"As is the principal, so is the school," wrote Chancellor Elliott in the report of the New York school survey. The principal is near enough to the actual teaching to control detailed procedure, to adapt it to the special needs of his district, and to keep the work on a high plane of efficiency. Unlike the teachers who have to do only with special grades or subjects, he is responsible for a large general program of education covering many grades and subjects. The principal is therefore in a position to wield a tremendous influence in the conduct of a school system. If he is active and efficient, the work of a building will be of a high character; if he is passive, inefficient, or a mere "odd-job man" around the premises, then the work becomes but stagnation or confusion. This strategic position of the principal, however, is scarcely recognized in the survey reports. In many or even most reports such topics as janitors, fire escapes, supplies, toiletrooms, blackboards, etc., receive more extended treatment than the functions, qualifications, and relations of the building principal. There are certain exceptions to this general neglect in the survey reports from which the recommendations contained in this article are taken. But even in the reports that have handled the topic most adequately the treatment is usually but brief and general. Only in certain regions of the wide field of his responsibilities do they specify detailed functions or qualifications or relationships. Our profession has a large assortment of standards to apply in the judgment of buildings, or business management, or the work of the teacher in the