School leaders, specifically principals, play a pivotal role in shaping student learning outcomes. The benefits of strong leaders extend beyond academic achievement, such as reductions in absenteeism and exclusionary discipline. While quality principals are critical for creating and sustaining quality schools, the staffing pipeline is facing…

This narrative study explored the administrative internship experiences of five assistant principals in Alabama for the purpose of better understanding how these school leaders perceived the benefits of Alabama's policy requirement for field experience in their practice. Attention towards this comparatively brief ten-day internship sought to…

Self-efficacy significantly influences the success of school leaders in managing the school environment, offering instructional programs, and working morally with the community. In this study, I addressed the following questions: What are school leaders' self-efficacy and its various components of management, instructional, and moral leadership?…

Continued professional learning and development of school leaders is a way to improve schools and promote positive organizational change (Andreoli et al., 2020; Kim, 2020; Rieckhoff & Larsen, 2012) as well as and a way to support sustainability in a profession with high rates of turnover (Levin et al., 2020). Although principals and…

Education is a standards-driven business where accountability is at the forefront of its practices and processes for evaluating schools. The role of today's school leaders has changed tremendously in this new era of accountability. The research and findings presented in this paper will explain the evolution that has taken place in the duties of…

This quantitative research study examined the characteristics and experiences that are significant in contributing to secondary assistant principals' perceptions of readiness to serve as instructional leaders. Secondary assistant principals were the only group used in this study. Very little can be found in the literature pertaining to assistant…

Many assistant principals are not provided the opportunity or do not engage in instructional leadership behaviors or responsibilities. This results in some being less qualified entering principalship or even reluctant to pursue principalship. The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the exhibition of instructional leadership behaviors…

The assistant principalship is a vital and necessary pathway to the principalship. There are more demands for the principal to be the change agent for a school system and there is great concern about the quality of preparation for assistant principals who may become the future principals of the school. Taylor and Martin (2007) suggest that…

The purpose of this descriptive qualitative content analysis study was to identify not only how Alabama assistant principals define instructional leadership, but what facilitating factors and barriers they face in the role as an instructional leader. Data sources for this study included five focus group interviews among 39 Alabama assistant…

The purpose of this quantitative study was to identify the characteristics and experiences of elementary assistant principals that contributed to their perceptions of readiness to serve as instructional leaders. Data were collected from survey responses of 118 elementary assistant principals across the state of Alabama. Six key findings were: (1)…

High-stakes, standardized testing plays an important role in the lives of many students as they apply to college and compete for scholarships. In states where college readiness measures, like the ACT® test, are used for school and district accountability, the ACT scores of all students, whether college-bound or not, are a top priority for school…

This article reports findings from a study investigating the capacity of assistant principals to be instructional leaders. Analyses of survey responses yielded four interesting findings: (a) years of experience as a teacher and age had no significance on assistant principals' perceived readiness as an instructional leader; (b) those completing…

In this study, faculty members of an educational leadership program, situated in a large urban university in the southeastern region of the United States, utilized focus group research to determine the perceptions of K-12 assistant principals regarding the effectiveness of an educational leadership program, and to provide recommendations for…

This quantitative research study examined beliefs and actions of assistant principals in Alabama. Assistant principals were the only group used in this study. From this research study, the researcher also wanted to explore what are barriers to prevent assistant principals from making behavioral, normative, and control beliefs match instructional…

April 27, 2011, will be remembered by many as a catastrophic day and event in Alabama, and specifically by K-12 educational leaders. Natural disasters like tornadoes have a significant impact on leaders, on their decision making and, obviously, on the survival of many of their victims. The possibility and threat of a major crisis caused by natural…