Leadership Preparation Programs Research Articles

A Framework for Rethinking Educational Leadership in the Margins: Implications for Social Justice Leadership Preparation

This article reimagines the social justice educational leadership field, highlighting the leadership of youth, parents, and community. We examine widely cited social justice educational leadership publications, in addition to critical research on youth voice, parent engagement, and community organizing. Our analysis reveals that the field often overlooks youth, parent, and community educational leadership. Through the theory of collective transformative agency, we propose a new framework for dismantling deficit ideologies and disempowering practices in leadership preparation programs. The article concludes with specific proposals for programs to re-envision the “how” and “who” of leadership preparation.

Examining University Leadership Preparation: An Analysis of Program Attributes and Practices

This study uses data from the Initiative for Systemic Program Improvement through Research in Educational Leadership ( INSPIRE) Preparation Program Features Survey to respond to national critiques of university-based principal preparation programs. The findings provide insight into the program content and relevancy, personnel, and content delivery of 97 principal preparation programs affiliated with the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA). We found that UCEA institutions align their curriculum and assessment designs to national standards, actively engage in formalized partnerships with districts, engage their candidates in a variety of assessment practices for formative and summative purposes, and work to offer coursework that bridges classroom assignments to field-based experiences.

Educational interventions to enhance competencies for interprofessional collaboration among nurse and physician managers: An integrative review

ABSTRACTCollaborative leadership and management structures are critical to transforming care delivery. Both nurse and physician managers are uniquely positioned to co-lead. However, little is known on how to prepare and support individuals for these co-leader arrangements. The re-design of healthcare professional education focuses on interprofessional collaboration, mutual learning, and a competency-based approach. While competencies for interprofessional collaboration have been delineated, competencies for collaborative management practice have yet to be addressed. An integrative review of empirical studies on existing educational interventions was conducted to critically appraise and synthesise the results regarding collaborative competence among nurse and physician leaders. We reviewed how these interventions have been designed, implemented, and evaluated within workplace settings in order to inform our understanding of what components are effective or ineffective for the future development of an educational programme. This review reports on key characteristics of nine empirical studies and emphasises that: a uniprofessional approach to leadership development is predominant within educational programmes and that the assessment of shared learning experiences are not addressed; there are inconsistency in terms used to describe competencies by individual researchers and limitations within the competency frameworks used in the studies reviewed; and there is a lack of suitable instruments available to assess whether competencies have been achieved through the educational programmes. None of the studies discussed the process of how individuals learned specific competencies or whether learning outcome were achieved. Educational programmes were developed based on a perceived lack of leadership preparation and orientation programmes for leaders in formal management positions and used multiple interventions. Only two of the programmes involved organisational or systems level competencies. Interprofessional co-leading requires enhanced capabilities and capacity for managers. There is a need for developing an in-action education intervention that addresses the unique learning needs of co-leader arrangements particularly among nurses and physicians who are new to their role.

A STUDY OF RURAL HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPALS’ PERCEPTIONS AS A SOCIAL JUSTICE LEADER

This multisite case study explores how rural principals in high poverty schools in a Southern state that had identified themselves as social justice leaders perceived student diversity, specifically LGBTQ students, and how they sustained a socially-just school climate for all students. Using a qualitative approach lent itself to understanding the principals’ descriptions of themselves as social justice leaders in their respective school and community contexts through their conversations (Creswell, 2007; Marshall & Rossman, 2016). The investigators drew from Theoharis’ (2007, 2009) and Bishop’s (2012) studies to serve as the theoretical framework guiding this study. The results indicated that the principals in this case study struggled with recognizing LGBTQ students’ needs and well-being. The findings in this study contain implications for pre-service preparation and in-service professional development programs to draw upon social justice leadership theory and research to inform leadership practices when addressing external and internal resistance. Moreover, this study recognizes the need for leadership preparation programs to integrate critical self-consciousness (Freire, 2000) with purposeful reflection (Webster-Smith, 2011) as essential to the development of the social justice leader. Keywords: school leadership, social justice, LGBTQ students, community resistance, pre-service and in-service preparation programs

Learning to Lead with Data: From Espoused Theory to Theory-in-Use

ABSTRACTLeaders play a vital role in how data is used to inform school improvement, but little is known about how they both develop their espoused theories about data use during leadership preparation and then refine those ideas when moving to practice and theories-in-use. This article uses longitudinal qualitative data from interviews with participants in alternative leadership preparation programs in New York City. Our analysis led us to two dimensions of data use central to leaders’ approach: leader-driven vs. leader-facilitated data use and highly structured vs. flexible data use, and demonstrates common shifts toward more leader-driven and highly structured approaches.

