S3 E2: The Power of Second Chair: Leading, When You're Not In Charge

In this episode, George Borum shares his transformative journey through 15 years of educational leadership, surviving 11 different bosses while maintaining his commitment to student success and learning the value of playing the supporting role.

• Understanding the power of being in the "second chair" leadership position
• How playing supporting roles teaches valuable leadership skills, like Scottie Pippen alongside Michael Jordan
• The importance of connecting personally with staff members beyond classroom performance
• Why bad leadership creates toxic workplace environments that hurt student outcomes
• How school culture and staff culture are interdependent, not separate considerations
• The evolution of charter schools and providing educational options for families
• Challenges of the "no excuses" model in education and its impact on students
• Building meaningful parent partnerships by having honest, jargon-free conversations
• Creating a Montessori charter school that makes innovative learning accessible to all
• Learning from both good and bad leadership examples to develop your authentic style

If you're interested in supporting Schenectady Scholar Charter School or learning more about George's work blending Montessori principles with charter school accessibility, check out these links: 

https://www.linkedin.com/company/schenectady-scholars-charter-school/posts/?feedView=all

Don't let your boss suck the life out of you.
Share your bad boss story on our website.
Learn more or Book Natalie.

Transcript

The Value of Second Chair Leadership

Natalie Parker 0:00

Michael Jordan never won any championships without Scottie Pippen , like that's the one thing people always forget . Michael Jordan never made it to the playoffs without Scottie Pippen and Scottie Pippen made it to the playoffs without Michael Jordan .

George Borum 0:11

George Borume has survived 11 bosses in 15 years and still believed enough in education to start his own school . That's either insanity or exactly the kind of radical hope that we need . Born in Queens and raised in Jersey , he's shaped by over 16 years of urban education and he's not just an educator , he's a systems disruptor . He's taught , led , been in classrooms and in charter schools , spending 15 transformative years at the Henry Johnson Charter School in Albany , from teaching first grade to leading as a principal . He's seen and survived the bureaucracy , the burnout and the bosses who break more than they build . In fact , with those 15 years and 11 bosses , he somehow has seen enough and still believes in education to launch his own school . Now he's the visionary behind Schenectady Scholar Charter School . He's redefining what it means to educate our kids with excellence and empathy .

George Borum 1:10

A National Fellow of Liberated Ed and an emerging leader with the American Montessori Society , he's commissioned to blend rigorous academics with cultural responsive care . In this episode we talk about surviving bad leadership , the hidden damages of no excuses education , what makes a bad teacher a better one , and how his soft-spoken strength and radical accountability are helping re-image school culture from the inside out . Get ready , because this is not just about school . This is about the soul of work , and George Borm is here to teach us class . George , welcome to the show . It's so good to have you , thank you so much for having me .

Natalie Parker 2:04

It's my pleasure for being on your show today .

George Borum 2:07

Listen , we're going to have a great time because the conversation we had just to prepare for this was so much fun . So tell me how a guy like you goes from playing basketball to going into teaching .

Natalie Parker 2:19

Oh man . So growing up in New York City and growing up in Far Rockaway , queens , new York , it was like a birthright . If you grow up and you're a male in New York City , you're like you're given a pacifier and a basketball . So pretty much that's pretty much how you get started . So growing up living in New York City until we moved to sunny New Jersey when I was about 10 years old , playing basketball was just a way of life .

Natalie Parker 2:44

So as I got older , you know I was good , never great . I was never that tall to ever get a Division I scholarship , but I was able to get a nice . I was able to get to go to a Division III school , play a little bit of basketball there , realized I wasn't going to go to the NBA , I wasn't going to be able to live out my hoop dreams . So I figured , you know , let me focus on school . So what I ended up doing was focusing on my bachelor's degree , getting that , and then I minored in education and while I was there I wanted to be able to kind of get back all the knowledge that I got from coaching and so I decided to open up the Yellow Pages and contact all the local high schools in the Portland main area . One got back to me and I was a volunteer assistant coach for my last three years . So that's how I kind of got into coaching and everything else .

George Borum 3:27

So for our younger listeners . Oh , I forgot . Before there were the interwebs , there were books that were sent to your house that were I don't know as thick as I don't know . Are there ?

Natalie Parker 3:42

any books as thick as books , because we don't use dictionaries anymore either , so can't even say thick like a dictionary .

George Borum 3:50

So these archives , these ancient relics of civilization , or a good 12 or 24 inches thick , and they had phone numbers in them , because we had no other way to contact people than to finding their phone number in the phone book .

Natalie Parker 4:06

And you had to know alphabetical order . They had different sections . They had phone numbers of names . You really had to know your information on who you were trying to contact , because you'd be calling random people for hours until you got the right person .

George Borum 4:18

So yeah , it's like oh , his name is Anthony Brown and they were like . You have just made me feel extremely old .

Natalie Parker 4:25

I apologize for that .

George Borum 4:26

Thank you very much . I think it's over All right , so you looked in the phone book , yeah .

Natalie Parker 4:32

I called him up and one coach got back to me Coach Russo in Portland Maine High School and he was like sure . He later on he said I thought you were only going to last a week . You ended up lasting three years . It was a great experience for me to be able to learn how to coach but also being around high school kids . But it also taught me how to play the second role to the leader right next to them and being able to be that comfort for students . But I was able to take that on as a leadership role as I kind of got older into education , as I kind of got older into education to learn how to play that excellent secondary role like that second pivot in your building to just be that support for staff as well .

George Borum 5:12

All right , so the two things I want to kind of pull the thread on here is one is I just want to just put a penny in the meter or quarter of the meter to talk about the tenacity it took to like just keep making phone calls , like talk to me about that in your life . And then I want to go to the second , the second chair conversation . So let's talk about like that , Like when did you get that tenacious Cause ? I don't know if I'd have called it so .

Natalie Parker 5:35

I was like bored and I was just like you know I'm doing all this work in and I just I've been playing basketball my entire life and just I think sometimes when you go to college they tell you to turn the switch off and if you've been playing sports and you've been playing sports since you were like five or six years old when you get to college and you can't play anymore , it's just like you took a piece of my identity . Yeah , it takes a piece of your identity away from you . It's just like I've been doing this activity my entire life . It's been who I've been , how people have recognized me , and I was just like you know what let me just open this book up and I've always been like that .

Natalie Parker 6:07

I've always been someone who's been like you know , basketball has been helpful for me because I was able to work on my skills by myself and I've tried to take everything that I've kind of done with that . If I wasn't a good reader , I wanted to be the best reader in class . If I wasn't good at this , I wanted to be able to improve . And I try to take all those skills that I've learned from basketball and kind of implied it to the rest of my life just to be helpful and supportive of me .

