unemployable. But, once someone becomes a director they seem to get recycled regardless of performance. What recourse do teachers have to point out the flaws of directors? The professional organizations like ISS, Search and even the IB program do not seem to take much notice.
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The Accrediting Institutions, such as CIS, need to warn teachers of schools known to be bogus with regard to Educational standards and ethical conduct. If this is not done, CIS and the others are simply condoning and perpetuating these schools, aiding the decline of international education and prolonging the suffering of students, teachers and parents–exactly the things they are there to prevent. Next in line for scrutinizing Directors: Board, Faculty, Parents, Students. We are all responsible for maintaining Directors that give their schools and the profession a bad name. Even though Faculty are in the worst position to do something about these morally corrupt Directors, they are often the ones risking their careers should they try to effect open recognition and change. I guess I am just another one of those in a long line who have been disadvantaged for speaking out where the powerful entities have failed to do so because they are too busy making money to rock the boat. It’s time this changes before most of us decide to go somewhere else. Then where will those international students go?<\/p>\n

I’ve worked for several excellent, ethical administrators at international schools. The director I have in mind was an honest and open communicator. He allowed teachers to voice concerns and to disagree. Because he was always respectful of the opinions of others, people could disagree with him. This allowed everyone to be heard fairly, and contribute to the free marketplace of ideas. I felt safe disagreeing or giving an unpopular opinion, so that even when I was overruled, I could accept his decisions as informed, fair, and thoughtful. So even when he had to make unpopular decisions, most teachers backed him.
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Yes! I have taught in five overseas schools. Four of them had administrators who exemplified the qualities outlined in the Ethical Directors article. Appropriate standards were in place and were followed through on. I could expect to be treated fairly, and in at least some cases, treated exceptionally well when unforeseen circumstances arose. These administrators followed through on their promises, valued me, prepared for my optimum readjustment to my new school and surroundings, and demonstrated care and concern, listening when I had a problem, and trying to solve it.
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Absolutely, the one administrator that I can recall was a role model to all and walked the talk. He set a very high expectation for the staff and students. At first many of us thought it was impractical, but when he started displaying, demonstrating and modeling such behavior, we all knew it was possible. He was open minded and was very clear that every decision was well thought out and had a positive effect on the staff and students. It was obvious that his priorities were the Staff and Students. He was also very personal and let us know that he truly had an “open-door” policy. People were welcomed to come in with disagreements and frustrations and left for the most part with a clearer understanding of why things are the way they are or why certain decisions were made. And when there were disagreements, the administrator was not shy about putting his foot down and supporting his decision, again with the best interests of the Staff and Students.
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Yes, I have worked for one of the finest administrators I could even imagine. He was honest, fair, open, even when it may have not been in his own self interest to be so. He modeled appropriate behavior in his relationships with staff, faculty, and students. This director knew educational values and consistently modeled for teachers at meetings and in initiatives that good teaching is valuable and that we are all teachers at some level. He was and still is a model of a teacher’s administrator.
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Yes, I have. I worked for an outstanding director who embodied all of these qualities and more. He was first and foremost an “empowerer” of others. He made each person feel valued and appreciated, he sought input and feedback of others. He was democratic while still being a clear decision maker when necessary. He communicated well, smiled often, and created an atmosphere of trust and well-being. Rare, but refreshing. He is now retired.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately my career in international schools has been dominated by unethical and ineffective directors. Individuals who did not honor contracts, changed contracts without any consultation, refused to collaborate or consult with anyone, and moreover were dishonest and, in several cases, were just plain vindictive. None of these individuals were the least bit transparent, fair or genuine; they were just the opposite and in each case they left the schools they were supposed to be leading worse-off than when they arrived. To be completely honest, I am ready to leave the international circuit because I have little faith in the leadership, and as a result have lost the belief that I can make a difference. The mentality that to survive, the teacher must just close their door and keep their head down is a sad commentary on the impact that directors have on schools. There are too few checks and balances for directors; they have complete authority without any accountability which, based on my experience, is a disservice to the teachers, students and parents.
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Yes, the majority of administrators I have worked with do not model the characteristics of ethical leadership. Examples include administrators that tell teachers where to put the desks and bookshelves in the classrooms, that tell students to disregard religious observations for the sake of the sports team, that micro manage every aspect of the budget down to the last penny, etc. These administrators exert power over staff and students; fear, cunning and deceit are their qualities.
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I have worked for an unethical director, and it’s hell. I will leave international education because of the lack of good administrators.
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Yes. It ultimately became clear that from the start, ‘integrity’ was not a word in this administrator’s vocabulary. He lied to me in answers to my questions at the hiring fair, where he was recruiting an entirely new faculty. It turned out most of his current faculty was in the first year of two-year contracts and he had left notes in their boxes that they wouldn’t be needed for the second year. He lied about the fact that it was a privately-owned school; did not pay me what he said he would pay me; did not order any of the materials he said he would order (and blamed it on shipping) — leaving me with a classroom with one teacher’s desk and NOTHING ELSE; played favorites–had ‘spies’ who fed him information, so that no one felt they could trust anyone; treated any difference of opinion as a traitorous act; pushed through a ‘gag act’ that resulted in everyone bottling up their emotions in a place where no counseling help was available; required all employees to live and take all 3 meals\/day together in the same crowded lodgings; made no provision for individual differences and needs for privacy; did not follow through on simple requests–like having more than one TV programming choice for the entire faculty–because it “costs too much,” but then spent vast amounts of money attending every recruiting trip possible.
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I did not have any personally bad experiences. But this will give you an idea of how the school was run. During final exams a student asked and was escorted to the toilet by a counselor. The counselor became concerned as the student was in the stall for a long time, and asked the student to hurry up. This resulted in repeated flushing of the facilities. The counselor opened the door to find the facilities struggling due to many papers in the water. She reached in a retrieved this soggy pile of notes, and confronted the student with cheating, escorted her to the principal’s office. After a visit by the parents, the teacher of the subject was told to examine the notes, determine what material on the exam was not covered by the notes, grade only that part of the exam and give the student a grade based on that section of the exam! Another time students were asked to stop playing football (soccer) in the middle of a league match! This was so that actors, with new school jerseys which no one else had ever seen, could take the field and be filmed playing–this footage was used to make another promotional video for the school! The lack of support shown teachers and students, the demands placed on teachers, and the pursuit of money at the cost of education made this school extremely difficult to work for.<\/p>\n