Through collaboration between one rural southeastern university and a local rural school system of high-poverty in southeast Georgia (a pseudonym, Justice County School System [JCSS]), a mixed method case study analysis was conducted to examine a system-wide professional learning initiative. The goal of this initiative was to provide professional…

NGSS Early Implementers is a four-year initiative created to help eight California school districts and two charter management organizations, supported by WestEd's K-12 Alliance, implement the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Designed for professional developers and administrators, this report describes 10 tools and processes that are…

This report describes the Achieve 180 Program in Year 3, the last of the three years initially planned for this comprehensive program. The 54 participating schools received Texas Education Agency campus accountability ratings of "Improvement Required" (IR), "Not Rated," or "Former Improvement Required". The 2019-2020…

Across the education field, there is unusual consensus that strong teacher leaders are key to improving our nation's schools. Unfortunately, clear expectations for what teacher leaders should do, and strategies to prepare them to do it, are few and far between. A recent survey found that while 86 percent of urban school districts have teacher…

Across the education field, there is unusual consensus that strong teacher leaders are key to improving our nation's schools. Unfortunately, clear expectations for what teacher leaders should do, and strategies to prepare them to do it, are few and far between. A recent survey found that while 86 percent of urban school districts have teacher…

This article provides snapshots of teacher leadership in action as one result of the Asheville (N.C.) City Schools Foundation Innovation Fellows program, an approach to providing high quality professional learning for the district's best teachers. With start-up funding from the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, this program was created to retain great…

Educational leadership coaching is a job-embedded, school-based form of professional development and an approach to transformational conversations that has the potential to change school cultures and improve student achievement (Stevenson, 2009). In this type of professional development, conversations and reflective questions guide educational…

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore how long term, focused, and embedded professional development influenced teachers' self-efficacy and preparedness to implement the Common Core State Standards in a large urban school district in northern Nevada. The sample was 17 7th-12th grade social studies teachers that participated in a…

At Peters K-3 Elementary School in Garden Grove, California, teacher leadership and empowerment supported by professional learning from the district have led to increases in student outcomes and in parent and student satisfaction with the culture and climate of the school community. Peters demonstrates the impact that empowering staffs and…

This study applies transformational leadership theory practices, specifically inspiring a shared vision, modeling the way and enabling others to act to examine the purposeful ways in which principals work to build the next generation of teacher leaders in response to the dearth of K-12 principals. The purpose of this study was to discover how one…

This brief summarizes the practices of successful, instructionally engaged leaders and the ways districts develop these leaders. These practices are drawn from "positive outlier" districts in California that have excelled at helping African American, Latino/a, and White students achieve at high levels on assessments of academic standards…

Teachers are increasingly dissatisfied. In one recent survey, 47 percent of teachers said they were not enthusiastic about their jobs, and another showed a sharp drop in teacher satisfaction since 2008, from 62 to 39 percent. This dissatisfaction does not stem from what one might think--stresses related to dealing with students and families.…

There is little research in the area of understanding educational leaders' psychological processes. This lack of understanding leaves educational leaders to develop their own sense-making practices while in the complex and stressful act of leading. This self-study, conducted over more than half a school year in 2014-2015, was my own effort to do…

Background: This paper describes the Problem-Solving Cycle model of professional development and the Mathematics Leadership Preparation model of PD leader preparation. These models form the backbone of our current research-practice partnership project in which we are working with a large urban district to adapt these models to develop district…

In many districts, the notion of labor groups and district administration working together conjures descriptions of war and battle rather than cooperation and collaboration. However, in San Juan Unified School District, the headline, "Union and District Exhibit Positive Partnership" exemplifies the changing relationship between teacher…