School principals are responsible for the safety and well-being of the children entrusted to their care. Parents expect their children to be safe and protected and that school leaders establish and maintain clear lines of communication during a time of crisis. Within their capacity as school leaders, it is incumbent on them to guarantee that…

Principals and superintendents are regularly required to write improvement plans. These are typically derided as being "left on the shelf" when they are supposed to be "living documents". The implication is that educational leaders are not working on their plans the way they are supposed to. Isobel Stevenson suggests that the…

In 2023, the U.S. Department of Education announced the "Raise the Bar: Lead the World" initiative to use decades of research and professional experience to transform public education and advance education equity. There are three focus areas: (1) Achieve Academic Excellence; (2) Boldly Improve Learning Conditions; and (3) Create Pathways…

School leaders often neglect a key mechanism for empowerment: The school-improvement plan. In this article, researchers Coby Meyers and Bryan VanGronigen discuss five fundamentals of improvement planning that school leaders can use to ensure their plans are useful, effective, and on-track.

School leaders' resilience is best built as a collective effort, write Soraya Sablo Sutton and Nate Gong. The "Change Makers" program at UC Berkeley's Principal Leadership Institute gave school leaders across California the opportunity to work together to solve problems of practice and build their collective resilience--a key to…

While the demands of teaching continue to escalate, teacher development has changed relatively little over time, leaving many of today's teachers feeling underprepared, overwhelmed, or demoralized with few opportunities to make real change. Teacher leadership holds promise for both addressing challenges within schools and empowering teachers.…

Bellwether scanned the country for ideas and resources that leaders can use to address staffing challenges in their schools. This curated set of tools is intended to support school leaders who have the autonomy to manage the talent life cycle in their school community and are looking for practical ideas to strengthen their ability to recruit,…

This report is one of a series of practitioner briefs dedicated to highlighting concrete strategies that education leaders can use to increase equity in education by building supportive learning environments that meet students' social and emotional needs. The initial brief, "School-Community Partnerships. Solutions for Educational Equity…

As racial violence in America took on an international focus in summer 2020, many began to make pledges and statements against racism. The author heard multiple outcries for support from teams of school principals in her school district who wanted to do more than make a statement. The tool featured in this article was designed as a planning and…

School improvement plans (SIPs) are increasingly used to structure the process of setting and monitoring goals. As SIPs are designed to identify and address local problems of practice, there is the possibility that these tools help school leaders initiate and carry out ambitious school improvement. Yet, practical challenges abound in the…

"Each Child, Our Future" is Ohio's shared plan for ensuring each student is challenged, prepared and empowered for his or her future by way of an excellent prekindergarten through grade 12 (preK-12) education. The plan's purpose: to lift aspirations, create hope and excitement, guide development of state-level education policies and…

This article summarizes lessons and examples from a learning community of leaders from 78 large and medium school districts across the U.S. that has been meeting monthly throughout the pandemic, that other educators might apply to their work as they continue to navigate difficult and ambiguous times. The learning community members have identified…

This article is on the development of the School Facility I.Q. Inventory (SFIQI), an instrument to assess the extent of knowledge a school administrator possesses in delivering their assignment to manage his/her school building. The instrument was designed based on the current literature. The validity of the instrument was verified by a panel of…

Principals are critical to improving schools, but job-related stress and burnout are factors that can limit principal effectiveness and lead to untimely turnover. Extant literature, leadership preparation programs, and district policies have largely ignored principal burnout despite the increased complexity of the principalship and increasing…

By 2030, most jobs will require some training beyond high school (a four-year degree, a two-year associate degree, or some type of industry credential). The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board established the 60x30TX Plan to focus collective attention on meeting this need. Progress has been made in the last decade, but COVID-19 has…