Name: Dr Eszter Salamon

Title: Director

Organisation: Parents International

Eszter Salamon is the Director of Parents International. Originally trained and practiced as a teacher she later became an economist specialized in nonprofit management, education and culture, nonprofit marketing and PR. She started dealing with rights of the child issues in 1989 and has specialized in students’ rights and parents’ rights, with focus on education for nearly 25 years, internationally for over 15 years. She has done her PhD in education leadership focusing on child participation and parental engagement in formal education.

Thank you to the 2,000 leaders who’ve generously done the 7 Questions on Educational Leadership!

I hope Dr. Eszter's answers will encourage you in your leadership journey. Enjoy!

Cheers,

Jonno White

1. What have you found most challenging as an Educational Leader?

My main challenges are linked to the still traditional training of teachers and the fact that school is probably the most difficult system to change. I'd highlight three main challenges I have been facing:

1. Changing the use of the word Educator. It has been used more or less as a synonim for teacher, and this fact hinders everyone - teachers, school leaders, non-formal educators, policy makers, parents, etc. - in understanding that learning takes place everywhere and all children have several educators - and only a few of them are professionals while they also often have the smallest impact on learning.

2. Changing to an asset-based narrative in case of both children and their parents.

3. Supporting the necessary change in the role of education professionals from trying to teach (I believe that is not possible at all) to facilitating and coordinating learning.

2. How did you become an Educational Leader? Can you please briefly tell the story?

Probably it all started with having some great teachers along my educational journey but also seeing how many of them are abusive, bullying and professionally below acceptable. I was also a youth leader from age 14, and probably this combination lead me to child rights while I was still in teacher training college. I started my professional career as a teacher in a 12-grade school.

I had uncomfortable opportunity already there to understand what a good leader means for an education institution and how a bad one can destroy it in a matter of weeks. My work in child rights and as a youth leader later resulted in an invitation to become the head of youth policy in my country as a ministry head of unit. When my son was born, I started also dealing with parents rights and duties, and became a parent representative.

First at school level and then eventually at international level. I was elected the last president of the since then dissolved organisation of parents in Europe. I've been the Director of Parents International since 2018. During these years, I had to realise two things. On the one hand parent representatives need to be far more professional than anyone speaking on behalf of education professionals and a related professional title doesn't hurt either.

On the other hand, my team and I also realised that we can only make our message go through if we mostly work with the professionals regularly working with other educators - including parents - and train, coach, mentor them.

3. How do you structure your work days from waking up to going to sleep?

Our work is relatively hectic with a lot of travelling. Since my team has been working remotely if we are doing work that other people would usually do in an office, and they are all over the world, I also don't have a typical workday. If I'm free to structure my day (there is not training or teaching to do, meetings that I can schedule myself, I don't have a plane to catch, etc.) I tend to start working relatively late and work until late.

I am not really suitable for regular school teaching as I am not a morning person. I need at least an hour to boot after my first coffee that I usually spend solving crossword puzzles or reading fiction. I also check what is on the agenda for the day before starting. I usually start working between 9 and 10, and I group all activities that do not need to much attention, let along creativity, for the period before lunch.

Colleagues in North America usually don't start before 2-3 pm my time, so I mostly work until at least 8 pm - unless I have tickets for a concert or theatre. It also means that I can include lunch meetings or meeting for a coffee when we need to brainstorm or create something new. Whenever possible, I try to totally switch off in the afternoon on Friday, and I always start working on Sunday afternoon to prepare for the week.

My phone is always on Do not disturb between midnight and 8 am. When I have long meetings, I knit or crochet during them, it helps me focus. I think time off is important, so I never disturb colleagues on holiday, and they also do their best to not disturb me when it is my time off.

4. What's a recent lesson you've learned for the first time or been reminded of as an Educational Leader?

As my original training is that of a teacher, I was made believe that it is possible and even important to control the learning process. For this reason, most teachers and I think also most leaders feel uncomfortable when people around them speak a language that they don't understand. I surely was one of them. It was a wonderful moment, especially for the leader of a multilingual, international education organisation when I realised in a training situation where I had no common language with participant that if participants are really engaged, you only need to read their body language to see when they need your support.

5. What's one book that has had a profound impact on your journey as an Educational Leader so far? Can you please briefly tell the story of how that book impacted you?

As an avid reader, this is the most difficult question for me. To highlight only one book. So I will point at two and neither of them are professional ones. I think the professional role model I first read about was Mary Poppins - and I was about 5. She is a conscious educator who knows what she does and why, often makes learning fun, she never disciplines without a reason, and when she leaves, children only wish she were back. The other, also very early reading was the Swallows and Amazons series. It makes a very strong point about child agency and the importance of trusting children but also the need for supportive (and not restricing) adults around them.

6. If you could only give one piece of advice to a young educator who aspires to be an Educational Leader, what would you say to them?

If you want to change the world of school, keep reminding yourself of it all the time and don't let your trainers, colleagues, leaders discourage you. School is mostly a bad place for children, and the current trends of taking children out of school by their families for good is not the solution.

7. What is one meaningful story that comes to mind from your time as an Educational Leader, so far?

An organisation from an African country joined us as a member and also asked for our help. They wanted to support parents in becoming better educators, but they were not successful. People were not interesed in their training and thus they had a very high drop-out rate. After analysing the situation, we realised that on the one had they tried to use an Australian training programme as it was, and also that their trainers only learnt to do what was written in the manual.

The trainers were not trained to be aware of diversity, their prejudices and biases, and also were not able to adjust the training to local needs. When we trained their trainers to have a deeper understanding of the topics and learner needs, and also offered them methodologies for localising the training, it became a success. This was a great positive feedback on our approach that emphaises the importance of adjusting the learning process to learners. In this situation, it was adults, but it is also true for children. There is no successful one-size fits all solution.