Stroll down the hall of a typical school and you are just as likely to hear a chorus of hammers and saws as you are the voices of students. During the past decade spending on school renovations grew by nearly 40 percent. Furthermore, factors such as aging school facilities, increasing enrollments, and emerging technologies suggest that spending on renovations will continue to increase during the coming 10 years.

From our perspective, what is notable about the need to upgrade and repair school facilities is that principals are managing the environment in which these renovations take place. Further, it is reasonable to believe that principals will play some role in the school renovation process. If this is so, they will necessarily have less time to devote to other important duties such as being an instructional leader, promoting better ways for teachers to teach and students to learn.

If renovations will increase principals' duties, we find it disheartening and inefficient that educators know very little about this issue. For example, educators lack answers to the following important questions:

• Do districts typically involve principals in renovations?

• How much time do principals spend managing renovations?

• Does principals' involvement in the renovation process benefit schools?

• What types of training do principals need to manage renovations effectively?

To answer these and other questions, we recently asked 280 principals across New York about their renovation-related experiences. This is what we learned.

Extent of Principals' Involvement

First, we asked principals whether they get involved in renovations when they occur. We found that 75 percent of the principals regularly take part in such activities. Moreover, 80 percent of these principals participate because district policy requires that they do so. This finding might reflect the move toward decentralized decision making that has characterized school governance structures recently. Nevertheless, this finding also highlights another responsibility that district-level officials mete out to building principals.

Next, we examined how much time principals devoted to renovations when they occurred. During the regular school year, we found that principals spent, on average, six hours each week managing renovations. This figure increased to about eight hours during the summer months of July and August. Although the complexity and duration of projects vary, these figures indicate that principals spend about 10 to 15 percent of their time managing renovations when they occur. This represents a substantial amount of time, given principals' many and increasing responsibilities.

Nature of Principals Involvement

To better understand the nature of principals' involvement in the renovation process, we asked principals to report how they divided their time among various activities. Table 1 reports what we found.

As the table indicates, principals typically spent 20 percent of their renovation-related time conducting needs assessments to determine the status of the educational facility and specify the actions required to meet educational, administrative, or operational objectives. Principals also devoted a substantial amount of time to the design phase of the renovation process, helping to translate facility needs into construction plans. It is during the design phase that school officials identify and select architects, project managers, and engineers. Because many of these professionals are not educators, principals reported that it was important to take an active role in this process.

The third phase of the renovation process is making sure that adequate funds are available. Principals most often become involved in the funding process when districts seek funds from local sources. For example, if the district presents a renovation project to voters in the form of a bond referendum, district officials, including principals, must garner public support.

It is curious that the presence of architects and contractors has lulled some principals into believing that their responsibility for renovations ends when the district signs the construction contract. As Table 1 reveals, this not the case. Principals typically spent 30 percent of their time consulting with these professionals. In many large renovations, principals conducted weekly meetings to discuss the progress of the project. During the course of these meetings, the contractor detailed the work performed during the previous week and specified the timing and areas of the building in which the coming week's work would take place. The parties then developed and agreed upon a work schedule that minimized disruptions to the educational program.

Table 1 also reports that principals spent 10 percent of their time inspecting renovations. Although construction contracts stipulate the work to be completed, good management practice dictates that school officials regularly inspect the quality of the work and the materials used by the contractor. If officials inspect the project only upon completion, it is often difficult and costly to make necessary changes.

Finally, Table 1 indicates that principals spent 18 percent of their time troubleshooting problems that arise throughout the renovation process. This finding is interesting for two reasons. First, it suggests that many renovation projects encounter problems. Second, it offers the possibility that principals' involvement in the renovation process can mitigate these problems.

Benefits and Concerns Regarding Principals' Involvement

Learning that most principals spend a substantial amount of time managing renovations prompts an important question: Should principals participate in the renovation process?