Women Transitioning into Leadership: Gender as both Help and Hindrance

Newly hired school leaders are confronted by the weight of tradition and prior practice (Hartzell,Williams, & Nelson, 1995; Marshall, 1992). They are frequently counseled to adopt "old" norms aboutpriorities and decision-making. Some find that to gain acceptance they must adhere to values andleadership behaviors counter to those that attracted them to school leadership or were espoused in theirpreparation (Hartzel et al., 1995; Marshall, 1992).This paper reports on an investigation of the impact of socialization on new assistant principals,particularly women graduates of a redesigned school leadership preparation program in North Carolina.The subjects of this study were women, therefore the investigation also explored the impact that genderassociatedleadership preferences had on their socialization.

What’s in a Name? The Confluence of Confederate Symbolism and the Disparate Experiences of African American Students in a Central Virginia High School

In 2015-2016, news stories from Charleston, South Carolina, and the University of Missouri, among others, motivated and inspired many people to organize against assaults on the Black community generally and Black students in particular. Similarly, Black students at Robert E. Lee High School in Virginia have come together around what they perceive as racist symbolism and inequitable educational policies and practices. The Black student leaders at Robert E. Lee High School have presented their school principal with a list of demands. Meanwhile, the school’s football and basketball teams, The Rebels, are threatening to go on strike until students’ demands are addressed. This case study could be used in educational leadership graduate programs as well as curriculum and instruction coursework, especially in courses that emphasize social justice and ethical decision making. Particularly relevant courses might include School-Community Relations, Organizational Culture, Politics of Education, Contemporary Issues in Education, Visionary Planning and Strategies, and Schools as Learning Communities. In addition, this case study aligns with Standards 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6 of the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium (ISLLC) Standards and can be integrated in leadership preparation programs accordingly. This case might also be used in school district–sponsored professional development workshops for current and/or aspiring administrators.

Are You Qualified to Be a Member of This “Elite Group”? A School Leadership Preparation Program Examines the Extent “Diverse” Candidates Are Admitted to Graduate School

This case outlines a dilemma encountered by faculty in a K-12 educational administration graduate program on the east coast. The case offers a detailed illustration of tensions arising when faculty discuss their graduate admissions process, their role as gatekeepers, understandings of merit, and the need for student diversity. Disrupting institutional systems of domination and faculty reliance on admissions criteria undermine programmatic diversity goals, including the meanings faculty associate with common admissions criteria. Implications include an authentic, holistic, and intentional examination of graduate admissions criteria.

Reflections on leadership preparation programs and social justice

PurposeFundamental aspects of educational leadership preparation programs regarding social justice are embodied in program design elements, yet the scholarly community did not adequately address these issues. The paper aims to discuss these issues.Design/methodology/approachThe essay suggests that organizational theories dealing with person-environment fit can shed light on the models, possibilities, and limitations of various preparation programs.FindingsThe essay proposes a meta-conceptual framework that builds on Schneider’s attraction-selection-attrition theory and on the socialization literature to classify leadership preparation programs by design. In addition, the paper reflects on the implications of program design in relation to the power and the responsibility of the faculty.Originality/valueThe essay argues that design decisions made by the faculty a priori enable and constrain its power and responsibility. The conclusion is that design decisions should be made by faculty with awareness of these issues.

An Analysis of 2013 Program Evaluation Proposals for the School Leadership Preparation Program

This article presents a content analysis of the 2013 School Leadership Program (SLP) grants. SLP projects provide a unique opportunity for participants in the field to explore innovative leadership preparation and development and their impact on program participants, schools, school districts, and students. The article begins with an overview of the SLP, the changing field of leadership preparation, and current research in the field. Findings then reveal a range of evaluation tools, methods, and data, the presence of myriad evaluators participating in the projects, and little focus on external dissemination of program evaluation methods beyond the scope of the projects. Suggestions for research to extend the field are provided.

