This dissertation describes a study that examined the experiences of community college leaders engaged in leading institutional change to improve student success. The study was conducted at a mid-size, public, 2-year institution in Southern California. Eight participants were chosen through purposeful snowball sampling of leaders from across the…

Project Tomorrow and BrainPOP have collaborated on the development of this new "Education Leadership Brief: Examining the Evolving Digital Responsibilities of School Principals" to examine specifically the evolving digital responsibilities of the school principal today resulting from the sudden shift to digital learning. This examination…

For school districts in California, just as one set of revolutionary new content standards is beginning to feel familiar, another deep change is brewing. Districts have now had more than five years to wrestle with how they implement the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSS-M) (NGA Center & CCSSO, 2010). Many have made large-scale…

This article focuses on the leadership practices that four public school principals in two Northern California large urban school districts used during the process of implementing the state-mandated reading curriculum. These four school principals' leadership approaches are described and analyzed through the lens of neoinstitutional theory to…

The 1983 publication of "A Nation at Risk" gave birth to an effort to reform K-12 schools and increase student achievement all over the United States. More than 30 years later, the school reform efforts have grown into immense industries with marginal effect. Major legislation and programs have been launched throughout 3 decades, with…

The learning demands of college, career, and civic readiness imply that all young people in public schools must have access to deeper learning opportunities that will prepare them to master rigorous academic content, think critically, work collaboratively, and learn to apply classroom learning to real-world contexts. As well, districts are being…

Reform efforts require stakeholder support, but more importantly, a strong leader to see them through. In this article, the author addresses the importance of strong leadership and the role of principals in effecting change. He describes the success story of Harborside Elementary School in Chula Vista, California as one of a growing group of…

This study follows leadership candidates through the first phase of a comprehensive effort to reform master's-level principal preparation at a large, urban California university. The reforms placed an 18-month field experience at the center of candidates' preparation. Researchers sought to capture the changes over time in candidates' beliefs about…

This article explores how place matters in public school reform efforts intended to promote more equitable opportunities and outcomes. Qualitative case studies of three California middle schools' eighth grade math reforms and the resulting opportunities for Latino English learners are presented, using the conceptual frameworks of critical human…

This paper presents the Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning at WestEd's 13th annual report on the status of the teaching profession in California, focusing on the role of the principal in supporting teaching quality. More specifically, the report discusses fiscal and policy trends, the competing demands of the principalship,…

A low-performing California school district experienced a dramatic turnaround when faculty members began studying student assessment data and working together to ensure students had the support they needed. Sanger Unified School District began its reform journey in 2004 when district leaders launched an effort to focus deliberately on student…

The importance of effective principals to school reform is well-documented. But what makes a school principal an effective change agent, and how can a school board and district administrators assist in pushing their top site leaders to excellence? Many district and board leaders say it's all about vision, building trust with staff, and developing…

Using an organizational theory to study how people can actually change routines, this study examined alterations made to two aspects of a high school's attendance procedures over 5 years. The authors drew primarily from interviews and school documents to describe and analyze changes made by administrators, faculty, and staff. Organizing questions…

Six years ago, to gauge the challenges facing new school system leaders, "The School Administrator" tracked the challenges of six superintendents who had assumed their first superintendency in summer 2001. The story of their experiences, "Superintendent Rookies," appeared in the magazine's October 2002 issue. The six…

Although practitioners have been asked to make fundamental shifts in their beliefs about reaching all students, the structures of high schools to support that work have not changed appreciably. Teachers teach in isolation, departmental silos lack curricular and instructional coherence across core subject areas, and few teachers share students in…