Needham principal defends decision
After criticism from Rush Limbaugh and a jab from Jay Leno, Needham High principal Paul Richards is firing back, defending his decision to stop publishing the high school student honor roll in a local newspaper.
"With so much competition these days with print, TV, radio, and the Internet, this issue was easily twisted into a 'politically-correct move to protect self- esteem,' " Richards wrote yesterday in an e-mail to the Globe. "That would sell much better than an intellectual discussion on student stress."
School officials, seeking to lighten the stress load on students in a community from which four youths have committed suicide since 2004, decided last week to end the years-old practice of listing in a local newspaper who made the academic honor roll.
Radio talk shows blasted Richards for coddling his students, and Jay Leno made him the butt of a joke in his Tuesday night monologue on "The Tonight Show."
Limbaugh chided Richards on Wednesday for caving under parental pressure.
"So one parent complained, and the school bent over backwards! They just fell, spine turned to mush," he said on his nationally syndicated radio show .
Richards's office has been deluged with media calls, according to his secretary. The principal said he never expected that the policy would spark so much attention.
"I'm shocked," Richards wrote in his e-mail. "This was simply an FYI to parents, until it was fed to the media by parents who disagreed with this. I had no intention of making a public stand."
In light of the backlash, the principal said he hoped the story would spark debate on how schools can reduce stress among teens.
"The character assassination of Needham public schools and myself was unfortunate, but there is indeed a value in providing 'food for thought' on an issue that many would like to think doesn't exist," Richards wrote.
Needham Superintendent Daniel E. Gutekanst said in a telephone interview yesterday that the decision on the honor roll was not made in isolation, but rather in the context of school district's efforts to address student stress. (School officials did not cite the recent suicides as a reason for ending the publishing of the honor roll.)
Richards announced the new honor roll policy in a short e-mail to parents early last week. He followed with a second e-mail Sunday, saying he had received a total of 60 messages from supporters and critics.
"By having an honor roll in the first place, the school participates in a sorting of students," Richards wrote. "When we publish this sorting, there are values attached that we should be mindful of."
Richards said critics of his decision contended that publishing the honor roll served to counterbalance excessive media attention to school tragedies and sports.
The principal has made reducing academic pressure a priority since taking the helm of the 1,400-student school in July 2004. He has enacted no-homework periods during holidays and long weekends. Students recently were surveyed about stress, and school officials expect to release results next month.
"He's running a great high school," said Gutekanst, who became superintendent last summer. "He's tweaking some of the traditions and practices with a focus on the entire learning culture." 