George Borum 6:30

So I like that , I like that a lot . Again , I don't know that I would have called everyone , thank you , thank you . Kudos to you , sir . So let's talk about the second chair thing . You know there was a movie it's probably at least six or seven years old called 20 Feet From the Start , and we talk about the backup singers to lead singers and you know you'd be surprised how many current singers or older singers were backup singers to now celebrities .

Natalie Parker 6:59

right , talk to me about like when you realized the value of being in the second chair and like why you weren't salivating over that first seat when I was able to be the assistant coach of the JV coach , I realized that he could be able to really push the kids and be able to get them to a point of demanding a lot of them and when they got frustrated they would go to the end of the bench and sulk lot of them . And when they got frustrated they would go to the end of the bench and sulk . And it was my job and my responsibility to go and rub their back and making sure like listen , I know the coach just said such and such to you . You're feeling some type of way , but we need you , we need your support , we need you to go back out there . So get yourself together , let's talk about what the issue is , figure it out . And we got to get right back out there .

Natalie Parker 7:41

So I learned in that three years how to play like that secondary role , how to be able to be supportive in the role . That was needed . So I think that was the biggest step that I was able to gain was how can I be supportive of the leader by being in the second chair ? What do they need me to play so the organization , the team , can run and be more functioning ? So that was the biggest piece I was able to learn , and I learned that at such a young age . I learned it from 19 to 21 . So it really helped me as I got older when it was time for me to be in like a leadership role .

George Borum 8:12

I'm going to stay here , george , because I think it's such a powerful lesson . A lot of people that are very skilled , that have just raw talent , often sit in the second chair and they are very scornful , very it's an old word scornful , but they're very just critical of the person in the first chair . Like talk to me about you know what you've seen , especially as an educator , and you've been an educator for decades now . Right , like , so talk to me about what you've seen , in contrast to like how you do it versus other people .

Natalie Parker 8:46

We all want to be able to say like we're the one in charge , and when you're an educator , any education that tells you that they're not a control freak , they're absolutely lying . We're all control freaks . Anybody who's in education , anybody who's a teacher , a TA , doesn't know . We're all control freaks . That's why we got into education , so we can control and manage this room . We use those words , but we're all control freaks .

Natalie Parker 9:06

So , first and foremost , any educator is a control freak by nature so , but for me , playing like that second role was important because I think it helps support everyone around you . So when I became like a teaching assistant , there was a lead teacher and I was the assistant teacher , so the support he or she needed of me at that particular time . I would always start it off by like , what do you need me to do ? Okay , if you need me to do those things , I'm going to maximize those things that you need for me to be able to do . And then when I became a dean or assistant principal or anything else and including in you know I've been married for 15 years and you know we are fantastic parents , because I always say there are things I do really , really , really well as a parent and I maximize that .

Natalie Parker 9:51

Like I go well and beyond over those things and anything that I'm weak at , my wife picks me up from that area and vice versa . And it's the same thing in the classroom . It's the same thing in leadership . I almost feel like a lot of people don't want to be Scottie Pippen , but a lot of people don't want to be co-president or vice president , but you learn so much from the position that you have . It could provide you the tools that you need to be a good leader .

George Borum 10:18

He never did .

Natalie Parker 10:18

He got some headache now because he's talking about things that he's spiteful about , but at the time , in the moment , people realize Michael Jordan never won any championships without Scottie Pippen . Like that's the one thing people always forget Michael Jordan never made it to the playoffs without Scottie Pippen and Scottie Pippen made it to the playoffs without Michael Jordan . And those are the things

From Basketball Coach to Classroom Teacher

Natalie Parker 10:42

that we kind of sometimes forget . Like playing that second role . You learn a lot from that spot .

George Borum 10:52

Again for the younger audience . We want to share with you that I'm sure you know who Michael Jordan is , but Scottie Pippen was the Robin to the Batman .

Natalie Parker 11:05

Everyone uses him as the prototype for any sport . He is the Robin to such and such Batman .

George Borum 11:12

He is but I think this is a really good conversation to have . I promise you . I don't know that I thought we were going to talk about this at all , but the idea of followership , even when you have bad leadership , is so important because it's easy to be critical of your leader and listen . I have my own critiques of a ton of people , but you never know what it's like until you do .

Natalie Parker 11:38

And the most creative people we've had . We all think of them . Steep jobs , like everyone that we've always thought of . Like they've had somebody in their back who is doing that grind and working hard and making sure things were getting done . So like you have to be so self-aware to understand that , like I'm not going to get any of this limelight , like I'm not going to get any of this like shine , I'm not going to be on any magazines , I'm not going to be at the top of news , but everyone in this company is going to know it wouldn't have worked if that person wasn't there . Like that's what you need to take with you .

George Borum 12:15

And I would even go a step further to say that a lot of people who play that role don't even want that kind of shine right . It's important for us , especially if we're in the second , want that kind of shine right . It's important for us , especially if we're in the second , third or fourth seat , to really define what success is in that seat right , rather than trying to get , you know , some level of pop , especially in the age where everybody wants to be Right , so , so , so , let's talk .

George Borum 12:40

So let's talk about your entree into education . So you were the coach and you decide , like you know what I want to teach the baby . Oh , that first year was awful .

Natalie Parker 12:50

It was awful , like every first year teacher is , and I look back on it 16 years into it now thinking how much of a poor teacher I was that those students had to get me in my first year . Like , research says that teachers are better in their third year , so I can only imagine , like how ineffective of a teacher that I was . And it takes a lot to be self-aware to understand like . I had them for 10 months and I wasn't the most proficient at what I was doing . I tried my absolute best . I came in every day , tried to improve and got better within that 10 months . But that first year was tough . From classroom management to understanding curriculum , to understanding kids , to understanding parents , to getting them to understand what I'm asking them to do . It was extremely hard in that first year .

George Borum 13:38

So classroom management is like the time management to deliver what you've planned . Curriculum design is like OK , here's what I want to teach them , and am I effective , or not Absolutely .

Natalie Parker 13:49

I remember that first week we had Fun Friday and my lead teacher , who had several years of experience . They were going to a teacher lead meeting and I got them all by myself for 30 minutes . I was like , ok , we're going to do something absolute fun 25 first graders . I was like , okay , we're going to do something absolute fun 25 first graders . I'm thinking I got this , no problem . No , they absolutely wore me out for that 30 minutes , to the point where I needed my parent liaison to come in and absolutely save my life and probably save my job that week because the class was that bad . She came in , said like four words and everyone got quiet and I've been speaking for like 30 minutes and she did it in 30 seconds and she gave me the best piece of advice I ever said said you better get it together or they're gonna walk over you for the next nine months . You're gonna hate coming here every day . So I got it together .

George Borum 14:34

After then , that is so funny . So what ? How did you stay motivated after the kids ate your lunch that first year ? Like because in a lot of I can't imagine failing my first year of anything Right , Like in the environments I've been in like you've got to put points on the board . There's not a whole lot of room for error in this teacher series . I've heard most teachers say like yeah , look the first one . Just it's kind of like when you're taking score and it's like just throw out the lowest score kind of thing .