To answer this question, we asked principals to respond to a series of statements, each embodying a supposed benefit or concern of their involvement in the process. Their responses, reported in Table 2, are instructive and encouraging. For example, most principals reported that their involvement helps them generate community support for renovations. Because financing school renovations is typically a local responsibility, this is valuable insight. In fact, one might reasonably argue that garnering public support is foremost among principals many responsibilities regarding renovations. After all, there can be no renovations without funding.

In addition, Table 2 reports that most principals felt that they are able to influence decisions about renovation projects. Moreover, 86 percent of the respondents believe that their participation helps ensure project quality. Given the growing interest of the public in school spending matters, this finding offers the possibility that principals can help districts spend those dollars wisely.

Table 2 also shows that most principals think that their involvement in the renovation process helps minimize instructional disruptions. Few principals, however, are able to make these projects a learning experience for students, a disappointing result given that renovations provide an opportunity to explore the construction process with children.

Similarly, we were disappointed to learn that so many principals felt that their involvement in renovations hinders their ability to be instructional leaders. We suspect that this is because the time that principals devote to renovations cannot be spent on other duties, such as supervising teachers, evaluating programs, and designing curriculum.

Our inquiry also revealed that many principals believe that their participation offers them an opportunity to improve school climate by engaging teachers in the project. In addition, several principals reported that their involvement allows them to prepare staff for the inconveniences that accompany renovations and to keep them regularly informed as the work progresses.

Alternatively, quite a few principals expressed concerns regarding their dealings with contractors and their crews. For example, many principals noted that their concern for student safety causes them to continually monitor projects, performing such tasks as closing doors, removing sharp objects, and discouraging crews from smoking, using foul language, and engaging in other inappropriate behaviors. Several principals also found themselves resolving conflicts between contractors and custodians over cleaning responsibilities.

To summarize, educators can be confident that involving principals in renovations yields both benefits and concerns. To help school officials balance these attributes, we simply asked principals whether they believed that the benefits of their involvement in renovations outweighed their related concerns. As Table 2 shows, an astonishing 96 percent of the principals agree that their participation yields net benefits.

Training Needs

If involving principals in renovations benefits schools, it is important to consider the types of training that they need to perform these duties effectively. We discovered that very few principals (11 percent) had received training on how to manage renovations. Instead, most principals learned how to manage renovations on the job. A task that one principal wryly described as learning by "trial and error and error and error."

Nonetheless, as Table 3 demonstrates, principals indicated that they would welcome opportunities to learn how to manage renovations. For example, most principals feel that consultations with facilities experts and experienced principals would be helpful. In addition, many principals desire formal training opportunities, such as graduate coursework and workshops. Together these findings offer a clear signal to districts, administrative programs, and professional development groups that principals want more training in the area of renovations.

Final Thoughts

In the end, our inquiry indicates that principals' involvement in the renovation process is time-consuming, but well worth the effort. Nearly all principals agree that the many benefits of their participation far outweigh any related concerns. Educational policymakers and district officials would be wise to provide much needed training opportunities so that principals can perform this valuable duty most effectively.

For More Information See:

Brubaker, C. W. (1998). Planning and Designing Schools. New York: McGrawHill.

Castaldi, B. (1993). Educational Facilities: Planning, Modernizations, and Management. New York: Allyn and
Bacon, Inc.

Kowalski, T. J. (1989). Planning and Managing School Facilities. New York: Praeger.

For a full report of the study presented in this article see: Brent, B. O., and M. Cianca (2001). Involving principals in school renovations: Benefit or burden?, Journal of Education Finance, 27 (2), 729-740.

About the Author: Brian O Brent is a Professor at the Warner Graduate School of Education and Human Development at the University of Rochester. His e-mail address is bnbt@troi.cc.rochester.edu. Maria Cianca is a Principal in the Rochester City School District, Rochester New York. Her e-mail is marie.cianca@rcsd-k12.org[1]