In order to complete this activity, I reviewed information on federal resources available to schools and spoke with AH, our Head of School, as well as RQ, our Chief Operating Office. Unfortunately (for this process), as a private institution, we don’t participate in any federal programs other than the tax benefits afforded to all non-profit organizations. Since there were no real-world examples to look into, I asked AH to describe what pitfalls an educational leader must be aware of and how to navigate them in the public school system to benefit from federal programs.
His response was characteristic of his style and essentially was that one must always take care to follow all guidelines and procedures carefully since the cost of an error is much too high to risk the institution and its reputation. I mentioned a summer camp at which I worked when I was younger which participated in a federal milk program and, I discovered, purposefully misrepresented the number of campers who drank the milk in order to collect more money than was deserved. This was the same institution which paid several employees in cash so as to allow them to avoid paying income tax (and to avoid the tax burden the camp should have assumed, presumably). AH wasn’t surprised but found it an unfortunate and all-too common characteristic of private organizations who figure that they won’t get caught, so why not play fast and loose?
Aside from the obvious risk of getting caught and the fact that the risk outweighs the benefits of cheating, AH pointed out the detrimental moral effect such behavior can have on an institution. “If you’re mission is to teach, you have to represent something worth learning,” he told me and nowhere is this more true than in the arena of organizational dishonesty. Such behavior can cause rot in a school..