Natalie Parker 15:11

Like teachers kind of just accept that that first year was a wash , because I think sometimes you forget like you don't know , and you can go and do a teacher prep program . You can do student teaching , but it doesn't prepare you for the first day of school . You have those faces looking back at you and they know without knowing . We always say like kids can just smell the fear in a teacher when they first walk in . And I don't think that as much as I used to . But they can tell when you're not prepared .

Natalie Parker 15:38

And there were days when I was not prepared and I and I didn't know my content . I I didn't know my lesson . I didn't know what I was going to do if a student did A , and as I got better with my craft , I could start planning out . If a student was doing this , this is what I'm going to do . I knew the content better , so it just started to flow naturally better . I was able to give the kids more of my personality and was able to understand them a lot more . So once you get out of that first year it's like yeah , you just got to make it out of the first year . You can make it out of the first year unscathed and you feel like you want to come back . That's the success . Make it out of your first year with some level of success . You'll be a great teacher coming down the road , I promise .

Natalie Parker 16:18

All right , so you make it out that first year .

George Borum 16:21

Then what happens ? You decide to stay . Tell me about like your first bad boss .

Natalie Parker 16:26

Oh man , I've had so many so in education and the first one was the first one .

George Borum 16:32

Give me the first one .

Natalie Parker 16:33

First principal I had . She stayed in our office every single day , never left , ever . And the only time she left her office was when we knew somebody was getting fired because she would be walking around , someone she just interviewed . So we would all start whispering she never up here . We were like , oh , somebody getting fired , who getting fired today ? Somebody gone , somebody's gone .

Natalie Parker 16:55

So we knew and we always would know , and this was very messed up because all the lead teachers at that time were white and all like the TAs were like black . So we knew if she was walking around , someone who was black was like some TAs getting fired today , someone's got to go , someone's on the block . So it was just like the way that she manipulated like the staffing there wasn't conducive for us to have a very good like working sort of relationship , especially around race . So whenever we saw those sorts of things , everyone picked up on it really , really quick and even though we tried to have conversations around that , it was never like understood , like what that appearance looked like if you were a black or brown staff member see there's so much to talk about so oh , absolutely your little underground railroad of knowing the things right .

George Borum 17:52

So in every , yeah , in every company , in every network there's there's an underground of people who know the things that are going on . So you all have these conversations and I would imagine both the teachers and the tas knew it , because they would know right and and tell like , did that ? Did anybody ever try to ?

Natalie Parker 18:11

tell her the quiet part out loud , but she would always get defensive and also she would also play the card that her husband was black .

Natalie Parker 18:20

So it always was kind of like , well , I can't do't do that , my husband , like we were like , oh , okay , okay , that's your card to use in this conversation . But we were just like it looks , because you have , you know , the black teachers who are , which we didn't have a lot of lead teachers that were black , they were all TAs , like we were in charge of , like classroom management , making sure we , like you know , kids went to lunch and recess . So we had this huge relationship with the kids that wasn't just in the classroom , it was outside of the classroom , it was getting them off the bus , putting them on the bus interacting with parents . So anytime parents had like an issue or something positive , they would always go to the TAs and then the TAs would always have to relate it back to the lead teacher . So it became a place where , like , parents were just interacting with the TAs and even though we had conversations around that , it never got fixed or never wanted to have like a larger conversation about what the appearance looked like to the larger public of parents .

George Borum 19:20

And as a teaching assistant , what was the functional relationship between you and the lead teachers ? Were they aware enough to like let's , you know , let's bury this because we don't have time for it . Let's have a good relationship . Or did it create like a bureaucracy In some classrooms ?

Natalie Parker 19:34

if you had a good relationship with your teacher , it did . If you didn't , it was a hierarchy , because it became almost if the TA wasn't there . Some classrooms function in a way that the students would only listen to the TA and then they would listen to the teacher only if the TA was in the room . But if the TA was out , was absent , wasn't there for a day or two , and then , you know , in any business we play the game of well , I'm just not going to come to work today , we'll see what the classroom looks like . So no , we always play those games . So in education that's a big thing . Like if you take a day , I'm gonna take a day , I'm taking my day off . So if you take Monday off , I'm taking Tuesday off and we'll be back on Wednesday . So yeah , absolutely , people would just you take Monday .

George Borum 20:15

I'm going to take off .

George Borum 20:20

You're going to be by yourself the next day . So don't do it . All right , you , you survive . So you , you guys , tried to confront it's unsuccessful , you survive . That you know . I think that what strikes me about that situation was is the the potential lack of discretion that the leader had ? Or or maybe it was intentional ? There's a ton of research on how fear in the workplace is extremely toxic for productivity . So I can't imagine the level of anxiety that that would create for the organization and the loss of productivity , because even if the person , the interviewee , was walked or the candidate was walked through one hallway people will spend time saying like hey , did you see what happened ?

Natalie Parker 21:10

like , and so it just yeah , interesting snowball effect of like what's going on you know , we weren't like naive to it , like we picked it up , like adults are smart . Sometimes when you become a leader , you feel like like you're the smartest person in the room . In reality , you're not Like your staff culture is huge , especially in education . It's massive because we talk about like two different kinds of culture . We talk about school culture , then we talk about staff culture , and we generally talk about school culture more than anything else because you want to have a safe nurturing environment for all students and staff . But that staff culture is just as important for all students and staff . But that staff culture is just as important . And if it's not and people can tell the difference between you finally coming out of your office and the only reason why

Navigating Bad Leadership in Education

Natalie Parker 21:52

you're doing that is for a new hire , then that's going to lead to problems in our school , which it did because people picked up on that and then didn't want to stay or wanted to leave .

George Borum 22:02

So what I hear you saying is that staff culture and school culture is not mutually exclusive . They're interdependent . And in what ways ? In your career , over the arc of your career , seen them work well together .

Natalie Parker 22:18

I've had the fortune and pleasure of being in really good staff culture and one of the things that was the most dominating force is that we supported each other in ways outside of work . So we would go to each other's family's gatherings and we would be able to understand and support each other . So when you came to work , you knew that person always had your best interest . So when they gave you feedback maybe that you didn't want to hear , you knew it was a place of like compassion , empathy , but also love to get you better so you can get better at your craft . Because if you want to stay here like , we need you to get better and this is how you can get better .

Natalie Parker 22:53

And I've learned over the years , like when you have a culture like that , especially in education , because you spend so much time in the classroom , you spend so much time with your peers , that you have to have this level of relationship . That's why you see so many teachers outside of work hang out with each other and do activities and stuff like that . It's a very for so many words like clicks and stuff like that when it comes to certain grade levels or certain teachers . Or this is the math team and this is the ELA team and you know this is the PE team . It's like we do a lot of that .

