For many principals weighed down by the time demands of bus schedules and budgets, improving instruction too often takes a back seat. This brief journalistic account describes how schools in nine states are testing a new position, called School Administration Manager (SAM), whose job is to help free principals of many of these administrative distractions and allow them to spend more time on instructional matters. The goal of this promising new approach, pioneered by the Jefferson County (KY) Public Schools with Wallace’s support, is to hire a SAM to assume operational functions, track the principal’s time to see how much she is spending on instruction, and provide coaching to ensure that the principal actually becomes more focused on instruction.