Brian M. Stack's School Leadership Blog

This article was written originally for MultiBriefs Education . It’s the start of what will be another busy week, and you’ve just opened your computer to find a flurry of emails that need your attention. As you scan through them, you can see that some will be quick responses, but some will involve much more than that. The phone rings, and you learn that one of your teachers has a family emergency and will need to take a couple of weeks off. You’ll have to figure out coverage, and fast. Luckily, your budget was due this morning to your Superintendent but you submitted it a week early. Wait, nevermind. One of your emails is from your boss, and she was breaking the bad news to you that the School Board would like you to go back and find another 2% in budget cuts and you’ll need to update them on where the money will come from tomorrow. As you look out your window, the school buses are pulling into the driveway so you decide to make your way to the door to greet them with a smile. Wait,

  This article was written originally for MultiBriefs Education . The pandemic continues to expose weaknesses in various parts of our educational system. This fall, one of the most debated was one that is often forgotten: The state of our 100,000 elementary and secondary public school facilities. America seems to have a love-hate relationship with its school facilities. They are costly to replace, yet when they are in disrepair, they can be expensive to maintain. For many communities however, they are one of, if not the most heavily used community resources. America’s 50 million children and 6 million educators spend between 30 and 40 hours each week in these spaces, and a school’s core common areas such as gyms, libraries, cafeterias, and auditoriums are used by the community for many evening and weekend events. Public schools account for nearly 7.5 billion square feet of interior space, which equates to almost half the area of all commercial office space in the nation. Each summer,