Greener on the Other Side

Sustainability practices that lead to greener schools are often overlooked in leadership preparation programs and in school improvement efforts. An urban middle school principal recognizes the potential to build community, foster a healthy learning environment, and redefine her school through focusing on sustainability practices in a collaborative manner.

Community-Based Equity Audits

Purpose: To equitably transform urban schools of color and the neighborhoods where they are nested requires approaches that promote community equity and foster solidarity among a range of stakeholders. However, most school–community approaches solely focus on improving school-based outcomes and leave educational leaders with little guidance for how to critically understand their school’s community context and act in solidarity with neighborhood stakeholders on community issues. The purpose of this conceptual article is to introduce what I call community-based equity audits and explain how educational leaders can use this process to work toward equitable school-community outcomes. Method and Approach: This process builds on equity audits in educational leadership, community audits, and community-based research practices and is theoretically grounded in Freirean dialogue. To demonstrate its impacts, this article draws on reflections of aspiring principals who conducted community-based equity audits in a leadership preparation program. Findings: The community-based equity audit consists of four phases: disrupt deficit views about community, conduct initial community inquiry and shared community experiences, establish a community leadership team, and collect equity, asset-based community data for action. Implications: This instrument is developed to guide educational leaders, and those who prepare them, in creating context-specific, equitable school–community solutions.

Who is the Building Leader?: Commentary on Educational Leadership Preparation Programs for the Future

Who is the Building Leader?: Commentary on Educational Leadership Preparation Programs for the Future

The preparation of cognitively agile principals for turnaround schools: a leadership preparation programme study

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this study was to examine the ability of two educational leadership university programmes to improve the cognitive agility of their graduates. The research looked to discover whether the aspiring principals exited the programmes with an increased ability to employ cognitive agility – the ability to use the multiple thinking skills of systems thinking, reflecting, and reframing – when engaged in their professional work and solving problems. Both Masters programmes were in School Leadership, offered through the same university department and following the same core curriculum leading to Level 1 educational leadership certification. The results indicate that of the two programmes studied, the Principal Rapid Orientation and Preparation in Educational Leadership (PROPEL) programme, designed to prepare leaders for turnaround schools, produced more cognitively agile graduates than the traditional Master’s programme. The mediating variables of participants’ years of experience and budget responsibility increased the level of cognitive agility of both programme’s graduates.

The Impact of Personal and Program Characteristics on the Placement of School Leadership Preparation Program Graduates in School Leader Positions

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of personal and program characteristics on the placement of graduates of principal preparation programs in assistant principal, principal, and school leadership positions. Research Design: This study relies on Texas principal production data from 1993 through 2007 matched to employment data from 1993 through 2013. The data include personal characteristics of each program’s graduates (age, sex, and race/ethnicity), program characteristics (program type, percentages of female graduates, and percentage of White graduates), labor market location, and certification year. We employ both descriptive statistics and multilevel logistic regression analysis to examine the factors associated with obtaining employment as an assistant principal, principal, and school leader. Findings: At least 50% of graduates obtained placement as a school leader within 5 years and about 70% did so over 10 years. Within 5 years of certification, men, Latinos, and middle-aged graduates had greater odds of employment as a school leader than women, Whites, and younger and older graduates, respectively. Differences arose, however, when examining placement as an assistant principal and principal separately. In particular, Black and Latina/o graduates had greater odds of employment as an assistant principal but had lower odds of employment as a principal than their White peers. Finally, there were few program characteristics associated with placement, and differences between programs explained very little of the variation in placement rates, bringing into question efforts to hold programs accountable for such outcomes.

Another Way to Go

This qualitative study examined the development of prospective leaders (PLs) from nonuniversity-based leadership preparation programs along two core dimensions identified as critical to leaders’ capacity to affect change—inclusive-facilitative and instructional leadership (Bryk, Sebring, Allensworth, Luppescu, & Easton, 2010). Within the core area of instructional leadership, participants learned to focus on supporting individual teachers, establish a vision for learning, and link individual practice to school-wide goals. In inclusive-facilitative leadership, participants highlighted bringing stakeholders together and enlarging capacity through distributed leadership. The analysis identifies important ways in which instructional and inclusive-facilitative leadership are interdependent and makes recommendations for leadership preparation programs.

