The Decision to Pursue the Principalship: What Motivates and Inhibits Orthodox Jewish Day School Teachers to Leave the Classroom and Pursue Administration

Abstract

Research examining the pursuit of the principalship reveals that many educators are driven by higher-level needs that make the role of principal compelling and desirable. The role of principal can be attractive to educators in that it enables one to positively affect the lives of students and teachers, and to raise one’s status, thereby satisfying higher-level needs that one tends to seek (Bass et al., 2006; Harris, 2011). Themes such as diversifying career options, making a difference, encouragement from mentors, and self-actualization were found to be motivating factors (Arthur et al. , 2009). External factors, including political, communal, or the like, make the role of principal an intimidating one, mainly due to the demanding nature of the role and the time required of a principal on a daily basis (Beach, 2010; Pounder & Merrill, 2001). Yet, for Jewish teachers in Orthodox Jewish day schools, there are other complicating factors as well. Salomon (2010) researched motivations for those entering the field of Jewish education and found that many of the male subjects expressed a desire to eventually occupy an administrative role within Jewish day schools, as a way of compensating for the perceived poor salary of Jewish day school teachers. This finding leaves open the question of the role of salary in the decision to pursue the principalship in Jewish day schools; it is not uniformly found to be a significant factor in the research on public schools.