Taylor Connard

Education 650

Principal Reflection

For this experience, I was able to shadow Crystal Gibson. Mrs. Gibson is principal of

Clay County High School. She attended Clay County High School and then returned to teach

there for 24 years. Mrs. Gibson taught 9th grade English all 24 years. After leaving teaching, she

was vice principal for two years and now has been principal for three years. Mrs. Gibson is very

to the point, so I felt like with shadowing her, I would get a lot of information that was direct and

not something I had to decode or sort through.

My first day shadowing was the day after we had shut down for contact tracing. We spent

a considerable amount of time discussing the ends and outs of Covid-19. She walked me through

the ends and outs of what happens when a student or staff member tests positive. If the student or

staff members alerts the principal first, she has to immediately contact the health department. If

the health department is contacted first, they then reach out to her. She has to provide seating

charts and class rosters to the health department so that contact tracing can begin. The health

department begins to make the phone calls informing people who must quarantine. It is out of

Mrs. Gibson’s hands if school is closed or open. If the contact tracing is successful, they can

reopen school quickly. If the tracing is unsuccessful, they will keep schools closed until it is

complete.

On this day, we also discussed WVLearns and how she spends most of her time fielding

phone calls from parents who are angry about their students’ grades. Her current mission is to try

and convince the board office to switch from the WVLearns platform to just straight Microsoft

Teams. Mrs. Gibson feels that switching to Teams will improve student success and ease the
burden on teachers. She explained that it can be hard to deal with the board office because they

do not always understand what happens at the high school. There is not a single person at the

county board office who has ever worked at the high school. On this day she was also sending

out letters of warning informing virtual students what will happen if they fail a course.

On day two, we discussed a lot about athletics. The high school was on deck to

potentially host a playoff football game. In order to host that game, they had to work with the

Secondary Schools Activity Commission. They had to measure how much occupants could fit

inside the stadium if they remained 18 inches apart. She was also preparing the gymnasium for

the start of basketball season. In the gym, they had to also figure out occupancy and submit that

as well. During our conversations, they became challenging at times due to the drilling of Mrs.

Gibson’s wall on the other side of her office. The school is currently undergoing a two-year

construction project. She informed me that this was something that she had wanted to

accomplish for the high school and the drilling is just confirmation that it is happening.

On our final day, I conducted the interview and presented my portfolio to Mrs. Gibson.

The interview was interesting and we ended up going down a lot of different paths of

conversation. The interviews are some of my favorite parts because you learn more about their

personal goals and successes as administrators. The portfolio has been such an intense process

and perfecting it has taken a lot of time. I was excited to show Mrs. Gibson what I had worked

on. We went through the portfolio together and looked at each component. She felt as though it

was a useful tool for hiring and would put me a step ahead of other candidates who do not have

something so extensive.

Mrs. Gibson is a formidable force as principal at Clay County High School. She is

determined to make the high school the best possible place for our staff and students. She loves
to consider us a family and strives to include that family atmosphere in her decisions. She puts

her students first and wants the best for them and their futures. It was an extremely beneficial

experience getting to shadow her. Covid-19 made things very difficult, but I would hope to get to

observe her more in the future.