i will do so, also just a side note, our district would much rather shut our
auditorium down than spend more than $1000 on our stuff. so hopefully when i explain to them the importance of this issue they will listen, if not i guess i'll do a fund raiser with the other techs and actors to get enough to at least get it inspected.
A lot of people that think that about their school districts. I hear that claim time and time again. It's rarely true, though. I thought that was the case at the high school I went to until I made friends with the principal and administrative staff. As it turns out, none of them really knew how to
address the needs of a performance space -- they were hired as educators, not technical directors. Not only did they not know
how to
address the problems, but they didn't even know there were problems, or if they did know, nobody really knew whose responsibility it was. Chances are your principal hasn't been making your performance space terrible, they've just left it the way it was because that's probably not far from the condition it was when they were hired.
The first thing you should do is find an administrative staff member who will listen to you. They don't need to agree with you, they just need to listen to you. Then you'll need to work your way up to the food chain to find the person most responsible for the performance space. When I say "most responsible," that might be synonymous with, "doesn't know it's part of their job description." A good possibility is that the person you're looking for may not even been at that school, they may be a district-wide administrator. In the case of the school district I graduated from and continue to work in, this is the Buildings and Grounds Supervisor.
When I was in a similar situation as you are, I didn't start with
him. I started with the high school principal (as in, scheduled a meeting with his secretary and did it the formal way), then he listened to me and we came to agree on some points. After that, we met again, and again, and then eventually him and I were on the same
page, so we worked together to work our way up the administrative food chain, where we ended up working out details on renovations with the Building and Grounds Supervisor, and then the three of us sat down with the Superintendent and her assistant to
lay out our
play, the expenses, and then work out an eventual budget.
That all started at a January meeting with the principal (who admitted he never fully understood whether or not it was his job to take care of that performance space) and before July 1st the entire project had been funded with over $65k that was allocated to effectively rip out all of the existing equipment (even down to the seating and carpeting) and start over from scratch. By November, all projects for that space were completed.
Don't walk into the situation thinking the people you're talking to hate everything you're suggesting or at the very least don't care at all. You'll tend to come across as more arrogant and offensive, and if they feel you're making personal attacks on them they'll end your conversation before you even hit your main points.
