This School Year we have a new principal, Mr. Pawlicki, who comes from North Hartford where he spent the last 5 years. I set out to interview Ms. Bales about him to get her take on the differences between principals. 

The first thing I asked her was “If there was anything Ms. Harris did that, Mr. Pawlicki doesn’t” and the only thing Ms. Bales could think of was Harry Potter day, which shocked me. I would have thought there would have been more things that were different, but I guess he’s not running that different ship than Ms. Harris was.    

I then asked her, “How did you feel when it was revealed Ms. Harris would be leaving” She then said, “I really enjoyed working with Ms. Harris, but I heard all the good things about Mr. Pawlicki, so I was excited to work with him.” I expected this to be the case and wasn’t shocked, as I doubt, they would hire a principal they hadn’t heard good things about. 

The next question I asked her was “Do you agree with Mr. Pawlicki’s enforcement of phones?” and “Do you agree with Mr. Pawlicki’s enforcement of backpacks?” All I got from her was “Both the phone and backpack policy are not his policies. They are from the Board of Education. As an admin team, we are consistent in our enforcement of policies.” I wasn’t really satisfied with this response, so I followed up with, “In regard to the phone and backpack policy, I guess I was asking if you think the phone and backpack policies are justified.” She then responded, “They were both created with student safety and student success in mind. My job is to enforce policies and rules.” This is about what I expected from her, but a part of me wishes she had gone deeper and told me about her thoughts on the phone policy personally. 

Overall, the only thing I got from this interview is that nothing has really changed. I feel like if things had changed in any meaningful way, the biggest difference would not be the lack of Harry Potter Day.