I didn't know what to say People who know me will be surprised to learn that the only time a newspaper ever called me for my opinion about something, I didn't know what to say.

I was working at Fremont High School in LA, and we had been assigned a bad principal. We were trying to get rid of her, and by this time the situation had escalated to the point that we had picketed outside of graduation.

My problem was trying to explain what was wrong with her. She came to the school after already having been marked as a lemon at her other school, and it was understood that her political backer on the board had lost her seat, so we assumed she was being dumped on us to either break her, break us, or both. She certainly didn't want to be at our school, and had made that clear. But I couldn't tell the newspaper any of that, because it was only gossip.

What I had to go on was my own experience with her, which was frustrating, but by itself not convincingly damning. I had approached her as the chair of the English department, full of zeal about creating classroom libraries to support student reading for pleasure. She had welcomed me by confiding her own partisan enthusiasm for this very approach. I left the meeting convinced she was completely on my side, and would champion me and my ideas against all those who doubted the power of reading. Then months dragged by, and I would send her increasingly plaintive memos, but she ignored them and me. Eventually, we got our books, but by that time I was done with her.

Looking at it objectively, though, the evidence seemed equivocal. We hadn't had classroom libraries before, so even though she dragged her feet, the fact that we had them now seemed to weigh in her favor. How could this story support her ouster?

I thought I owed this reporter a sound and rigorous argument, backed up with facts, and I worried that I didn't have one.

I realize now that I didn't need one. All I needed was the fact that all the teachers opposed her. Other teachers had become alienated from her in much the way I had. We had already made that clear, which is why the reporter was calling me. The burden was on the principal. How could she lead a school if the teachers wouldn't follow?

I now realize why I couldn't understand this. As a verbal person with control issues, I have always relished the notion that political power and decision-making are about marshaling facts and arguments and deploying them persuasively. It plays to my strengths and addresses my fears.

In this case, though, power flowed simply from the collective will of teachers to stand up and say we didn't want her. We did not stand in need of supporting facts, reasons, and arguments. The fact of our consensus was sufficient. Indeed, it proved to be so: I talked to the reporter for an hour and couldn't quite explain myself, but the principal was out within six months.

We teachers mattered. Our opinions had an overwhelming weight irrespective of how we came to them. In the last analysis, I didn't trust myself and I didn't trust my fellow teachers. I didn't feel right trying to convince a reporter because regardless of the facts, I couldn't convince myself that we counted.  ¶ 8:31 AM