George Borum 23:22

So how much of that is coping versus connectivity Like you know what I mean , like cause sometimes , when you're in trying situations like I'm just going to be here and commiserate and cope with you , versus like we are connected and we're living this thing out together .

Natalie Parker 23:36

I think that's part of it , because part of it is just being able to say , like we in this together , like if you got to suffer , we all got to suffer , so we got gotta suffer , so we gotta suffer together . Then we need to be able to come together to be able to understand , like , what's for the greater good . And that's what we always used to say , like , regardless of who is sitting in that hierarchy chair , as principal of our building , we still got to do it for the kids . Because at the end of the day , like we have to perform for our kids , especially working in a charter where you know you're working , sometimes off of a five-year renewal , especially in New York state . Like , if you're a charter and you don't get a five-year renewal , you get closed , you know , and you're an at-will employee . So after you don't have a contract that's two or three years you have a 10-month contract . So if you don't get renewed for the next year , you don't have a job . So you constantly have to learn to get better at your craft .

George Borum 24:24

So talk to me about charter schools . When did you start your love of charter schools versus I don't want to say versus public schools , but opposed to public schools , right , because you've been in both spaces ?

Natalie Parker 24:34

Yes , I think my love for charters have always come from a place of giving parents choice and options . Like I grew up , my mother sent me and my brother both to Catholic schools and then when I moved to New Jersey , I went to a public school Like that was her option . She could have sent me to a Catholic school , but she chose to send me to a public . And that's the biggest thing with charters .

Natalie Parker 24:54

I know there's this always this animosity between public and charter and stealing funds and stealing kids , which I've never understood . How a charter can physically steal a child from a public school . We don't go in and physically take them and steal them from their parents and make them come here . It's a choice that a parent wants and if we are offering a parent something that they're interested in doing , like a longer school day and a longer school year and parents are enjoying that , then they have the option to be able to come to a charter . If they don't , then obviously they will stay at a public school , which might be high performing , or they just feel more comfortable being at a public school .

George Borum 25:36

So I feel as though giving parents that choice is the most important thing . Okay , so you move from the public school to the charter school piece . Tell me about the leadership differences between public and charter .

Natalie Parker 25:45

I think the biggest thing in most charters is we don't have a teacher's union behind us , so it's very much an at will .

Natalie Parker 25:53

So we work in an environment where , like I said before , we have a 10-month contract or a 12-month contract that we're working for that school year and we have to get renewed , and also we're working under the umbrella of okay , we have this five-year renewal . So in three or four years the authorizer is going to come in and look at our scores , look at our enrollment , look at our finances , look at our operations and if we're not up to snuff , we get closed . And the difference between public is just like there aren't many public schools being closed after like five years of just opening . So you really have to make sure that everything you're putting in place is academically sound for kids and also that you're hiring the correct staff , because you have a very small window and you can't afford to have a teacher that is behind or failing , that's there , for three or four years . You just can't , because you can't move them to like another building or to a higher grade level or anything else like that . You just don't have that option .

George Borum 26:50

So in your tenure and I don't know if it was in the charter schools or not , but , like at one point , you had 11 leaders 15 years .

Natalie Parker 27:00

Yes , I have a record . Yeah , I have a record . Yes , all in charter . So I've had 11 different building leaders , including myself . I was principal for three days . I had the best three-year tenure of any principal in the history of our building .

George Borum 27:14

The three days . The three days Was it over the weekend . George , it was over the weekend Friday , Saturday .

Natalie Parker 27:20

No , I did a Monday , tuesday , wednesday . I did a Monday , tuesday , wednesday . I got . I got interim principal on Friday and then I was off interim by Wednesday . And if you ask any of my old staff , they say I was the best principal in three days . Why ? Why , because our schedule said that we were going to end school .

Natalie Parker 27:39

I had the ability because when you're in a charter and transportation becomes an issue , so for some reason someone didn't look at the calendar really well . So we were going to have to pay for busing for three extra days and it was going to be like one hundred and eighty thousand dollars . And I was just like we don't have that right now . The director of finance told me I said OK , so what we're going to do is we're just going to tell parents on monday there's no school on tuesday and wednesday . So came up with this very crafty conversation I had with parents and let them know . I said listen , we have three days left . Two of these are half a days . We can't afford transportation , so today's going to be the last day of school .

Natalie Parker 28:14

Kids were applauding me , I was getting high fives , and and then , listen , on Tuesday we had kindergarten graduation . On Wednesday we had fourth grade graduation . It was beautiful and then I was all done , so no one could complain about my principalship because I ended school early and the kids loved me , the teachers loved me and that's two out of the three stakeholders that really appreciated it . So I'll take that 75% . I was shooting 75% . I'll take that 75% , I was shooting 75% , I'll take it .

George Borum 28:43

Listen , let's talk about the third stakeholder Cause . As a parent , I will tell you there is nothing that gets me to the highest levels of irritating than seeing that my child who goes to I think they're like trimesters , right , but it's like every other week . She's off on a Friday , every other .

Natalie Parker 29:00

What did the ? Parents say to you they got to work , george . Just one parent that got fucked up . I only had one , that's it .

George Borum 29:11

No , no , no . Let me help you out . You had one parent that said they were mad .

Natalie Parker 29:15

I had such a good relationship with parents they would come up to me and they would be like what you doing ? I'd be like , listen , it costs about $180,000 . And y'all know y'all not going to bring your kids for a half a day anyway , so why are you pretending ? And they were like yeah , you got it . You know they wasn't coming Tuesday or Wednesday anyway , because it was a half a day . I said exactly so we ain't got to do all this . You know what . We'll see you next year . Have a great summer . You know , let us know if you need anything . You know we'll see you in september . And they'd be like you got it . I was like , okay enough . Said only one parent called and got upset . I explained it . He was still upset . But I was like one parent out of 375 was like and I'm two to three of the stakeholders thought it was the best decision the kids and the teachers shooting 75 . I'll take that any day so , so let's talk about these .

Natalie Parker 29:59

I would I'd have been hot .

George Borum 30:00

I don't mean that she's calling you like , look man , you you can close the school , but you got to take her . So talk to me about the stakeholders , because one of the things that I'm finding is that , you know , unlike a person that works in like a corporate situation or even a small business right , we try in most cases to have one boss right , the person that gives you direction , whatever in education , it's just an interesting dynamic of having both the , the administration , the students , the parents , the federal requirement , like it's a lot of things pulling at you . How do you , how do you manage that in a way that doesn't suck ?

Natalie Parker 30:43

I think having those conversations with all of your stakeholders and being able to be up front with them .

Natalie Parker 30:48

I think when you end up like clouding it in jargon where no one understands , that's when you get like people you get lost .

