to think new headteacher really should be abke to say a few words

[lisbey]

I've just come back from school where parents of the new intake (juniors) were invited to find out what's what for Sept.

They have a new head from Sept and outgoing head introduced him and asked him to tell us about himself and his experience.

Now I know lots of people would find that daunting, but it goes with the territory for this job surely and assuming he knew he was to speak shouldn't he have prepared something?

He basically said hello and sat down. AIBU to think he should have done better?

He definitely should have done better. After all we teachers like the sound of our own voices!

Absolutely. If he's not confident enough to do this how did he get the job?

he cannot very well stand up and start going on about all the wonderful changes he intends to make with the existing head there though, can he?

surely the correct form in these circs what a great school it is and how chuffed he is to be there and what a great job the outgoing head has done and how he looks forward to continuing his good work?
even if none of the above is, in fact, true.

Even if he didn't know he was going to be asked to say something, surely he could have waffled on for a bit. Even I could have.

Maybe he wasn't feeling well.

YANBU

The head at my sons first school is a horrendous public speaker which I think makes her a terrible ambassador for the school. She was speaking at a pyramid concert last week in front of parents from other schools and I felt quite embarrassed as she ummed and aaahed and dithered.

PeedOff - he wasn't asked to talk about all the changes he was going to make. He was asked to introduce himself, and talk about his experiences...

YADNBU - I would think that was odd, to say the least. Come on man!! It would not fill me with confidence!

Take it as a bad sign! We had a new head four years ago and she did the same thing when introduced at the outgoing heads last school function. She has been fairly rude, uncommunicative and unhelpful since. She is clearly uncomfortable dealing with parents and hates speaking to a crowd. Will not speak at school functions eg the summer fayre etc.

As someone who used to be a teacher I would say that this an important part of the job and do wonder how she got to be head at all!

Quite,Riven, the outgoing head did go on for ages, much of it grammatically incorrect, she even threw in a couple of malapropisms for good measure. 'Tis a worry how these people get these jobs