School principals are agents of change in the implementation of education policies as they oversee accountability actions that serve to monitor and evaluate student achievement and identify the measures required. In Québec, where "results-based management" (RBM) is encouraged, the "professional learning community" (PLC)…

Teacher effectiveness has long been identified as critical to student success and, more recently, supporting students attaining the skills and dispositions required to be successful in the early 21st century. To do so requires that teachers engage in professional learning characterized as a shift away from conventional models of evaluation and…

This inquiry focuses on the "overall instructional leadership" approaches used by exemplary principals in three high performing Canadian provinces to overcome three persistent obstacles to effective teacher supervision and evaluation: (a) the management challenge, (b) the complexity challenge, and (c) the learning challenge. Analysis of…

This book discusses teacher evaluation and how it can provide the foundations for professional development. The editors and contributors illustrate how teachers with varying levels of expertise, experience and learning needs can benefit from differentiated evaluation and professional development designed to help them reach their full potential.…

A questionnaire was used to determine the individual and collective teacher supervision practices of school principals and vice-principals in Québec (n = 39) who participated in a research-action study on pedagogical supervision. These practices were then analyzed in terms of the principals' sociodemographic and socioprofessional characteristics…

This paper presents the results of a study of interviews (N = 17) conducted with members of a community of practice (CP) comprised of school principals, vice principals, and department heads responsible for teacher supervision in their respective schools. This CP met once a month over the course of 2 years to work on adapting the New Brunswick…

Describes collaborative teacher and administrator training in cognitive coaching, a form of teacher supervision in which the administrator acts as a facilitator of teacher reflection on teacher's own teaching practices and the thinking behind them. Includes one principal's thoughts on his own professional development as he proceeded through the…

This paper profiles Anna Steffin, principal of a Canadian elementary school, who has built a community of learners among her teachers and encourages quality staff development, collegiality, parent participation, and parent teacher cooperation. She promotes her beliefs by being an active participant in all activities. (SM)

This study, initiated by the Scarborough (Ontario) Board of Education, examines principals' perceptions of their role in curriculum implementation, the difficulties inherent in this role and the support systems available to assist principals, and the leadership component of the principals' role in curriculum implementation. Interviews, based on a…

Although it has been the practice of the University of Manitoba to place the majority of student teachers in metropolitan schools, recently there has been increasing pressure to place students in rural school divisions as well. One rural school division, however, has given some evidence of distrust in the university faculty and in its methods of…

Discusses the results of a recent Canadian study in which the perceptions of superintendents, principals, and teachers were analyzed and compared in order to determine the actual level of agreement between the practices for instructional supervision outlined in the school division's policy manual and the actual practice in the schools governed by…

Literature is reviewed and research is proposed on the supervision of teaching. The literature review on administrative theory in business and education reveals three periods of thought: a period when theories of supervision focused on the producer (the worker or teacher), a period when theories focused on the supervisor-producer relationship, and…

Nine conference papers examine educational administration in Canada and England. Three papers present the results of survey research on rural principals' reactions to decentralized budgeting in Saskatchewan (Canada), the impact of local government reforms on local educational services in England, and the effects of principals' leadership styles on…