Natalie Parker 30:55

Like , if you just tell parents and tell teachers and even tell students , like this is what we got , like this is what we need to be at , I think we're completely honest with people . When we start getting into like this heavy jargon of things that no one really understands , that's when you start losing them . Like , just tell parents , like completely upfront , this is where we are at a school , this is where we need to be at . This is the support that we need to have from you . School this is where we need to be at . This is the support that we need to have from you . I think they're more willing to listen to you if you tell them what you need from them , as opposed to just giving them constant information . Just what do you need from me as a parent ? Do you need me to make sure that my kid reads 20 minutes at a time ? Do you need me to be able to make sure that their homework is done ? Those sorts of things are extremely helpful .

George Borum 31:33

So let's talk about parent partnership and it comes to your experience . Tell me about some of the straining parental relationships you've had like again as stakeholders , like what are some of the challenges you had and what would you want to see from parents ?

Natalie Parker 31:48

as an educator . I have this theory , like because when I first started I'm gonna age myself . Back in 2008 I realized a lot of my parents were older parents . When they saw me they were like you're my child , they don't . I'm just saying . I'm just saying when I was older parents .

George Borum 32:09

you look like my son's age Older parents I had a lot of you got a kindergarten with a 60-year-old parent . You got to follow up Some grandmas and stuff like that .

Natalie Parker 32:19

They'll be like you , my son's age what are you talking to me about ? My child ? So they were so involved , like they were actively involved in day-to-day . They were , by most standards , helicopter parents , if you want to be able to call them . I think , as we progressively have gotten like towards now , obviously parents are like obviously younger and we're seeing like a huge different dynamic on like their interactions with teachers and with the schools , because I think their experience in schools may not have been as great and as may have not been as warm .

Natalie Parker 32:53

So they're willing to like push back and challenge . That's why you see a lot of like challenges with parents

Staff Culture vs. School Culture

Natalie Parker 32:59

, like pushing back on schools , and it doesn't always end up in like spoken in the right way . But I think , like generation , a generation before me had maybe a more positive experience interaction with schools and with teachers than this generation of parents who did with schools , because , because , like , look at all the things we just pushed into schools for parents .

George Borum 33:23

I think that's part of the problem so for the , for the young , oh , yes , yes , I'm 40 , so I think a lot of what we did with kids especially parents that are anywhere between their 20s and like early 30s is they went to school .

Natalie Parker 33:41

Especially if you went to charters like we did , like this sort of no excuse model charters where we wanted to just harp on very small things making sure your shirt was tucked in , make sure you had a belt , and we would send kids home if we didn't like , we would suspend kids , like we had . We wanted to instill these expectations for kids very much in the classroom and by doing those things I think they had a negative experience . So anytime anything resembled that , they come very hard at schools and stuff like that rightfully so , because they have their own trauma from that experience and that's something that we have to kind of have a conversation about with parents about what was their experience in schools and how can we address those and make sure that it doesn't look like the same thing for their kids .

George Borum 34:26

So it's interesting because I was talking to someone else who said part of their challenge is that the parents don't know that they should be helping .

Natalie Parker 34:34

That's true , too , parents , because we haven't explained to parents what we want them to do . We tell parents to be with your kids 20 minutes a day . Make sure you check their homework and make sure you get them to school on time . Like OK , like there's so much that goes into K-12 experiences . That's more than just that . Like you have to , realistically , at the dinner table , what's your favorite subject ? What did you guys do ? Asking open-ended questions , like those sorts of things . But how many parents are prepped with that ? How many parents had conversations with their kids that looked like that ? So if you're not trained as a parent , that your parent did that , what's the things we need you to be able to work with with your kids at home ? So , when they are doing a reading comprehension lesson , because you had a long conversation with them , this question that they about to answer , they already have , they're already familiar with . Like those are the sorts of things that we need to do .

Natalie Parker 35:27

Yeah , I agree , I will tell you I treat both of my children's education like a performance management plan where I'm like OK , now what is going ?

George Borum 35:35

for this year . Where are they along the line of continuum ? What do we need to work on ? Tell me what they're doing well .

Natalie Parker 35:42

Because at the end of the day .

George Borum 35:43

I'm trying to make them fully functional adults , and so I won't be like Bill Cosby , where he couldn't get all the people at his house Like I need them out of my house , george , so we need to make sure that they can do all those things Like raised . Are we on schedule ? And if we're not , I can accept not being on schedule , especially with a kid who has a neurodiverse need . Cool with that , I just need to- .

Natalie Parker 36:07

And are you asking the teachers ?

George Borum 36:08

Always making some kind of progress , even if the progress is failure in learning .

Natalie Parker 36:12

But what are we like ? And those are the conversations that we need to be able to have with parents . And I always tell parents all the time , like a lot of the experiences maybe you had , like did your parents talk to you about school and some of them you know , a lot of times I would ask them we would do new parent orientation and I would talk about all the things that we do here at school and I would say , like raise your hand if your parents spoke to you when you came home every single day for 15 , 20 minutes and a lot of the hands at the beginning of my career were up as my career went later on , later on the hands were down and that wasn't a case . And I implore parents , like have a conversation with the kid , ask them how their day was , what did they learn ? Like , why was that important ? Like those sorts of things that we need to be able to do . But we also have to train parents to be able to be a community school where we are teaching our parents what we want them to be able to do .

Natalie Parker 37:04

So , like a lot of parents had really tough experience , like they had schools that thought like let's do the broken window theory of teaching students in schools schools what's that ? Tell people what that is . So broken window theory was an approach of like a criminologist back in the seventies . So coming out of the sixties and you know civil rights and we've seen riots in Detroit and Newark and New York and all places . So this criminologist comes up with this idea that if you have a car that has been busted out of the windows and the hubcaps off and the tires are there , you're going to start getting a little bit of crime . Then you have graffiti on the building , then you're going to have more crime . So the plight is the idea that , like , if you have a broken window , it's just going to lead to more and more crime .

Natalie Parker 37:52

So what schools did coming out of like late 90s , going into the 2000s , was we started developing schools around this idea If kids shirts are not tucked in , then it's going to lead to more suspension . So if you don't have your shirt tucked in , you don't have a belt on , you're not doing your homework , you got to leave school . So that's what we did . So a lot of kids who now are parents are like I don't want that experience for my son or daughter . So the minute they get any resemblance of that , because we never explained to parents why we were doing it that way . So nowadays we have to be able to explain to parents more and more about our approaches , not from an academic standpoint , but just from an overall standpoint .

George Borum 38:33

And I think , as a stakeholder , you owe it to them . Like here's what , here's the contract we're trying to go for , right ? Yeah , otherwise , what are we ?

Natalie Parker 38:40

doing yes .

George Borum 38:42

So let's talk about this 11 leaders in 15 years . So you have your three-day principalship , and then what happens ? You know you say the best . I will not forget it . So tell me about some of these other 11 rotating leaders . Like what was going on ? Were they not hiring well , Were they ? They weren't built for it . Did they in over their head ? Like what was going on and how did it affect you ?

