Research has shown principals have the second highest impact on student achievement, only surpassed by the level of instruction. This being the case, it is critical to have the most effective leaders serving in the principal role who are committed to continuing to grow and evolve to meet the needs of their students. This case study was designed to…

School principal demands, compounded by increased accountability and insufficient support, significantly contribute to principal burnout and adversely affect educational leadership and institutional efficacy. This interpretive qualitative case study examined the role of district leadership in mitigating principal burnout within a Texas school…

The purpose of this replication study was to examine the leadership practices, instructional practices, and high expectation beliefs employed by school district superintendents in Texas with the aim of eliminating the performance gap between Hispanic and White students in the state. The research employed a qualitative approach, consisting of…

Demographic changes among the Latina population across the United States depict evidence that there is a need to develop current principals to become administrative leaders at the central office leadership level. These leaders would in turn represent the rapidly changing population. This study aims to understand the career pathway that Latina…

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between job satisfaction and turnover intent of executive level central office administrators in Texas public school districts. For the intent of this study, executive level central office administrators were defined as staff members who serve in one of the following roles in a school…

The effects of competition from public charter schools on district school budget decisions are theoretically ambiguous. Competitive pressures could increase desired budget autonomy since they give district school leaders more flexibility; however, competition could decrease desired budget autonomy if district school leaders are generally…

Realizing their coaching program was not having desired effects for teachers or for students' achievement, leaders in the Manor School District in Texas revamped the district's coaching program. They created two "communities" encompassing all coaches in the district (since district schools were each doing their own thing with regard to…

Why is it that so many women seem to climb the administrative ladder leading to the superintendency frequently and with relative ease, but do not reach that top rung? Data to help address this question is presented here. These data are part of a larger research project completed in the fall of 2006. In addressing this question, an overview of the…

This article explores how stakeholders in one Texas school district perceive, experience, and respond to the Spanish bilingual teacher shortage. Interview data from a qualitative case study contributes to the article's vivid portrayal of the teacher shortage and its impact on the elementary education of bilingual Latino school children in Texas.…

Research has explored the use of evidence-based practices within schools but less is known about evidence-based decision-making among school district central office administrators. This study explored how individual and school-level characteristics of administrators were related to the implementation of evidence-based practices. Findings suggested…

This study examined if there were differences between central office administrators', school administrators', and bilingual and English as a second language (ESL) teachers' efficacies when controlling for years of experience with bilingual/ESL classrooms and hours of training on the English language proficiency standards (ELPS). Data from a…

For much of the last two decades, beginning with the passage of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) in 2002, the top political leaders have shown concern about children stuck in failing public schools. NCLB required districts to do something -- not enough, but something -- about those schools. Millions of children still languish in low-performing schools,…

Though scholars agree that professional development (PD) is a key mechanism for implementing education policies that call for teacher change, and that PD generally needs to be content-focused, active, collaborative, coherent, and sustained, the application of this framework has yielded mixed results. In this qualitative study, we employed…

Educational leadership coaching is a job-embedded, school-based form of professional development and an approach to transformational conversations that has the potential to change school cultures and improve student achievement (Stevenson, 2009). In this type of professional development, conversations and reflective questions guide educational…

As the Professional Learning Community (PLC) process becomes embedded within schools, the level of district support has a direct impact on whether schools have the ability to re-culture and sustain highly effective collaborative practices. The purpose of this article is to share a professional learning community conceptual framework from the US,…