Purpose: A school principal's ability to engage with external stakeholders is critical for achieving a range of school objectives such as involving parents, implementing policy mandates, and accessing resources from the school district. This study examines how novice school principals make sense of different external stakeholders' demands and…

School leadership is broadly acknowledged to be the lynchpin for school success. Yet, amongst the countless demands that school leaders face, making wise leadership choices is increasingly challenging. On what should leaders focus their attention and how should they prioritize their improvement efforts? How can they identify, understand, and make…

In the early 1990s, the logic and policies of systemic reform launched a press to coordinate the pursuit of excellence and equity in U.S. public education, with each other and with classroom instruction. There was little in that policy moment to predict that these reforms would sustain, and much to predict otherwise. Yet, nearly three decades…

Several social processes guide and shape how school actors engage with high stakes state and district policies relative to mandated curriculum and instruction. In this article, we use rhetorical argumentation analysis to explore how stakeholders mobilize resources through argumentation and rhetorical appeals (logical, emotional, and…

By concentrating on the formal school organization, researchers can miss the informal relationships that are fundamental to leadership. Distributed Leadership Studies (DLS) provides a framework for examining school leadership and management that considers the interactions of leaders, followers, and aspects of the context. The framework involves…

This article examines how formal school leaders are positioned in their school's instructional networks based on an analysis of data from all 30 elementary schools in one mid-sized urban school district. Premised on the assumption that advice and information are key building blocks for knowledge development, we analyzed the instructional advice…

Purpose: This article aims to validate the Leadership Daily Practice (LDP) log, an instrument for conducting research on leadership in schools. Research Design: Using a combination of data sources--namely, a daily practice log, observations, and open-ended cognitive interviews--the authors evaluate the validity of the LDP log. Participants: Formal…

This study examines the work of US school principals from the perspective of their workday using a distributed perspective to frame the investigation. Using data on 38 school principals in one mid-sized urban school district in the US, it describes school principals' work practices, examining both the "focus" of that work and…

This paper examines two questions: What does it mean to take a distributed perspective on leadership in schools? What are the entailments of taking a distributed perspective for research on school leadership? Arguing that the practice of leadership should be a key concern in scholarship on school leadership, the authors explore the leader-plus and…

Teaching is a critical consideration in investigations of primary school leadership and not just as an outcome variable. Factoring in instruction as an explanatory variable in scholarship on school leadership involves moving away from views of teaching as a monolithic or unitary practice. When it comes to leadership in primary schools, the subject…