Let me preface this by saying, I am not a morning person. When I agreed to take part of the Principal for the Day program, I knew I would have to be with my principal from the second they arrived at school, to the second they left, which meant an early and long day for me. When the day finally arrived on Nov. 17, and my alarm went off at 5 a.m., I instantly regretted my decision.

I sleepily went through my morning routine but had to add some time to make lunch, something I haven’t done so early in about eight years. After fighting traffic, I arrived at Emerald Park Elementary School at 7 a.m. The first thing that greeted me was Principal Dean Ficken’s beaming smile and exuberant attitude. I was instantly awake.

I expected my day to be filled with a little walking around while Ficken showed me around classrooms, but I expected it to be more of a normal, mundane day filled with a lot of office sitting and watching Ficken do paperwork. Boy was I wrong.

The first half an hour we waited for a teacher to have a post-classroom observation conversation. Besides that half an hour and a short 20 minute lunch, our day was non-stop. I wrote down everything we did that day and when I was looking back through my notes, our day was completely booked up with things we did. No office sitting for us. At one point, he was doing a post-observation, having me shadow him, had a staff member come in for a signature on something and had emails going off. He handled it swiftly, like a professional.

Ficken has been with the Kent School District for almost 40 years, and it definitely shows. The way he interacts with students and his staff was so wonderful to see. Every student that walked by, he knew by name. His positive and happy attitude didn’t die down for even a second throughout the hectic day, as if it was his first day on the job. That alone was impressive.

His interaction with the students was such a positive experience. It was obvious how much he truly cares for his students, like waiting outside at the end of the day to make sure every student had a way home. You can tell he puts in a lot of effort to get to know and care for his students. At one point, a student had a bit of a melt down. Instead of handing the student over to his parents or someone else, he took care of it. He dropped everything he was doing to take care of it. He casually mentioned that this has happened a few times before, and he knew how to take care of it. It was just another part of the job for him, that he happily did. He was so patient and understanding of the student’s needs and made sure he was OK until he let him go back to class.

That wasn’t the first crisis of the day, either. Right before school was about to start, a staff member let Ficken know that a substitute teacher had not showed up, so they were down one teacher. Ficken immediately went into action to find a substitute teacher. We ran around talking to all of the teachers to see if any of them could fill in and every teacher pitched in anyway they could. An hour or so after Ficken found teachers to help fill in for the absent substitute, another teacher said she had to go home early because she wasn’t feeling well. One more thing Ficken had to deal with.

All of the teachers and staff at Emerald Park were so welcoming and great with the students. In every classroom we visited, all of the students were very well behaved and self-efficient. I know young kids get distracted easily and get excited over little things, like having the principal and a guest come in to their classrooms. While the students were excited to see us, we didn’t take their attention for long. They went about what they were doing, some of them didn’t even stop what they were doing when we came in. Ficken explained that the teachers have a way of getting the attention of their students and making them learn how to be self-efficient, and it shows.

The use of technology in the classroom was a new concept to me. Even when I was in high school, we never used technology like smart boards or tablets in the classrooms. It made the lessons more engaging for the students, and it taught them how to be patient. I noticed that when a program a student was working on wouldn’t respond or wasn’t doing what they wanted it to, they would be patient. The students would either try to figure it out themselves or waited patiently for their teacher to help them.

I would get up at 5 a.m. to do Principal for the Day program again with Ficken, it was such a positive experience and it really opened my eyes to what principals really do. It’s so much more than I ever thought. And with such an outgoing and personable principal, it made my experience even better.