Three Ways to Build Connection, Culture, and Community This School Year

By S. Kambar Khoshaba

For principals, experiencing challenging years is inevitable. Putting our best foot forward right out of the starting gate is essential to setting us on a positive path to building a strong, connected school community. Conflicts with student schedules, staff morale issues, and parental concerns about academic pressure and mental health status are among the few in a very long list of potential variables that we manage on a regular basis. Having spent time in the valley, I can tell you how great the view is when you reach the mountain top and look down to find that you just experienced your best opening week in 28 years of education. Here’s how I found that “mountain view” and how you can, too. 

1. Prioritize Student Engagement.  

I believe most principals would agree with the need to focus strategically on how engaged students are at school. For our school, the accumulated effect of small actions together has made all the difference. In The Slight Edge: Turning Simple Disciplines into Massive Success and Happiness, authors Jeff Olson and John David Mann emphasize the idea that success and failure are not the result of a single, monumental action but rather the accumulation of small, seemingly insignificant actions done consistently over time. They argue that the choices we make every day, no matter how small, have a compounding effect, leading us either toward success or failure. Within the first two weeks of school, we chose to do the following things, which I believe will have that compounding impact: 

• We hosted a “Senior Sunrise.” On the first day of the school year, this event for seniors enabled them to gather early in the morning to watch the sunrise, marking the start of their final year of high school. 

• We held a “First Day Pep Rally.” This spirited event generated excitement and school pride among students and staff. 

• We created a “Culture Champions” team. These staff leaders will collaborate to host events such as our first winter semi-formal dance and student talent show. 

2. Engage and Appreciate Your Staff.  

Harness the power of your superhero staff by bridging the teacher morale gap with programs like our school’s “Teacher TLC: Boosting Morale During the Toughest Months.” We run this program during November and March, with specific appreciation activities on Fridays. These activities are geared toward helping staff feel appreciated and respected. 

Second, we show our teachers the love with “Weekly Cards.” If you as a school leader are not finding someone to appreciate each week, it is because you haven’t been in the hallways and classrooms enough. Write cards of appreciation for your staff who are embodying the qualities you challenged them to embody this year. 

 3. Be Communication-Centered and Detail-Oriented. 

One of the goals I set for myself this year was to put all the meetings I aspired to attend on my calendar before the year started. Department meetings, advisory councils, and formal recognition programs are intentionally marked in my calendar over the summer to ensure that the meetings I want to prioritize attending were scheduled before other meetings could encroach on them. To that end, I did the following: 

• I scheduled all meetings with reminders. Doing so helps ensure meetings, especially my separate advisory meetings with students, staff, and parents, are well-organized with scheduled reminders for me to begin preparing for them two weeks ahead of time. 

• Giving weekly newsletter updates (see an example). I learned from staff and community feedback that there were aspects of the school they wanted to receive updates on each week. I also wanted to find a way to keep our beginning of the year message consistent throughout the coming months. So, I created consistent sections in our newsletter, including the “Staff Spotlight,” “Club Corner,” “High Quality Instruction,” and a focus on using AI via a new (and hilarious!) avatar of me each week. 

• I strategically placed myself in different parts of the building. In previous years, my morning presence was always in the section of the building where we had the most congestion of students; however, that left me inaccessible to stakeholders in other parts of the school. To increase my visibility to staff and students, I have divided the building into different sections and strategically schedule my morning walk-through in a different part of the school each day. 

Creating a thriving school environment depends on a principal’s ability to build strong connections, foster a positive culture, and nurture a sense of community. By focusing on student engagement, staff appreciation, organization, and instructional leadership, we as school leaders can significantly impact the success and well-being of our schools. I hope these strategies equip you to lead your schools to not only survive but thrive. I wish you the best school year ever.