My Paperwork Got Lost?
As a master/cooperative teacher I have had the great opportunity to work over 20 student teachers. While these aspiring educators are “gung ho” to practice their content delivery or hands-on activity they have been planning for hours. One of the greatest impacts the takeaways from me that remind of when I see them is on how to treat everyone they work with. During weekly meetings, I would try to impart advice on how to organize themselves and how to deal with site support staff. The support staff is a vital part of student success. They handle the day to day operations that are needed for the school site to function, provide nutrition, health care, transportation, safety, and care for the grounds and facilities. These street-level bureaucrats handle the site level operations that make the school work day in and day out. Lipsky, (2010) uses the term “street-level bureaucrats” to describe teachers, judges, police officers, health workers, social workers, public defenders and more. They provide benefits and sanction directly to citizens, possess common traits such as discretionary decision-making, and have relative autonomy from management.
I would student teachers through the various processes and paperwork needed to request a purchase order for materials and supplies, field trip requests, fundraising requests, transportation, requests, maintenance requests, and special education reports. I would remind them that this was far more than a paperwork process, you didn’t just fill out and turn it in and wait for magical things to happen. I took the time to explain how well they filled out the paperwork in terms of completeness, neatness, and promptness help to make the person on the other end job easier. Lipsky (2010) describes how street-level bureaucrats make policy in two related respects. They exercise wide discretion in decisions about citizens with whom they interact. Then, when taken in concert, their individual actions add up to agency behavior. These two methods will either make your job as a teacher easy or difficult when it comes to getting request fulfilled in a timely manner. I would describe to student teachers how my paperwork could get lost in the transfer from secretary to administration or from the site to the district. This would cause delays in getting a purchase order (PO) from the business office for your supplies. It could mean that your transportation request was not received by the district office within the time specified for these request to be accepted. It also meant that your classroom would be the last one cleaned in the summer, something that was dread to all teachers when it came to getting ready for the first day of school.
The question the student teachers all got around to asking me was “how to avoid this from happening to them? The answer is simple, but the devil is in the details. The answer is to treat everyone works with you, with respect, dignity, and goodwill. Remember that they have to deal with their managers too. Lipsky (2010) states, nonetheless, public managers are pressured to secure or improve workers’ accountability through manipulation of incentives and other aspects of job structure immediately available to them. So the support staff is under constant pressure from their management to get things done they need to be done as well as the individual teachers needs. As a new teacher to the site try and get to know everyone. Ask them about their positions and what they do, what is the hardest part of their jobs, what drives them crazy when paperwork is submitted. Take a genuine interest in them as people, don’t we all want to be cared about? For example, when we had meetings or activities where we would serve food in the evening, I always ordered or prepared extra so that I could invite the night shift custodial crew to join us for dinner. When we got new program logoed hats, shirts, and jackets I would order extras to share with support staff. Nothing makes you feel like part of a team than looking like part of the team. Yes, this cost me extra money to do so, but in the long run, the out of pocket expense ensured goodwill so that when I did miss a deadline or needed a favor last minute it was no big deal. So my final words of wisdom to the student teachers on this topic was to get a stack of thank you cards, $5.00 Starbucks gift cards, birthday cards, etc that can be easily shared on special occasions or for thank yous! This way your paperwork does not get lost and your classroom is cleaned on the first week of the summer break.
Lipsky, Michael (2010). Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services.
30th Anniversary Expanded Edition. The Russell Sage Foundation: New York, NY
Sam, thank you for this blog post. You are a man after my own heart. I am a huge proponent of managers taking care of their staff and the folks that support our work. This can be, as you mention, some college swag, a Starbucks card or a school t-shirt. I think also just saying hello to support folks like custodial staff, gardeners, the campus police and others goes a long way to building not only positive working relationships but keeps attitudes out of the gutter.
ReplyDeleteI can’t tell you how many frontline people (the street-level bureaucrats) I meet that when treated poorly, will react in the only way they feel they can. Most frontline staff won’t be outright rude to a disrespectful customer, but they will use the limited power they have – a combination of expert knowledge in their field and what Lipsky (2010) calls autonomy and discretion. A front-line person working a registration desk when rudely asked by a student, to “get me in that class, or else” will use their discretionary ability to let the student know, “oh, I’m sorry, that class is full”, when there are actually 2 or 3 seats left. They are usually at the desk on their own, so the autonomy granted by their position allows the use of the little bit of power they possess.
A great example to support your blog would be our building custodian Dave. We know about his wife and kids, we know his favorite baseball players and he is included in the office fantasy football team. Because he is included and made to feel like one of the team, he takes pride and special care in making sure that offices are vacuumed, that common areas are dust free and that the bathrooms are extra clean. He is doing his part to help our office serve faculty and students. With his specific job knowledge, discretion and autonomy Dave could make life for us in the office miserable if he wanted to. But the staff treating him with the respect, dignity and goodwill that you mention goes a long way to keeping him from being one of Lipsky’s street-level bureaucrats and keeps him as one of our team.
References
Lipsky, Michael (2010). Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services. 30th Anniversary Expanded Edition. The Russell Sage Foundation: New York, NY
Sam,
ReplyDeleteThat's the first thing I tell student teachers as well! It's worth an hour to walk around meeting secretaries and support staff.
My principal tells a story about how he was hired as a teacher at our campus. Working as a sub for a year, he visited with the district secretary, brought her a birthday card, returned her calls promptly and with a smile on his face. When he applied for his own classroom, she personally walked his application in and demanded that he got an interview.
When street-level bureaucrats (Lipsky, 2010) share in the purpose of the institution they create a team focused on the goal. At our school, students have close relationships with cafeteria staff, bus drivers, and some janitorial staff. Those people know their purpose is students! This leads to a fun problem; every year the students' first choice for Homecoming Grand Marshall is janitor Jay Garcia and they only get to serve once. He goes above and beyond his job description for students every day.
Street-level bureaucrats (Lipsky, 2010) will vary from official policy, but communication of purpose determines if it hurts your organization or helps it.
References
Lipsky, Michael (2010). Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services. 30th Anniversary Expanded Edition. The Russell Sage Foundation: New York, NY
Sam,
ReplyDeleteThank you for such an informative blog post! I truly believe that it is of the utmost importance to meet every individual that is employed at our institutions. The former CSUCI Vice President of Student Affairs, Dr. William Gregory Sawyer made it a point to meet every single person hired on the campus. It didn’t matter if you were staff, faculty, groundskeeper or student employee- meeting one another and getting to know one another was crucial for him. He believed that if you got to know each member of your team, it would make a world of difference.
I truly believe that we all play a part in the success of a student. It doesn’t matter whether you’re an administrator, faculty, groundskeeper, or staff member. We all share a common focus- the student. We all share a common goal- student success. As Lipsky (2010) mentions, street-level bureaucrats share in the purpose of the institution so that it creates a team focused on the goal.
Lipsky, Michael (2010). Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services. 30th Anniversary Expanded Edition. The Russell Sage Foundation: New York, NY
-Khat