Providing an in-depth look at the processes, pitfalls, and successes that can emerge from major education reform efforts at the state level, this volume covers the full policy change cycle in the development and transformation of the Illinois principal preparation program. Offering perspectives from the major stakeholder groups involved in…

The growing prominence of value-added models for measuring teacher effectiveness has prompted a recent surge in policies that consider students' classroom performance part of a teacher's evaluation. Yet, in light of the criticism and limitations of the current models, whether and how evaluation systems will adapt over time is unclear. This paper…

New Leaders is a nonprofit organization with a mission to ensure high academic achievement for all students by developing outstanding school leaders to serve in urban schools. Its premise is that a combination of preparation and improved working conditions for principals, especially greater autonomy, would lead to improved student outcomes. Its…

New Leaders is dedicated to promoting student achievement by developing outstanding school leaders to serve in urban schools. RAND Corporation researchers conducted a formative and summative external evaluation of the New Leaders program, its theory of action, and its implementation from 2006 through 2013. This document presents technical…

Reports the results of developing and pilot testing assessment procedures for evaluating the level of program implementation of administrative and leadership roles in an innovative early childhood education program. Subjects were school principals, educational program specialists, and classroom teachers in five urban schools. (Author/BB)

Investigates the role of district supervisors (assistant superintendents) in a British Columbia school district's implementation of a peer coaching network for principals and teachers. Two school improvement approaches are also compared. With one exception, results indicate a need for greater district support of principals as school leaders. (CJH)

After implementing changes in language arts instruction, the principal--who is in a key position to sustain or institutionalize the changes--faces several responsibilities. Factors involved in directing innovations to become "built in" to school programs include solving specific problems, sharing decision-making responsibilities, upgrading and…

Six causal-influence diagrams introduce a model showing the difficulties of implementing school improvement policies in such areas as teacher expectations and student behavior. The first diagram deals with basic dynamics of improvement. Cybernetics of activities to correct student achievement are revealed in a second diagram, which portrays…

The three diagnostic dimensions of the Concerns Based Adoption Model (CBAM) are tools that can evaluate the degree of new program implementation at the classroom level. Implementation success is a function of use/nonuse, appropriate/inappropriate practice, and user concerns about the innovation. These dimensions: Levels of Use (LoU) of the…

Past research has correlated differential curriculum implementation outcomes at the classroom level with the actions of the key change facilitator at the school level: the principal. Accordingly, this paper reports the results of a study of three change facilitator styles among principals: responders, managers, and initiators. Working definitions…

Describes the Principal-Teacher Interaction Study that focused on the interventions made by nine elementary school principals and their staff and on their involvement together in the implementation of new curricula. Examines what principals and others did in the process of facilitating change and what effects their interventions had on the…

Describes a study which polled secondary school principals to determine the factors contributing to successful implementation of computer technology in instructional programs. Results indicate a strong positive relationship between principal effectiveness scores and successful implementation. Monetary support was the only demographic factor found…

This paper summarizes some of the main conclusions of the Study of Dissemination Efforts Supporting School Improvement, specifically those regarding the process of innovation implementation. The focus is on the contributions of potential assisters to various implementation outcomes, from which implications for policy and practice are derived. The…

This paper synthesizes data from two studies of educational change to describe how school contextual factors influenced teacher involvement and how principals reduced those influences. The first study, involving 14 schools representing a mixture of levels and types of areas served, began in 1979 and spanned 3 school years; the second study, which…

This paper reports the results from an investigation of a method for systematic development of a procedure for assessing the administrator and instructional leader roles in implementation of an innovative school program. The purpose of the study was to design and field-test a feasible and useful approach to examining the degree of…