Natalie Parker 39:08

So my first four years I had one building leader and then after that we started getting a new building leader and our first building leader was from out of state , came from Michigan . He ended up staying half the school year because just didn't work out . But as a staff we knew we had to come together and work together . We would always say , like he's out making an album , so like we would come up with random things like and then we got another building leader who was from New York State . But we were in urban school and our board decided to hire somebody from a rural community 45 minutes away from an urban area and it wasn't new to her , she had no idea what she was doing .

Natalie Parker 39:51

So we would always want to do this splashy hire . We're going to do a nationwide search . We had a principal from Detroit , we had a principal from Vegas , we had a principal from Tennessee and we just kept bringing in all these names from our state and it just never worked out because they weren't familiar with the community , they didn't get comfortable with our students , they didn't get comfortable with our families and it was about making a splashy hire . It's about being able to say we got a principal from Vegas , we got a principal from Michigan , as opposed to just being like , ok , we're hiring the best candidate locally because we want to be able to support what parents want and people who know Albany or know the area that you're around , but how does that affect you as a teacher ?

George Borum 40:31

You know we've decided that you're good second chair You're . You're still in this in the classroom , like , like . How did that suck for you .

Natalie Parker 40:44

So literally my first year , my first four years , I had one principal , and then the next year , my last year , in the classroom I had my second principal and when he left we just kept chugging along and finished out the year and then , literally that next year I became an administrator .

Natalie Parker 41:01

So then I went through this span of just having all of these second these , all these different administrators , coming with these ideas of what the mission and vision was even though we knew what it was because it was right there on the wall but their vision of how do we get to that excellence in playing second chair , of how do we get to that excellence In playing second chair ? I was able to use all those skills that I used back when I was an assistant coach to help me be able to filter in this new person with a new personality , from a different geographical background , to be able to help support them without them thinking , oh , you just want my job or why didn't they just give it to you ? Because everyone came in and literally asked me that why aren't you principal ? That's what they would all say to start off the conversation . How did you reconcile that in ?

George Borum 41:44

your mind , though , Knowing that at least you had the respect of your peers right and you have the respect of the stakeholders ? Did you ever ask I don't know , the chair of the board or anybody like , look , OK , tell me what I'm not doing ?

Natalie Parker 41:59

So I probably and I'll be honest , I self-sabotage myself . So I said one of two things I said the one time we were in a transition . Our board chair came to our building and spoke to me and said like your principal left without you guys knowing he's no longer here . And this is when my three-day interim and they asked I said , how would you feel about being a principal ? And I told them I said I can't be principal here because I know the staff too well and it would be hard for me to let somebody go when I've gone to a barbecue at their house .

Natalie Parker 42:40

I'm too connected to the building to be able to run the building effectively . You have to bring somebody from the outside . I can help and support them , but I can't run this building because I will have to make decisions for staff that I've grown too close to because we've had so many different building leaders , and for me to have kept them here . They knew that I've grown too close to because we've had so many different building leaders , and for me to have kept them here . They knew that I could always be that support that they could lean on during a difficult time , even though we did have different building leaders or they didn't like a different teacher . They could always come to me for that level of support when I had to step into that role . I was going to lose that and I didn't want to .

George Borum 43:17

I don't know that . That sounds like self-sabotage , as in as much

The Charter School Experience

George Borum 43:21

as a deliberate choice .

Natalie Parker 43:24

Or maybe a career suicide . Maybe I chose to do that as opposed to taking on .

George Borum 43:28

So so , looking , looking back , though , would you , would you have done it different ?

Natalie Parker 43:34

No , absolutely not Everyone asks me like like now that you are like I'm no longer working there , I've worked there . I worked there for 15 years . No , because I always , like , at the end of the day , I think back on my 15 years there and , having all the them who have left to go teach at a public school , I've had superintendents contact me and say , whatever you guys did there , this teacher is fantastic and wonderful . So whatever you guys did there was great , thank you for that . Like you really get a superintendent from a public school to call a charter or any any in general , just to say like thank you for that . Or a principal would call and reach out , or just to be able to say say like , whatever you guys did at that particular time to get this teacher where they are at , like they're a joy and a pleasure to be able to have here .

Natalie Parker 44:27

So I think back on , like we did such a good work . We were independent charter , we were mom and pop , we stayed open , for they're still open now . And I think that's more rewarding because you know schools , especially charters , can become like Pepsi and Coke , like a conglomerate . You can have all these schools with all the same name . But we were independent , we were mom and pop .

George Borum 44:45

We worked off of that we loved that Explain the conglomerate of charter schools .

Natalie Parker 44:51

So , you have different charter schools that , yeah , almost franchise , I would say . Like there are like like franchising of charter schools that you hear the name just like , oh okay , they have schools in new york , they have schools in florida , they have schools in texas . They could be high performing schools , but they're also a level of like any kind of grocery store that you see around in your area there's a lot of them . So they all have the same mission or the same vision . Now you can bring that business to that particular area , but does it hold any value ?

Natalie Parker 45:24

Because it's not like homegrown , like being an independent charter . We were independent . We worked off of word of mouth . We had second , third generation kids that were in our building because their older brother went there and then they had kids and then they brought a cousin and a nephew and you know , great-grandmother kids went here and they liked this teacher in second grade so they signed them up for kindergarten to make sure that they got that second grade teacher . Like we worked off of those sorts of things and sometimes when you become like a larger conglomerate of things , you kind of lose that homegrown piece to it .

George Borum 45:59

So you leave the classroom , go into administration . Then you become building manager .

Natalie Parker 46:10

Yeah , so I become . I go through three different roles , name titles , but they're all the same thing . I went from being a dean to assistant principal , then to principal for behavior and culture . So I did all the day to day sort of stuff open the building , close the building , read to kids when they come off , did the level of like when teachers were out planning that pieces of things , so like if you needed something fixed or done or knew where , I knew where everything was . So I managed the building day to day . So it made life easier for our principal for academics . It made life easier for our head of school at that time to be able to work on like bigger picture things where I dealt with like the day to day sort of things of a parent complaint or you know , something was broke or the AC wasn't working . Who do I need to call just to be able to get somebody here ?

George Borum 47:00

So like an operational triage kind of thing .

Natalie Parker 47:03

Yeah , it was every day , because somebody would always call out . You know somebody , some kid would throw up in the middle of the hallway and can't find a janitor . So you got to get the gloves on , you got to get the mop out , you got to get it off the floor . Before we transition , like those sorts of things that keep a building moving , you need to always have a second person who's ready to be able to work and be able to get those things done .

George Borum 47:26

So I mean , what I love about your path is that you've you've gone up through the ranks and now let's talk about where you are now . Like what's what's different for you ? What have you learned , especially from some of the bad leaders , like I'm never doing that what they did . Like I'm never doing those three things . Like give me some of that , talk to me about that .