Technological self-efficacy among school leaders in Oman: A preliminary study

There is more need today for school leaders to be up-to-date with technology and its various uses in education. Enhancing self-efficacy in the use of technologyis an expected role of educational leadership preparation programmes. This study investigated technological self-efficacy of a group of educators in leadership positions while participating in a leadership preparation programme at Sultan Qaboos University in Oman. The findings show that these educators had high technological self-efficacy. There were also significant, positive relationships between technological self-efficacy variables, academic achievement and age. Age was negatively correlated with general learning self-efficacy and also with one indicator of academic achievement. In the qualitative analysis, the study used the framework of the Theory of Margin (TM) to identify the factors affecting technology self-efficacy. Results indicate that, while participants with a high power-load margin (PLM) reported a higher number of internal and external powers, those with a lower PLM reported a higher number of internal and external loads.

Preparing Special Education Higher Education Faculty

There is a well-documented need for leadership personnel who are prepared at the doctoral level to fill special education faculty positions at institutions of higher education (IHEs) and train the next generation of teachers. The intersection of continued retirements of special education faculty, shortage of well-prepared special education faculty to fill those positions, and changing preK-12 student demographics provides unique challenges to special education doctoral leadership preparation programs. Although a variety of variables influence special educator preparation in 21st-century schools, five contemporary issues (i.e., changing roles, evolving diversity, need for funding support, situating doctoral trainees in teacher training, and training delivery models) rise to a level highly relevant to special educator preparation at the doctoral level. In this article, the authors explore this complex landscape and offer policy recommendations to strengthen and update special education higher education leadership preparation.

Educating Young Women to be Global Leaders: A Model

The United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization estimates that over 40 million girls worldwide are not being given the same opportunity to attend primary schools as boys. The World Academy for the Future of Women (WAFW) leadership preparation program for young women is working to change that statistic and many others regarding the inclusion of women in global society. A survey was conducted to ascertain the knowledge, perceptions, and opinions of the participants who are university students from various schools of study at the university who demonstrate leadership qualities and the facilitators who deliver the leadership content, concerning the WAFW. A key component of the Academy is the eight modules of study which seeks to meet the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (UNMDG). The intent of our study was to gather initial data on the value of the Academy. The majority (93 % of respondents) of the responses indicate knowledge of the vision, mission, and goals of the WAFW. The responses overall indicate value in continuing the WAFW; 93 % of the respondents knew and believed in the oath they had taken; after completing the modules, almost 88 % of the young women believed that they had inner strength would allow them to be global leaders and that WAFW was critical to being successful women. Similarly, 88 % of the WAFW members understood how to utilize the problem solving skills they learned to generate new strategies and approaches to solve global problems. We believe this research to be significant as it is supported by World Bank research (2016) that says “Empowering women and girls is not only the right thing to do: It’s also smart economics and vital to ending poverty and boosting shared prosperity”—women cannot be empowered if they lack the opportunity for education and leadership knowledge and skills. Without a seat at the global decision making table, gender inequality will remain a global issue.

Qualified to lead? A comparative, contextual and cultural view of educational policy borrowing

Background: Around the globe, education policy borrowing remains pervasive and prevalent. The strategies, interventions and innovations of education systems that perform well, in international assessments, are enthusiastically borrowed and copied in the anticipation of similar educational performance and outcomes.Purpose: This purpose of the article is to highlight some of the implications and consequences of policy borrowing by comparing the preparation and development programmes for school leaders in various education systems. The article explores the way in which the leadership programmes and models are being adopted and developed by different countries.Sources of evidence: The article draws upon findings from a contemporary, comparative study of leadership preparation and development across seven different education systems (Seven System Leadership Study). This large-scale, mixed-methods, comparative research study is collecting quantitative and qualitative data about the nature and impact of leadership development and preparation programmes in seven different education systems.Main argument: The findings from the study reinforce how leadership preparation and development programmes are increasingly becoming standardised as a result of education systems borrowing and adapting from each other. This article also argues that in the contemporary policy discourse, important cultural and contextual influences that significantly affect subsequent implementation and outcomes are increasingly being side-lined and ignored.Conclusions: This article highlights some of the limitations and unintended consequences of educational policy borrowing. It concludes that adopting some of the design features of effective interventions rather than simply borrowing policies or strategies, in part or in their entirety from very different contexts, may be a more productive way forward.