Principal David Finley treasures his job and reveals how he does it all

By JADE CARLIN, COLE MORRISON and BRANDON WOLFE

We recently interviewed David Finley, the principal of RISE, EAcademy, and Adult Ed.

We asked him what is it like to be the principal of three schools and how he manages his time between all three.

“Well, it’s awesome. We have kindergarteners, we’ve got second, third, fourth graders, we have middle schoolers, we have high schoolers. Then at the adult school, we have adults so we have the whole range. I love what I do, it’s always interesting, there’s always something to do. If you have one dead end, you can work on something else and come back,” replied Finley.

When answering how he manages his time, Finley stated, “That’s the hard part, obviously. It’s about prioritizing because there will be seasons where there’s a bunch of adult school stuff that really has to happen. Right now there’s a lot of EAcademy stuff because we have our WASC visit coming up, so it’s like you kind of have to balance that. I have a list that I make everyday of prioritizing all the stuff that has to happen. I try to work though that order. List-making helps, it’s not like I have to look back at my list and say, ‘You have to do this today.’ This is really important, if you don’t do it today, tomorrow is going to be very difficult so get that done.”

To finish the question, Finley finally said, “It’s easy to be busy, but does that business help you get to what you want to do? The immediate isn’t always the most important. If you just do what you have to do all of the time, then the really important stuff that you need to do doesn’t get it done. Just seeing the same things on the same lists over time is like ‘Maybe that’s not as important.’” Overall, Finley enjoys being the principal of three schools because of the diversity and knowledge being gained by each individual grade.

In his free time, Finley enjoys spending time with his wife and two children. The things he enjoys most are outdoor activities such as biking whenever possible, hiking and camping out in nature. Mr. Finley is a big soccer fan. His favorite team is the LA Galaxies. He really enjoys reading books and poems. He also likes watching and going to plays. Finley plays guitar quite well. He plays music at his church and especially enjoys playing with a group of adults with disabilities there. Finley gets the most free time during winter break, because during summer break there is so much transition work that has to be done between the different school years so he works most of summer break. During winter break, everything is going well, so this is when he can rest and enjoy his favorite pastimes.

Lee este artículo en español aquí: https://laplaza.press/2019/05/31/david-finley-atesora-su-trabajo-y-revela-como-el-hace-todo/