From Hopeful To Hectic

By Mark Warren Segar

Everyone knew who I was, of course. The teachers, students, parents, and custodial and office staffs all greeted me by name that first day. I remember a sense of imbalance welling up, a kind of professional vertigo as I looked at all those welcoming, wondering faces with names not yet securely attached.

I was sure that most of them wanted me to succeed; certain, too, that some of them had special interests to guard, maybe even axes to grind, and that they would be anxious to know where I stood on a whole host of issues facing the school and its community. All those projected hopes, unvoiced but no less real, piled high on the in-basket of expectations and emotions that met me as I began this new and different work.

I had come to The Common School from state government, from the governor's staff where I'd worked on state policy for education and youth services. I'd been eager to get away from state politics for some time. I wanted to work with real families again, with individual children instead of statistical populations and groups. Politicians constantly wondering about the extent of their minimal obligations to children had strained my commitment to child advocacy and early education. The opportunity to lead a small, experimental school was timely, a chance to move away from questions like "What can we afford?'' toward "What's the...