Baldwin High School Principal Jason Flanders is a man of many motivations, and who understands the usefulness of private motivations in the assistance of others. His spiritual faith and love of math became vehicles for his first forays into education. "A pastor friend of mine, his dad said you need to get an education degree if you're interested in becoming a pastor, so you can learn how to craft your sermons," Flanders said. This prompted him to switch from an engineering track at Mercer University to education. "I've always enjoyed helping people to understand things," he said, "and helping people learn new things. So that's what drew me into education."
During National Principals Month, the District is taking time to recognize the heavy responsibilities that fall on our school's highest leaders. Half of our nation's educational leadership are considering changing jobs or retiring altogether, according to the latest survey by the National Association of Secondary School Principals, so what makes Baldwin different? "I think all the principals at Baldwin, we love our job," said Flanders, "there's nothing we'd rather do, and we all want to see the Baldwin School System be as successful as possible."
That level of responsibility to the local community means that the principals aren't just looking after their students, but the needs of their students' parents, their administrative staff, and their teachers as well. "Essentially, the responsibility of everything ultimately comes back to me," Flanders said, "so that's a huge level of responsibility... but if you love what you do, that outweighs the stress, so for me personally, I'm not looking to go to another career by any stretch of the imagination."
Flanders' personal faith is large part of what compensates for the stress of the position, "I believe in God, and I read my Bible, and when I get stressed and whatnot, I turn to the Word of God and I try to get some sort of scripture that I can apply to the situation." Flanders said that his faith also helps him to maintain a positive outlook on the challenges that he faces as principal.
After graduating from Mercer, with his B.A. in Mathematics, Flanders came to Milledgeville to get his Master's and Specialist degrees at Georgia College. He's now been at Baldwin High for six years, and as the state and country continue to claw its way back from the pandemic, Flanders looks to the future with a sense of optimism and hope. "A lot of things do come and go with education," Flanders said, "I think that the charter system is an excellent model for the future, but there may be a new model that's coming forward 5 to 10 years from now that we don't know about that might be an even stronger model for education for the state of Georgia."
Mr. Flanders, his wife of 26 years, and their son, Clay, maintain a positive outlook on the future, and work diligently to accomplish their goals, and by doing so each day, are able to make those goals a reality.
Comments