The purpose of this phenomenological, qualitative study was to investigate how district leaders' support is perceived by district pupil personnel service (PPS) leaders in the areas of ethical leadership, district policies and practices for special education programs, and how that may contribute to a culture of inclusivity. One on one interviews…

Students With Disabilities (SWD) typically underperform compared to their non-disabled peers; these gaps are often widened by poverty, race or ethnicity, and English language proficiency. Principals are often unprepared to meet their learning needs. This mixed methods study took place in the Westford Central School District, a pseudonym, a high…

The healthy functioning of a school system depends upon many factors. The internal micro factors require a leader to take into account the heart and human conditions that coexist within the lived environment. The external macro factors are the events that occur in unexpected ways. When these internal micro factors are not functioning well, and a…

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the leadership styles and the extent to which central office administrators are using technology and compare this to the districts' practices regarding the integration of technology. The intent was to find if there was a correlation that existed between a digitally advanced administrator at the central…

The purpose of this research was to examine the accomplishments and obstacles of central office administrators who have followed traditional educational career paths with those who have followed non-traditional paths. The demographic markers, educational backgrounds, administrative responsibilities and tasks, and significant positive and negative…

This mixed-method multiple case study investigated nine elementary schools. Six "odds-beating schools," which serve relatively high numbers of economically disadvantaged children, achieved higher than predicted performance on state assessments when compared with three typically performing schools. The overarching research question…

What does an effective classroom look and sound like? What does it mean to have students engaged in learning? What is high-quality instruction? To answer these questions, the Greece Central School District in New York created a common language around teaching and learning as a way to support student achievement. The district developed a five-year…

The increased demand for educational reform and accountability has resulted in a renewed focus on the relationship between building leaders and district leaders, particularly on how district leaders can support principals to ensure the academic success of students. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) and Race to the Top (RttT) legislations…

The relationship between teacher union officials and central office administrators' descriptions of the level of importance and the level of difficulty when negotiating Annual Professional Performance Review (APPR) language into a teachers' union collective bargaining agreement was examined. Relationships were investigated using the New York State…

For central offices to become full partners with schools in improving teaching and learning, simply defining new roles or creating new reporting structures is not enough. Through the authors' recent central-office research, they have confirmed that creating the conditions for improved teaching and learning districtwide demands new practices within…

In this article, the author talks about the resignation of New York State's commissioner of education David Steiner, and how it will affect the state's Race to the Top. He contends that Steiner was savvy enough to understand the importance of Race to the Top and able enough to turn the state's education energies toward it. The "Washington…

This technical brief describes updates to a database of dropout prevention programs and policies in 2006/07 created by the Regional Education Laboratory (REL) Northeast and Islands and described in the Issues & Answers report, "Piloting a searchable database of dropout prevention programs in nine low-income urban school districts in the…

This report summarizes main results from a national study of how leaders in urban school district central offices fundamentally transformed their work and relationships with schools to support districtwide teaching and learning improvement. All three study districts had been posting gains in student achievement and credited their progress, in…

"The Learning System" is a newsletter designed for superintendents and central office staff with professional learning responsibilities. This issue includes: (1) Principal-Coaches Transform Teachers and Schools (Valerie von Frank); (2) District Leadership: Delve into NSDC's [National Staff Development Council's] New Definition of…

In this article, the author explains why she took an unpaid leave for a year from her central-office administrative role in an upstate New York school district, and shares two defining moments that helped her find her way back to public education. The first was an academic exercise and the second was less academic and more emotional. Through the…