Instructional Leadership for School Improvement

Sally J. Zepeda

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781317919308
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

This book explores the principal's role in meeting high expectations for student achievement. It provides detailed tips and strategies to show you what principals need to do to: assess and promote a culture and climate for school improvement, build teams and support the work their work, create the conditions so that teacher leaders can emerge, and monitor school improvement efforts

1Thinking About School Improvement

In this Chapter …

♦Accountability

♦School improvement broadly defined

♦The work of the principal in school improvement

♦Overview of the process of school improvement

Introducing School Improvement

What is the work of the principal in championing school improvement? This book attempts to address the myriad responses that could be given to answer this question by exploring school improvement and the work of the principal. The following list highlights the contents of each chapter.

♦Chapter 1 creates the context for school improvement and outlines the role of the principal, as defined in the chapters that follow.

♦Chapter 2 explains the principal's role in assessing and building a positive school culture and setting the climate for school improvement.

♦Chapter 3 explores ways in which the principal can be supportive of and create conditions so that teacher leaders can emerge in the educational setting.

♦Chapter 4 outlines ways in which the principal can support team building and the work that teams need to tackle during school improvement.

♦Chapter 5 leads the principal in the planning for school improvement.

♦Chapter 6 identifies the principal's role in implementing and monitoring school improvement.

School improvement is not a new construct, and principals, who are instructional leaders, have been and will continue to motivate teachers, students, and others toward improvement. Effective principals will not be caught off guard by increased accountability, because these leaders approach school improvement as a constant and prevailing process. School improvement is at the forefront of the work of these principals, and these principals accept that they and their schools can work toward meeting high expectations. As the leaders, principals in schools that are improving must do the following:

♦Focus their own and the efforts of others by asking tough questions.

♦Track data to provide a basis of reality for the answers to these questions.

♦Identify the needs of students through systematic and inclusive means.

♦Develop strategies based on research to meet these needs.

♦Prioritize the needs of students, teachers, and others who are served by the school.

♦Provide teachers with the support and assistance needed to meet the needs of their students.

School improvement is a multifaceted process that never really ends. The process of school improvement is a collaborative effort dependent on a culture and climate that support growth and learning for teachers and the organization. It is not likely that there will be growth and development unless there is alignment of the needs of both the people and the organization itself. Programs and initiatives that forward school improvement for schools labeled as “failing” are based on criteria such as standardized test results; although these programs and initiatives might be noteworthy, they are outside the scope of this book and are, moreover, often implemented as quick fixes.

More than just a commitment to improvement is needed to accomplish school improvement that is lasting and reaches the level of the classroom teacher. Although it falls to the principal to organize, plan, and accept final responsibility for school improvement, it takes teachers to mobilize a plan of improvement. Harris (2002) stresses, “the school improvement research base highlights the centrality of teaching and learning in the pursuit of sustained school improvement” (p. 1). Harris suggests further that the centrality of teaching and learning is related to change, and that for successful school improvement to occur, both the people and the organization must be able to change in ways that align with improvement.

Accountability

Accountability is a reality that school personnel face, and it is doubtful that the press of the accountability movement will waver in the minds and actions of internal and external stakeholders. Although accountability for schools has evolved since the 1960s, the accountability movement has created many zigzags and unlit roads ahead for schools.

A Brief History Leading to the Present Call for High-Stakes Accountability

Essentially, the beginnings of accountability through standards for schools began in 1965 when the U.s. Congress passed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and established Title I of the ESEA, which provided money to support poorly performing students in disadvantaged schools (Popham, 2001; Rudalevige, 2003) Popham (2001) explains how evaluation standards emerged from the passage of ESEA:

The law required educators receiving ESEA dollars to demonstrate that these funds were being well spent—namely, by evaluating and reporting on the effectiveness of their federally supported programs. According to the new law, if local officials did not formally evaluate the current year's federally subsidized program, then they would not receive next year's ESEA funds. (pp. 8-9)

Popham further relates that

it should come as no shock that educators who were getting ESEA awards scurried madly about in an effort to document the success of their ESEA-funded programs. And because almost all these programs were aimed directly at improving students' basic skills, the first step for most local educators was to identify suitable tests that could determine whether students were in fact learning the three Rs. (p. 9)

To an extent, the standards of the accountability movement began with the passage of ESEA and the Title I: Improving The Academic Achievement of the Disadvantaged provisions that include:

Sec. 1001. Statement of Purpose.

The purpose of this title is to ensure that all children have a fair, equal, and significant opportunity to obtain a high-quality education and reach, at a minimum, proficiency on challenging State academic achievement standards and state academic assessments. This purpose can be accomplished by—

(1)ensuring that high-quality academic assessments, accountability systems, teacher preparation and training, curriculum, and instructional materials are aligned with challenging State academic standards so that students, teachers, parents, and administrators can measure progress against common expectations for student academic achievement;

(2)meeting the educational needs of low-achieving children in our Nation's highest-poverty schools, limited English proficient children, migratory children, children with disabilities, Indian children, neglected or delinquent children, and young children in need of reading assistance;

(3)closing the achievement gap between high- and low-performing children, especially the achievement gaps between minority and nonminority students, and between disadvantaged children and their more advantaged peers;

(4)holding schools, local educational agencies, and States accountable for improving the academic achievement of all students, and identifying and turning around low-performing schools that have failed to provide a high-quality education to their students, while providing alternatives to students in such schools to enable the students to receive a high-quality education;

(5)distributing and targeting resources sufficiently to make a difference to local educational agencies and schools where needs are greatest;

(6)improving and strengthening accountability, teaching, and learning by using State assessment systems designed to ensure that students are meeting challenging State academic achievement and content standards and increasing achievement overall, but especially for the disadvantaged;

(7)providing greater decision making authority and flexibility to schools and teachers in exchange for greater responsibility for student performance;

(8)providing children an enriched and accelerated educational program, including the use of schoolwide programs or additional services that increase the amount and quality of instructional time;

(9)promoting schoolwide reform and ensuring the access of children to effective, scientifically based instructional strategies and challenging academic content;

(10)significantly elevating the quality of instruction by providing staff in participating schools with substantial opportunities for professional development;

(11)coordinating services under all parts of this title with each other, with other educational services, and, to the extent feasible, with other agencies providing services to youth, children, and families; and

(12)affording parents substantial and meaningful opportunities to participate in the education of their children. (Sec. 1001)

Source: http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/esea02/pg1.html

Providing fodder for the evolution of the accountability movement were key reports in the 1980s and the 1990s (although now some of the findings in these reports have been challenged) that detailed the...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Also Available from EYE ON EDUCATION
• Dedication
• About the Author
• Acknowledgments
• Table of Contents
• 1 Thinking About School Improvement
• 2 Principals Promote a Healthy Culture and Climate
• 3 Principals Support Teacher Leadership
• 4 Principals Build Strong Teams to Sustain School Improvement
• 5 The Work of the Principal in Planning for School Improvement
• 6 The Work of the Principal in Implementing and Monitoring School Improvement
• References