The further one goes up the career ladder in education, the more one is exposed to open criticism. Every week brings new stories of superintendents under attack. Usually the crisis involves failed proposals or terminated contracts. The average tenure for superintendents nationwide runs less than five years. Sometimes the stories of confrontation…

Peter Negroni, former superintendent in Springfield, Massachusetts, believes Ron Heifetz's insights about the importance of taking the long view helped save his career in school administration. Negroni was on a quick fix, my-way-or-the-highway approach to school reform in 1994 but sensed he was in trouble. Brutal and ongoing contretemps around his…

On a late March morning in the early 1990s, less than 2 1/2 months after he was forced to resign his tumultuous superintendency in a small Midwestern school district, Ed Evans took a shotgun into the woods and, using a spatula to push down the trigger, took his own life. His body was found by his teen-age son three days later. He had devoted…

New superintendents of three urban school districts turned to a group of "critical friends" from other school districts and education agencies to conduct formal evaluations of their school systems. Leaders in private industry have long relied on outside perspectives. The process can dispel professional isolation. (MLH)

Those who expect consultants to solve problems for schools operating under the traditional model of fragmentation and teacher isolation will be disappointed. The key to using consultants effectively is developing systematic processes that engage staff in the work of a professional learning community as they consider the ideas presented to them.…

Recounts difficulties experienced by an Ohio principal who chaired his district's contentious boundary-realignment process. The community was divided over dispersal of heavily concentrated low-income students to other schools within the district. In hindsight, this principal would have had someone take minutes, selected a more diverse committee,…

Superintendents, principals, and teachers can no longer work in isolation or on parallel tracks. Leaders must be role models, engage in meaningful dialogue about children, and create new learning opportunities for the adults teaching them. Schools must cultivate talented leaders, not managers, to create what does not exist. (MLH)