“I feel so happy and accomplished when I see teachers apply the different strategies that they learned from one another,” Principal Nancy Ebardolaza shares. “It just means they were able to attain the leadership skills of a good teacher that I wanted them to develop, granting them the promotion and transfer (to other schools) they rightly deserve.”

School leadership for this elementary school principal is all about empowering her teachers.

“My greatest take from the Educator Empowerment Program (EEP) is that my teachers learned to appreciate themselves and one another,” Principal Nancy reveals. “They went beyond teaching, understanding that their greater purpose is to make sure the children under their care will have a strong and holistic development.” 

She speaks of the program with utmost certainty, having successfully implemented the EEP in two other schools, Aurora A. Quezon Elementary School and Betty Go-Belmonte Elementary School, both in Quezon City. For now, however, her current school, Doña Rosario Elementary School, would have to wait due to the pandemic. 

But while the various challenges of the “new normal” may have delayed the implementation of the program, Principal Nancy sees this predicament as part of her usual, daily grind. She may not be directly experiencing the current difficulties faced by most teachers, but she sees that the many obstacles to students learning remain to be just obstacles. They simply evolve. She’s quite familiar with the process. She was once a teacher, after all.

ACCIDENTAL EDUCATOR

“Being a teacher wasn’t part of the plan. I was to become a chemical engineer,” she confides. 

But with her mother’s sudden passing, she figured that she could already earn money to support the family by becoming a teacher. She moved to the National Teachers College where she majored in Math and Science teaching. 

“I never even thought of becoming a principal either. It just so happened that a co-teacher of mine from those years ago encouraged me to register and take the (principal’s) test. Luckily, I was one of the passers. Everything followed from there,” she explains. 

She first taught at a private school for 10 years before transferring to a public school, where she made a deliberate effort to step up, and got noticed by the principal, who then assigned her the task of finding out what it takes for their teachers to improve. This didn’t sit well with her colleagues, particularly those who have been teaching longer than her. But it is through this experience that she realized how important it is to develop a strong cooperative school environment.

This same experience made her recognize right away the discord among teachers when she first became principal, in 2013, at Aurora A. Quezon Elementary School. She knew that if such discord persists, it will ultimately affect the behavior of everyone in the school.

LEADERSHIP IN ACTION

“There was a problem among the parents, teachers and school administration when I entered the school. And there was this kind of aloofness among teachers,” she notes. “The teachers would go to my office and voice out their complaints. The divide is usually between different grade level teachers. They did not know how to relate to each other.” 

This made her look back once more to her teaching days and to the animosity she received from her co-teachers. 

“I really didn’t care much for it. If you really are a seasoned teacher, then you should show me more, and not the other way around. You don’t drag me down,” she points out. 

She recalled this whenever her teachers approached her with their concerns. 

“I listen to what they have to say, but I keep quiet. It was only when I met the people behind the Educator Empowerment Program that I saw what I can do with these problems.” 

Aurora A. Quezon Elementary School became the first school to implement the EEP.

“It didn’t have a smooth start,” she recalls amusedly. “The teachers hated me for it. They weren’t used to staying in school for an hour more, especially on a Monday, to attend a (training) session.” 

But she was relentless, and joined the teachers in each and every session. 

“Normally, teachers would report to school late, enter the classroom, and write something down on the board for the students to copy,” she explains. “That, for me, is not teaching. Doing that actually deprives the student of learning.” 

But as the EEP sessions progressed, so did the performance of the teachers. 

“You can see the students starting to appreciate their teachers. And it’s not that the teachers didn’t know what they are to teach. It’s more of them figuring out what the students should be learning, and how.” 

After three years in Aurora A. Quezon Elementary School, she was transferred to Betty Go-Belmonte Elementary School, where the EEP was immediately implemented through the support of City Savings Bank. 

“We hold sessions every Friday afternoon. I really asked permission from the division office to allot some time for the weekly sessions,” she narrates.

Thanks to Principal Nancy’s persistence, her school’s EEP efforts paid off. 

“Betty Go-Belmonte Elementary School was only known for its floods when heavy rains hit the city. I would sleep there during those times, if needed be. I even got to ride a boat just to get to and out of the school,” she shares. 

Today, among other achievements, the school is known for its learning resource center and its outstanding reading program, which Nancy and her teachers have brought out of the school and into the depressed communities in their vicinity to directly serve the out-of-school children there.

EMPOWERING OTHERS

By July 2020, Principal Nancy was transferred to Doña Rosario Elementary School, where she plans to launch the EEP by January 2021 to better respond to the challenges of teaching during the time of the pandemic. While online distance learning and meetings are the primary practice, teachers are still required to report to school on a particular day of the week, according to the grade level they teach. Principal Nancy makes use of this time to catch up with them, and be there for them. 

“I told my former teachers that I hope I was able to leave a strong impression on them during our time together,” Nancy shares. 

Their replies were overwhelmingly positive. One former teacher said, “You helped set the standards of a good teacher.” 

Another said, “You showed us the true sense of being a teacher.”

“I was really touched,” Nancy declares.

“It always boils down to how you treat them. Overall, I know I am the leader who needs to make the final decisions. But I see both pupils and my teachers as my children. I also treat my teachers as my co-workers. It depends on what they need. I can be a teacher, I can be a peer, or I can be a mother. Whatever figure they’re looking for, I’ll be there,” she elaborates. 

“The end goal here is to make sure that the pupils are educated and guided properly by me and my teachers. If they do well, and then the school, I know I’ve done my job.” 

Doña Rosario Elementary School formally launched the Educator Empowerment Program in December 2021. The school began its regular EEP training sessions in January 2022. 

The Educator Team salutes Principal Nancy Ebardolaza of Doña Rosario Elementary School (Quezon City) for her dedication to her work and for her empowerED ways.