The Virginia Board of Education has provided recommendations that have now become policy by the GA for funds transfer by local school boards to allow flexibility for staffing schools. The policy, on the surface, is much needed and will provide the opportunity to staff schools needing special teaching assignments by using funds designated in the particular area of instruction. The measure also has another side which may cause headaches for building principals. The amendment permits school boards the discretion to transfer assistant principals into schools “with the greatest need”. This policy will allow superintendents to transfer elementary school assistant principals up to middle or high schools and vice-versa with high school assistant principals moving down. This all works well in a climate of good intentions and professional integrity, but there is the other side of this process. In graduate school, the phrase used to describe this unwanted reverse side of the process is “the dance of the lemons” and you could end up with a lemon that no one else wants on their staff.
