The prevalence of educator shortages has long been a topic of research and policy discussions in Illinois. Across multiple years, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) and Illinois Association of Regional Superintendents of Schools (IARSS) have collected data and reported on the magnitude, severity, and impact of shortages statewide. Prior…

School districts in the United States often borrow on the municipal bond market to pay for capital projects. Districts serving economically disadvantaged communities tend to receive lower credit ratings and pay higher interest rates. To remedy this problem, 24 states have established credit enhancement programs that promise to repay district debt…

The 2024-2025 AASA Superintendent Salary & Benefits Study marks the thirteenth consecutive edition of this report. The national survey tracked the demographics, salary, benefits, and other elements of the employment agreements of school superintendents throughout the country. This year's study results are based on 2,077 complete responses. The…

The purpose of this study was to examine whether district funding influences the leadership work of school principals. This study explored the role of the elementary principal in four school districts. Two districts were located in communities with an affluent population and the schools had an abundance of fiscal resources; the other two districts…

"Making the Grade analyzes the condition of public school funding in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The current report presents a picture of school funding in 2020-2021, the first full school year of the COVID-19 pandemic and the most recent data available. The report ranks and grades each state on three measures to answer the…

Concerns over the teaching workforce have been rising across Wisconsin in recent years, particularly since the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic. A series of Forum reports have raised warning flags about declining graduates from schools of education, record turnover among state and local government employees, and the rising use of emergency K-12…

The role of superintendent is complex, and it is one that carries with it the responsibilities of chief executive officer. The superintendent as the chief executive officer for the school district is often standing directly in the eye of the storm and is caught between competing interests and competing opinions regarding how to navigate moments of…

Leaders of education policy continue to decentralize school districts, particularly in predominately large urban districts, despite mixed results from this reform. In this article, we seek to explain how decentralization came to fruition through the policymaking process in one of the largest and most diverse districts in the United States that…

California's investment in Universal Transitional Kindergarten (UTK) reflects a commitment to providing access to UTK for all 4-year-olds in public schools by the 2025-2026 academic year. However, the implementation of transitional kindergarten (TK) presents challenges for districts in aligning this new grade coherently with existing grade levels…

A study was conducted to evaluate the impact of CAPIT Reading on student early literacy achievement. The study utilized a quasi-experimental comparison group design using data from 12 elementary schools in a suburban school district in Oklahoma during the 2019-20 school year. CAPIT Reading is a comprehensive PK-2 literacy solution that includes a…

The problem that was the focus of this study is that only half of the students entering kindergarten in the United States are considered kindergarten ready. This problem is important because children who are successful in kindergarten are more likely to continue to be successful in elementary school. The purpose of this basic qualitative study was…

This paper explores school principals' use of human resource management (HRM) strategies and their influence on teachers' professional learning communities in X Rural District in China's Shanghai. Semi-structured interviews with 16 school and kindergarten heads showed that school-level contextual factors accounted for school principals' use of HRM…

In the United States, K-12 school finance is largely controlled by the states. Every year, hundreds of billions of dollars in public funds are distributed based on 51 different configurations of formulas, rules, and regulations to over 13,000 districts that vary in terms of the students they serve, their ability to raise revenue locally, and many…

Superintendents in Missouri public schools are revising their approach to strategic planning based on the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education's new iteration of the Missouri School Improvement Program (MSIP 6). MSIP 6 requires superintendents and other district leaders to rethink the utility of their district's Comprehensive School…

Superintendents in Missouri public schools are revising their approach to strategic planning based on the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education's new iteration of the Missouri School Improvement Program (MSIP 6). MSIP 6 requires superintendents and other district leaders to rethink the utility of their district's Comprehensive School…