Lessons Learned Rising Through the Ranks

As a young principal in a Mississippi school district where corporal punishment had recently been banned, Tristal Watson’s first order of business was to create a safe building and successfully transition students and staff toward a world without corporal management. But she was a young principal and new to the district, so a move toward positive behavioral interventions and support was difficult — although supported by her superintendent — and demonstrated how hard education leadership can be.

“It was a big, big challenge,” she says. “After my first year, I had 10 teachers who retired. So, I had all these people who were much older than me, refusing to change, who thought you cannot manage children without corporal punishment. It was very eye-opening to see and discipline did go through the roof. I believed there was a better way, a different way.”

When she enrolled in the School Turnaround Leaders Institute at Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Professional Education, it was a pivotal step. The education leader — who got her start as a tutor and rose through the ranks into principalship — knew she wanted to come back to Harvard and earn an Ed.L.D.

“I didn't know anyone who had ever gone through the institute before. And I remember when I left, I thought, I really liked Harvard and I was kind of shocked,” she says, “I was like, ‘Oh, the people here are nicer than I thought.’ It feels really comfortable. It was just everything I didn't expect it to be and I really enjoyed it.”

Still, she hesitated to apply to the doctoral program because by then COVID had created so many overwhelming challenges in her work as a principal. Plus, she wasn’t sure the timing was right.

Watson now laughs remembering how within hours of Senior Lecturer Paul Reville’s acceptance call she went into labor and gave birth to her fourth daughter. Having a newborn could be reason enough to put off doctoral studies, but it was the only program she applied to. She admits to being nervous about attending Harvard but ultimately couldn’t pass on the experience. “I needed it to reaffirm things I already knew to just reaffirm my leadership because I came in thinking of all the things I didn’t know, of all the things I haven’t done,” she says.

Throughout her years in the program, she’s developed a deep understanding of the complexity of education systems and how everyone plays an important role.

“I used to think schools were best positioned to serve students and families in the community in order to have positive student outcomes,” she says. “Now, I think that it takes people at every part of the ecosystem rowing in the same direction and being committed to student outcomes whether that's nonprofit organizations, or elected officials. ... It takes a collaborative effort of people to do that work.”

As part of her residency in the Philadelphia School District, she was tasked with launching an extended learning initiative in collaboration with the district and Mayor Cherelle Parker, who campaigned on offering an out-of-school programming and expanding services from 7:30 a.m. – 6 p.m. throughout the year. Within just a couple days of Watson’s arrival, they were already rolling out the initiative. “I've learned a lot really fast, which I knew I would,” she says. “I wanted to throw myself out there and see if I could thrive in a large, complex system.”

The initiative was developed to help shrink an opportunity gap for parents and students of Philadelphia, she says, which has one of the highest poverty rates among large urban cities in America. The extended day/extended year initiative aimed to expand access to enrichment programs in 20 schools for hundreds of students. This meant expanding services before and after school, and during winter break, spring break, and summer months.  

A big part of Watson’s work revolved around communications about the initiative. Extended day can mean different things to different people, she says, and as with many new initiatives, was sometimes met with resistance. “When you move really fast, you don't have time really to solidify the process, but you have to think politically,” she says, adding that in some cases schools already had afterschool programs so they had to make sure this initiative was going to offer something new. Communication became key in ensuring that the free program had participants across the district; in some cases, it was easy to fill the site whereas other schools were more challenging.

She supported the roll out of the initiative, along with the collection of data to assess the overall effectiveness of the program, particularly the sessions during winter break. Although there was a lot she learned along the way, Watson says one of the most important is also one of the most basic — to not overlook the technical aspects of the process.

“You can’t even begin to think about the adaptive piece about what people actually think and believe about enrichment until you have some strong technical pieces that bring people along,” she says, noting that in this case, her development of the Winter Break Program Directory, which states who does what and who to call in an emergency, seemed basic but was vital for daily operations. “You can use technical tools to build trust in an organization where people don't know you, where you're new.”

This fall, she’ll be bringing what she learned in Philadelphia to her new role as an assistant superintendent of instruction at Hazelwood Public Schools, located in the greater St. Louis area.

“I think that it's important that we continue to empower the people who are in districts, whether they're public or charter or independent or whatever, to have voice and to be comfortable and know that they are still the experts in the area and that they should absolutely continue to advocate for students no matter where they are,” she says.