Natalie Parker 47:48

I think having soft skills , especially with newer teachers that you're coming in I think when I was coming in it didn't like matter if the leader liked you or not . Like you just work , just to work . I feel like now you have to work for somebody you like who generally cares about your wellbeing and making sure that like it's not just about what's in the classroom , about worried about you as an individual . So my biggest thing in learning , one of the things I've learned , is , like it's simple , things like how was your weekend , was your weekend remembering you know your staff's kids names and if they play soccer , like oh , how was that soccer game yesterday ? Like doing those sorts of things it affirms that you like understand .

Natalie Parker 48:27

One of the things that I did before I left it henry johnson last summer was I we had like 40 or 50 staff like I hand wrote a note to every single staff member before I left because I thought it was important for them to be able to just understand . Like even though this might have been your first year or this is your 15th year with me , like I appreciate the time that you put in in being here . So I think on my journey right now trying to open up a charter school . I think using those skills when it comes to leadership , but also getting people to understand like what my mission and vision of the school that hasn't even been built yet is the biggest takeaway from that .

George Borum 49:02

It's a personal peeve , but I don't like the term soft skills and it's just it's . For me it's . They are life skills , like if you never learned how to do calculus . It is far more important for you to learn how to talk to people do calculus . It is far more important for you to learn how to talk to people .

George Borum 49:24

It's far more important for you to learn how to resolve conflict yes we all need technical skills , but then the receiving end of the educator space . So we receive all the people that you guys educate and then we get them in the workforce and they don't know how to talk to people , they don't know how to have conflicts , they don't know how to debate , they don't know how to negotiate .

Natalie Parker 49:40

It's funny , I was talking to someone .

George Borum 49:41

I was coaching somebody the other day and they were like well , I don't like this and I don't like that , and I don't like that . And I'm like well , it sounds like you don't prefer a lot of things , and that's fine . You can have preferences , but your inability to pinpoint . So how do you negotiate so you can get further , rather than just being mad at the things that aren't like the way you want them to be ? And for me , I feel like a big miss in education is really honing in on just these fundamental people skills like to be able to connect and operate , Because even if you are a coder in the back Western wing of some big conglomerate , you still got to know how to talk to people .

George Borum 50:22

And so for me it's always interesting , and I think in the age of digital and all things , AI , we don't know what's real Authenticity and being able to manage relationships is going to be the chief thing that makes people successful in this day and age .

Natalie Parker 50:42

I completely agree with that . I think when I was coming up , even just growing up like , just like that level of like we're just going to grind , we're just going to like you're coming to work , to work , it doesn't matter if you like your boss , it doesn't mean anything , you need to come to work . And that was like the approach that I had for my first , like several years like , especially when I first became a dean . Very like , late in my 20s , my fifth year in education , I was like I don't care what the teachers like who cares ? Like you're going to do your job because I'm the boss and I'm telling you what to do and I had to learn that skill . Like oh , people don't like that . Like okay , like I have a different approach . Like they don't like that too much . Like okay , like , and that wasn't , that's not even my personality .

Natalie Parker 51:29

But I figured like that's how I see bosses were on tv and that's what I've read in books . And like that's the mindset you had to have . And I didn't know you could shift the mindset because every boss that I've ever had , even when I was working at a movie theater when I was in high school , did the exact same thing . So my high school basketball coach was the exact same way . Everything was very stern and very to the point when giving feedback , like you're going to do this , because I told you to command and control . Exactly so when I got to become a leader , I didn't know that you could deviate and be something unique or innovative in your building .

George Borum 52:08

But as I've gotten older and I've become more red . I understand . Has anybody ever given you , like you call anybody giving you that feedback , like , look , boss , I'll work that way , like when you now , ok , now , like now I feel more comfortable with myself being able to access .

Natalie Parker 52:23

I think early on I did not feel super comfortable , but what ended up happening was those who , when I became a leader , those who were my friends as teachers were just like that's not you . Why are you acting like ? Like that ? That's not you . That's never been you . So why are you pretending to be this human that we've never interacted with ? Like you can be the leader of the building . We respect you , but you don't need to act like that or treat people like that . You've never done that before and I had to take that and sit with it .

George Borum 52:53

I appreciate having people in your life who know you well enough to give you the mirror and be like let's look at this and see if this is you people in your life who know you well enough to give you the mirror and be like let's look at this and see if this is you and I also . It lends itself to really having people you know , whether you're listening or watching or whatever . Just think about the kind of leader you would want to be , whatever the situation is , and be intentional about it .

George Borum 53:15

I do think there are certain . We talk about this sometimes when we're facilitating and training . There are some times where command and control is important when the building is on fire I'll have time for you to , like me , get out the building right and then there are times where we need to work together and negotiate . I think there's space for each style , but any style overused is dangerous . Is that what I'm going to preach ?

Natalie Parker 53:40

No , and I think that that's the case sometimes , that we have to just

Building Relationships with Students and Parents

Natalie Parker 53:44

figure out all those pieces , and I think it's it's been hard for me and I think , but over time you grow and you just become like , you improve and you get better , and I think that's the biggest thing that I've tried to gain is just how do you get better each and every day ? And that's how I kind of take the approach to doing things .

George Borum 54:03

So you are now in a different seat altogether , right ? So you ? Your love for charter school has spawned something new in your life . Tell us about what ? All of the surviving , the 11 bosses and 15 years and learning your own leadership style . Where are you now in this space ?

Natalie Parker 54:22

Oh , I'm in the space of trying to open up my own charter school , Schenectady Scholar Charter School .

George Borum 54:35

It would be the first Montessori charter school in central New York Free tuition you got first of all you got to define because there's a lot of for those who are not in education .

Natalie Parker 54:41

There's a lot of the first Montessori .

George Borum 54:46

So let's talk about the recipe , the gumbo of things going on in that title .

Natalie Parker 54:51

So most people when they hear Montessori , especially in or around this area where I live at , it's usually affluent , white , typically very expensive school to be able to get into . And Montessori is an approach where you know , freedom with limits and it's very much students mixed age classrooms . So it's a very unique learning style and learning approach to having schools . It was something that was adopted many , many years ago , which has been co-opted , typically in more affluent areas , and what I wanted to do , especially after COVID , was , over the years , charters have been very structured , Some people would say even like it's very rigorous , but it doesn't allow itself to be able to be flexible , and what I wanted to do was to have a charter school that was very flexible .

Natalie Parker 55:38

So , thinking about this approach , it was just like let's put these two ideas together , Because 10 or 15 years ago I could never see how these two opposite ends of the spectrums could come together . I said if we blend these two models together and take the pieces that we enjoy , we can still have a longer school day , a longer school year , but not have this high level of compliance in the building where we're drawing lines in the hallway making kids walk on it .

