This retrospective study by SCOPE Associate Director, Ann Jaquith, chronicles the progression of the Canterbury Learning Collaborative (CLC), first within the Collaborative and then later within the district in which the CLC resided, and shows how its development has supported instructional change. The story of the CLC provides lessons about how…

The School-University Research Network (SURN) Principal Academy at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, has a mission to build a leadership development program that increases principals' instructional knowledge and develops mentor principals to sustain the program. The academy is designed to connect and empower principals…

African American women leaders are often found in urban schools that have been exhausted of resources and lack support. However, due to their disproportionate representation in urban schools, African American women principals have become adept at uniting and engaging stakeholders in marginalized school settings into action. The intent for this…

Developing excellent principals who can set direction, develop people, redesign organizations, and lead instruction requires a system of high-quality preparation and professional development. This paper summarizes the elements of high-quality principal preparation and professional development programs that have been associated with positive school…

This article examines the educational leadership of the first African American female principal in Richmond, Virginia: Mrs. Ethel Thompson Overby. It seeks to ascertain, through a historical framework utilizing critical race theory, how this particular educational and instructional leader conceptualized academic achievement given the context of…

After a school district is desegregated, what factors determine whether the individual school becomes a harmonious entity with full acceptance of both races, or simply another resegregated school where blacks and whites coexist uneasily? This study attempts to demonstrate that in a school's alteration from segregation to desegregation, the…

In order to study the process of school desegregation, it becomes necessary to pinpoint that administrative position most centrally involved in the alteration of the individual school: that of the principal. From the pilot study conducted with the principals and assistant principals in York County, Virginia, in the spring and summer of 1969, a…

To generate information that would help rural schools take advantage of the Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration (CSRD) program, 47 principals of rural schools in Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia were interviewed via telephone. The schools fell into two categories: schools that applied but were not funded through the CSRD…

"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) Preparing, Recruiting, and Retaining Education Professionals: Senator Reed Proposes New $500 Million Bill to Improve…