When you hire people
that are smarter than you are,
you prove
you are smarter than they are
- R. H. Grant

Teachers who move "up" the ladder to positions such as coordinator, principal, or supervisor and coordinator are given to understand that they have improved their position. The jobs have to be packaged as a promotion because otherwise nobody would take them.

Those in the positiond often realize that they have been demoted. The positions do offer higher pay, but it is not necessarily commensurate with the many additional bureaucratic responsibilities, as well as the time that you spend at the job. Administrators spend more time at the job, and they often perform less professional work. It's a demotion from a professional into a clerk.

True, teachers also put in extra time at work and at home.

However, the teacher can limit and control how much time she wants to invest in her schoolwork. She can plan her work in advance so that she'll be able to handle personal affairs or events. At a certain point, the teacher's work becomes easier and more natural. Preparation time is reduced, leaving routine chores such as marking assignments or tests.

Not so with administration. Administration never decreases. A serious or devoted administrator will always have to spend a great deal of time on the job.

Thus, someone who loves to teach should teach. Someone who loves to administer a school should take that job. Unfortunately, educational institutions try to select educators to run schools. Most educators (at best) know how to educate, but they don't know how to run schools.

Strangely, everybody is happy when the wrong person - the educator - follows the Peter Principle and becomes an administrator.

The educator is happy because he believes, incorrectly, that he has received an advancement. The educational system is happy because they mistakenly wanted a professional to fill the job, and they received what they wanted. The teachers are happy because they think that they have one of their own, an educator, in charge. They feel that a fellow teacher will understand their needs. True, that is not the person who is needed, and he will not do the job right.

Yes, the wrong person in the job is making everybody happy.