Natalie Parker 56:00

We can have freedom with limits . We can teach the kids what we want them to be able to do . We can use hands-on materials , like they use in Montessori , but we can also prepare kids to be able to be doctors and lawyers by using both of these approaches . So I was like we can still do this . It's just going to look different , it's going to sound different , but it can be innovative for especially black and brown families , who need a different approach , who just need a different option . And that's what we want to offer . It's just a different option for families .

George Borum 56:27

What ? What makes that option so much more important , at least now , in this day and age ?

Natalie Parker 56:37

Oh , great question . I think we have been stagnant on like , what our approach is . So like , okay , if we go to public school , public schools look like this . We go to charters , they look like this .

George Borum 56:49

Okay .

Natalie Parker 56:50

And then that's it in school , or you have money to be able to send your kid to a Montessori school . It affords you these opportunities the more money and resources they have , or just geographically where you live at . What I want to be able to do is blend these two ideas together and be able to make it work for families who typically wouldn't have the opportunity to be able to go to one of the other options .

George Borum 57:17

Listen , man , I'm excited . So where are you on this journey and how can folks support you ?

Natalie Parker 57:24

So we so our application was due April 8th . We were able to get our application in because it is an extremely heavy lift . I wrote together a 567 page document because you have to put all these things together . So if you think of a school and all the documents that go into it , because you have to put all these things together , so if you think of a school and all the documents that go into it .

Natalie Parker 57:44

And one of the big things was , I called in every single favor I've ever had in education in my entire life . I called every favor , anything time I did . And if I lifted a box for you , I called in and asked can you look at this document for me real quick ? I literally did . I called it . I don't probably have any favors left in education .

Natalie Parker 58:04

I have to build my equity back up again but I was able to get the application in with a fantastic and wonderful board . I have 14 board members , which is extremely high for education , and what's special about our board is that it's mutually exclusive of black and brown women . I think that's extremely , extremely important for myself when I was putting this board together . 70% of the teaching force in this country is women , most households . Research says that education and health decisions are made by moms , aunties , grandmas . So I wanted a board that kind of looked like that and they all come from finance education .

Natalie Parker 58:38

One's a professor , one's still in college , one's a teacher , they still in college , one's a teacher . They are just like a wealth of fantastic and wonderful human beings that are helping me put this vision out there , and a couple weeks ago we had public comment where the community was able to come out and say if they were pro or against us , and they were able to come out and show their support for our school . So right now we are just kind of waiting out the process for the next step in the process , and right now we're just , you know , enjoying the summer and getting the word out to parents about what we can offer and , you know , just trying to give them another option . That's the biggest thing . It's not to embarrass the school district or make them look bad or say that their teachers are not good . It's just to afford parents another option .

George Borum 59:25

That's all . We just want to give people another option . George , I'm really excited for you because I think that what you're doing is lending innovation in a space that hasn't had a lot of innovation at least real innovation . I think we've kind of moved around the deck chairs on the Titanic a bit right .

George Borum 59:34

Yes , absolutely Really excited for the work you're doing . I want to hear about how you balance family as an educator and the leadership lessons you've learned again kind of , from bad bosses and what you've taken for your family and things that you will or will not do .

Natalie Parker 59:52

I think what I've learned is when I became a parent . I became a parent later on in my career Are you one of those old parents .

Natalie Parker 1:00:01

I am one of those old parents I am . I have an eight-year-old and 40 years old . So when I say that to people , they're like , oh , you're old , your kid is going to be you know , you're going to be almost 50 when your kid goes to college . I'm like , okay , I'm not realizing . Like , okay , I'm an older parent , sure . Like , oh , okay , I'm an older parent , sure , so I'm an older parent . So I think I was able to learn a lot , especially by being an educator .

Natalie Parker 1:00:27

When you're in the classroom you see so many kids and I think what I , early on , I did in the classroom , which wasn't the right thing to think and have the mindset I used to say , well , I'm not going to do that as a parent , but not understanding , like every parent , situation is slightly a bit different and I think what made me realize as an educator , after being like a dad , is just understanding that , like , every decision you make , you're trying to make it in the best interest of your child and sometimes it doesn't come off that way . So you know , I would often like I realize now having a daughter that you know , when I was in the classroom as a teacher , I used to say , like girls were bossy . But I would never say boys were bossy , never say that . But as I got older in my career and was able to do a lot of reading and research and understand that like it's like oh , that's my own bias

Creating a New Montessori Charter School

Natalie Parker 1:01:14

. So I stopped saying I used to say like no , she just has a really good leadership skills , that's all . We just got to find a better way to hone us those . So she's not bossy , she just has really good leadership skills . We just have to hone us those better . So like those sorts of things I think really has helped me as like a parent and an educator , I think for my leadership style .

Natalie Parker 1:01:33

I think the biggest thing I was able to take away from all the 1,500s of building leaders that I've ever had in my entire career is that I think being able to understand your staff is the most important thing . Just being humble and I never want to ask a staff member to do something I wouldn't do myself . So that means helping to serve lunch , covering a class teaching third grade for a day because the teacher is out , like those sorts of things go a long way with your staff to be able to understand , like he's in the fight with us every single day Like he understands . He has a lot of things on his plate that's different than mine , but he's willing to come into our classroom and teach for three and a half hours , like that's going to go a long way with the teacher than anything else I can do .

George Borum 1:02:19

I think those are wonderful lessons . I want to ask you one last question to wrap our conversation . What would you say to the early in career teacher , or even the medical career teacher who's dealing with a bad leadership situation in their work environment ? What's one survival skill you try to give them ?

Natalie Parker 1:02:41

Find your group of people that make you want to be able to come to work every day .

Natalie Parker 1:02:46

But , most importantly , make sure that those 25 , 30 faces looking back at you know that you're there for them , making sure that you're still empathetic and all that frustration that you might have towards that leader or principal that's in your building , or instructional coach whoever is giving you that high level of frustration that you're putting all of that emphasis into your classroom and then in your spare time , try to make sure that you are thinking of other innovative ideas .

Natalie Parker 1:03:12

So find those two or three people that have that same level of frustration and work on a separate plan , maybe opening up a school or developing a fellowship that you can maybe go to the superintendent about that you want to be able to work on some level of leadership and then being able to see how can you leverage yourself to be able to say , moving forward , like , ok , I see all the things that they're doing wrong . So when I become a leader , I'm not going to do that , because everything is a teachable moment . So you can learn from a bad boss , you can learn from a good boss , you can take skills from both and be able to say I want to be like that when I become a leader , or I don't want to be like that . So I think that's the biggest thing .

George Borum 1:03:47

George , it has been awesome to have you on so it's been my pleasure as well . Thank you so much for being here .

Natalie Parker 1:03:52

Thank you so much .

George Borum 1:04:07

Today's episode is brought to you by Natalie Parker Enterprises , where we shape the future and unlock potential by helping organizations and people work together to do good work . Find out more at thenatalieparkercom , or , if you'd like to be a sponsor , email us at info at thenatalieparkercom .