If ever there was a year to prioritize and lean in on principal support to lead learning, this is it. Candice McQueen, CEO for the National Institute for Excellence in Teaching, shares three actions principals and their supervisors can take to strengthen instructional leadership.

Leaders have three classic responses to discord. Authors Robert Feirsen and Seth Weitzman call them the 3 "A's"--avoidance, attack, and addressing. They make the case that the third one--addressing conflict--is the healthiest way for leaders to solve problems and promote a positive school culture.

Considering how common unconscious racial bias is, many teachers have likely at times sent subtle messages to students that white students are more capable or trustworthy than students of color--and new teachers need to be aware of the possibility of racial bias. School leaders can guide new teachers--and others--to be sensitive to biased actions…

Principals often have administrative duties that take them away from instructional leadership and other big-picture ideas and changes. And yet, "running a smooth ship" and effectively managing those day-to-day operational tasks might actually make school leaders better. Hochbein looks at 100 years of research about how principals spend…

The author highlights increasing district efforts to provide greater on-the-ground supports to help principals succeed as instructional leaders amid the many challenges of their job. The article looks in particular at district mentorship and supervision programs for principals that, according to initial studies and principal experiences, have…

Many instructional leaders--superintendents, assistant superintendents, curriculum coordinators, principals, assistant principals, instructional coaches--forget how hard it is to teach. The real-life experience of teaching, with its day-to-day intensity, fades a little bit each month one is not in the classroom. There is, however, a way that…

"There are no shortcuts for true equity," says authors and consultants Shane Safir and Jamila Dugan. Equity work is hard, on-going work--and it means not falling into ineffective traps and tropes. Find out what these traps are and how to avoid them.

A disciplinary literacy framework suggests that content-area teachers are best positioned to guide students into discipline-specific ways of reading, writing, and communicating, such as teaching science students to write as scientists do. "Disciplinary literacy instruction" can move students beyond generic literacy strategies and prepare…

Susan Moore Johnson, a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and leading scholar on school staffing, highlights research from the Project on the Next Generation of Teachers showing the importance of inclusive leadership and team-based structures in improving teacher recruitment and retention. School context is key in determining…

School leaders could see all their students ascend to new heights of academic achievement and find their jobs de-stressed and joyful--if they focused on only the one or two most urgently needed instructional initiatives. Schmoker makes the "case for less" and notes that if school leaders applied strict criteria to select the initiative…

To be an effective school leader, one must respond promptly and honestly to performance concerns. Unfortunately, this is often a difficult and uncomfortable job to do. Hall looks at various ways that school leaders can fail at handling poorly performing teachers and then discusses the correct and fair way to handle them.

As a new principal, Adkins-Sharif shares his lessons learned in the first year on the job. He hones in on classroom-focused learning to improve instructional leadership and create a thriving school culture. Adkins-Sharif suggests learning from other school leaders and peers, making time for classroom observations, and creating open dialogues with…

One of the most important relationships a principal has is with his or her instructional coach (or coaches). The strength of this partnership directly impacts student outcomes because it builds collective teacher efficacy. In this article, Student-Centered Coaching experts Diana Sweeney and Ann Mausbach share three practices to elevate the work of…

Julie Causton, Kate MacLeod, and Kristie Pretti-Frontczak work with administrators all over the world who believe in supporting students with compassion and leading schools with love. But these administrators report incredible challenges they face in ditching traditional behavior-management practices like punitive or public discipline tactics.…

Discussing school leadership in the absence of race is like building a house absent a foundation. While that house may stay upright for some time, it will be ill-prepared to withstand the strong winds of change. This is why Mark Gooden fervently recommends that every school principal, no matter their color or background, writes a racial…