Your First Year as a Principal: Everything You Need to Know That They Don’t Teach You in School

As you sit at your desk behind the door ominously marked “Principal’s Office,” you are suddenly struck with a feeling of terror: What have you gotten yourself into? Being a principal and essentially being the leader of a school is a difficult job filled with responsibility and stress. Before you panic, you should know that most principals survive the first year. However, Your First Year as a Principal will help make the first year easier, providing you with all the information you did not learn in school.

In this new, extensively researched book, first-year principals will learn how to deal with teachers, how to step out from behind the previous principal’s shadow, how to make changes without changing too much too soon, how to deal with parents and students, how to deal with the feelings of loneliness and unpopularity, how to handle the piles of paperwork that never seem to shrink, how to become accustomed to the workload, how to find a mentor, how to write important letters, how to plan for public relations, and how to obtain feedback.

Additionally, you will learn the common mistakes first-year principals make. You will learn about how everything falls on your shoulders and how to handle that responsibility. You will also learn how to build strong relationships with teachers and staff, how to pick your battles, how to have confidence in yourself, how to boost staff morale, how to discipline students, how to use the staff to your advantage, and how to deal with conflict.

Ultimately, you will clearly understand what comes with being a principal. You will be able to clarify and define your roles, expectations, and responsibilities. We will provide you with advice and tips from novice and veteran principals who have all been in your position. Whether you are the principal of a small, large, public, private, urban, rural, or suburban school, Your First Year as a Principal will be an indispensable companion. With the help of this book, you will not only survive, but you will enthusiastically look forward to your sophomore year.

The College Roommate from Hell: Skills and Strategies for Surviving College With a Problem Roommate

Every year, more than 500,000 new students join the ranks of American college students and a good percentage of them stay in student housing. For those who do not stay in student housing, it is almost guaranteed that you will have a roommate at some point in your college career – it’s a rite of passage. But, for someone who has lived with their parents, in their own room, for 18 years, having a college roommate can be an entirely new experience, especially if that roommate is the roommate from hell.

When living in a dorm, you have almost no choice as to who you live with. It could be the nicest person in the world or the your worst enemy. It is that horrible roommate who can ruin your college experience—unless you know how to deal with them. This comprehensive guide to everything bad in a roommate is designed to show you how to do just that, providing you with a detailed plan to take on, confront, and handle your problem roommate.

You will learn what you should honestly expect from a roommate on the first day and how to tell if part of the problem might arise from you. Learn how to know if your personality types are too different and what you can do to alleviate the stress this might cause. Outlined in detail are common cultural and social differences and multi-step plans for handling each one of them. For those that have issues with confrontation, a special chapter designed to walk you through a calm conversation will help you bring up those concerns that have been nagging at you for weeks.

Information on the biggest problems you might encounter with your roommate have been gathered through hours of interviews with college students both new and graduated. Topics such as a roommate using your personal stuff, not cleaning their share, staying up too late, making too much noise, being rude or moody, neglecting to pay their share of the bills, bringing over too many house guests, and dozens more of the most common problems college students encounter with their roommates every year are discussed in this book. Tips for each and every one of these issues and a special chapter on successful communication with a stubborn friend will help guide you through the harrowing maze of trying to fix your roommate from hell. You will learn when a problem roommate may actually have a real problem and how you can help them deal with it. Finally, if things just are not working out, you will learn how you can get help dealing with your roommate and even how you can move out if necessary. If you are pulling out your hair and agonizing over one too many late nights or moldy quarts of milk kicked under your bed, this book is exactly what you have been looking for.

The Complete Guide to Investing in Exchange Traded Funds: How to Earn High Rates of Return—Safely

The growth of Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) in recent years alongside an unprecedented access to investment resources by any individual with a computer has led to a major boost in the market for many of these funds. According to recently released numbers for the 2007 fiscal year, as reported in the Chicago Tribune, there are currently more than $608 billion in assets within ETFs, with almost $400 billion of that in domestically traded assets – an increase of almost 40 percent in one year. This book will provide for you a complete guide to both understanding how to invest in Exchange Traded Funds and to earn the highest possible rates of return without risking your financial future.

You will learn why the ETF has become the next major addition to essentially every casual trader’s portfolio, offering a viable alternative to high-fee mutual funds and Wall Street infused stock trading. You will discover the multiple ways in which you can build the stock equity side of your portfolio, through large and small growth, sector investing, international investing, and with specialized stock ETFs.

In addition to standard forms of ETFs, you will learn the various forms of Bond ETFs, Real Estate Investment Trading ETFs, and Commodity ETFs for gold, silver, and other precious metals. Also, you will discover why you should include a mixture of non-ETF investments in your portfolio to remain diversified at all times. A special section detailing a sample ETF portfolio and how yours should be organized will help you understand the format and building structure for ETF investments. The keys to buying and holding successfully, a stark change from normal investment strategies, will help you learn what ETFs do differently, while the listing of rule exceptions make it easy to recognize when you will have even more options than you originally expected.

Through countless hours of interviews with financial professionals and newly independent traders like yourself, you will learn exactly how ETFs are being used today to revolutionize the world of personal finance, including retirement funding, education savings, and portfolio diversification. A list of commonly asked questions will ensure that every possible question you currently have is taken care of and the top ten mistakes that every new investor makes when starting with ETFs will help keep you from increasing your risk. You will be shown the entire corral of trading options at your disposal, both online and offline, and how Internet trading can help to increase your returns even further. The vital task of risk management is touched on repeatedly within each chapter, while trading profiles help you understand which investments have been most successful in recent years. For anyone getting ready to start trading in the highly lucrative ETF market, this book is a must have tool.