Purpose: Research on school leadership has confirmed that principals influence teacher and student learning by building an "academic-focused ethos" in their schools. In this study, our objective was to examine if and how the learning-centered leadership of principals influenced academic optimism of teachers and the resulting effects on…

Teacher professional learning plays a critical role in education reform by enabling teachers to refine their professional skills and keep up with changing content knowledge, pedagogy, and trends in schooling. This study examines how and under what conditions principal instructional leadership contributes to teachers' professional learning in…

Over the past 30 years, school principals have been exhorted to articulate a clear vision as a key tool for stimulating the improvement of teaching and learning in their schools. Over the past decade, as school systems have sought to distribute leadership more broadly within schools, the same imperative has applied to middle-level leaders. Indeed,…

Examines the current (inadequate) system of initial preparation and inservice development for school leaders and suggests potential ameliorative strategies. University programs are badly tarnished, from student recruitment practices to curriculum content and employment certification procedures. Establishing a professional knowledge base and…

Examines ways to improve the potential transfer of knowledge, skills, and attitudes through professional development institutes. Discusses briefly the conceptual basis for transfer and presents specific ways to transfer theory into practice in the design of a two-week training institute offered to school principals at Vanderbilt University. (33…

An evaluation of participation patterns at the Westchester Principals' Center (NY) is discussed. Fifteen principals were interviewed. Findings are presented on levels of participation in professional development activities; program preferences; and the impact of personal beliefs and values, prior experience, and district context. (IAH)

Assesses the range of variation among the predominant types of professional development programs for principals in the 1980s. Highlights divergent trends in organizational processes and program content that characterize these programs, and identifies their varying potential for reaching competing policy goals. (JB)

Analysts have recently identified features such as program content that distinguish emerging administrator training programs from traditional ones. To examine variations in current approaches to school administrator training, three questions are addressed: (1) What are the variations in program content and organizational processes among emerging…

A proposal that calls for increasing the relevance of administrator preparation by applying a problem-based learning approach is offered in this paper. A review of literature on problem-based learning (PBL) in medical education concludes that, compared with traditional programs, PBL yields superior or equivalent results on a variety of outcome…

Articles in this issue are among the first published findings from empirical evaluations of administrator training programs begun in the 1980s. This introduction presents background information on the leadership development movement in which these program evaluations occurred. Themes emerging from these studies are synthesized. (SLD)

Results from an exploratory evaluation of the Indiana Principals' Leadership Academy (IPLA) over its first four years are reported. Interviews with 30 principals (20 IPLA graduates and 10 current participants) and review of IPLA documents reflect favorable responses to the program by principals and its strengths and weaknesses. (SLD)

This paper adapts the framework developed by J. Murphy and P. Hallinger (1987) in a conceptual analysis of current approaches to educational leadership development. Murphy and Hallinger identified differentiating patterns of program operation in the areas of program content, program process, program focus, and what this referred to as "supporting…

This comprehensive guide explores Problem-Based Learning (PBL), an innovative approach to leadership training. PBL has been adapted from its original use in medical school training into a tool for administrator preparation. In PBL, a real-life scenario with an open-ended problem or question for which there is no single right solution is presented.…

Messy, real-life problems provide the starting point for learning in a radically transformed instructional environment. In problem-based learning (PBL), students in educational administration classes--aspiring and current principals--jointly decide how to deal with the problems and learn leadership skills by facilitating collaboration and building…