When COVID-19 changed schooling in Illinois from face-to-face teaching and learning to remote teaching and learning, the transformation was sudden and swift. While there may have been premonitions and feelings of urgency about the effects of the novel coronavirus, there was little time to plan for the change that would take place and little…

Trans-informed administrative guidance introduces concepts from trans studies to educational leaders, but researchers have relatively ignored these policy implementation tools. This content analysis describes the design of administrative guidance using a representative sample of 112 Illinois districts: the who, what, how, and why of supporting…

This dissertation investigated the reasons that school districts chose to change the structure of their middle grades learning environments from the traditional junior high school to the newer middle school model. The study answers the following research questions: According to the perceptions of teachers, school and district administrators, and…

Since the fall of 2012, Illinois principal preparation programs have been operating under new state requirements intended to produce highly qualified and effective school principals capable of leading Illinois schools to higher levels of student academic performance. The rules guiding new program development are applied with a broad stroke,…

This study begins with a review of court cases that have helped shape public education in America. Following the review is an analysis of federal reform in education from 1965 to the present, paired with educational leadership literature to highlight a disparity in what federal mandates and state policies have in place for accountability measures.…

This paper presents an array of structural configurations that invite new consideration of the necessary conditions for developing systemic school reform; first by reviewing the current literature, and then by examining thirty-six existing partnerships as structural configurations, an exploratory typology for the analysis of successful…

The roles and responsibilities of the school principal have changed throughout the years, and, with that, the face of the principalship has changed, too. The average age of principals in the United States is 57 with a significant portion of those individuals retiring within the next ten years (United States Department of Labor, 2008). As these…

Facing a superintendent change in 2006-2007, Decatur Public School District 61 in Illinois was already confronting the major challenges of a widening student achievement gap, increasing dropout rate, and schools not meeting Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). From the beginning, Superintendent Gloria J. Davis professed several simple beliefs that…

The rationale for taking bold action on the nation's persistently failing schools can be summed up in one dramatic and disturbing statistic: half of the young Americans who drop out of high school attend just 12 percent of the nation's schools. Ending the cycle of failure at schools is a daunting challenge and a surprisingly controversial one.…

The components of a successful school are clear. Many educators can easily list them: high expectations for all students, a safe and orderly learning environment, strong instructional leadership, highly qualified teachers, data-driven decision making, etc. Then why don't more schools change the what they are doing to mirror them? Knowing the…

A study was conducted to determine what a selected group of Illinois school administrators perceive to be the critical factors which facilitate planned educational change. Focus was on the administrator's conception of his role, the development and utilization of innovational practices, and the methods and procedures used in the evaluation and…

Ninety-five elementary principals from 14 northern Illinois school districts participated in a study of the role of school principals in bringing about educational change. The study indicated that elementary school principals recognized needs for establishing effective communication and good working relationships with their constituents.…

A study was conducted to investigate empirically the nature of program development, testing Everett Rogers' model of collective adoption of an innovation against the data, and distinguishing between the developmental patterns of high and low quality programs. Subjects were 34 school districts representing a 10 percent sample of 340 districts…

The article explores the consequences of new systems of shared decision making and governance for the assessment of principals, presenting case studies of two Chicago-area school districts that made substantial progress expanding teachers' professional roles in school- and district-level governance. (SM)

This paper focuses on four participants in the public schools: parents, students, teachers, and administrators. These parties make up the key school community. This discussion highlights the rights and responsibilities of each of these major groups, especially in the curriculum, budget, and personnel areas of educational organization. In order to…