By encouraging a single-minded focus on instructional leadership, the training, socializing, and mentoring of school leaders has unwittingly fostered a culture of caged leadership. Leaders are expected to succeed via culture, capacity building, coaching, and consensus--no matter the obstacles in their path. Those are all good things, the author…

When it comes to reforming American education, today's would-be reformers only get it half right. On the one hand, they correctly argue that statutes, rules, regulations, and contracts make it difficult for schools and school system leaders to drive improvement and lead. On the other hand, they wrongly overlook the fact that school officials have…

Principals and superintendents frequently lament that their hands are tied by contracts, policies, and regulations--especially when it comes to hiring and firing staff, assigning employees to schools or classrooms, designing programs, or allocating resources. But it is also the case that educational leadership is marked by a debilitating timidity…

For more than a century, school boards have endeavored to govern America's schools and school systems. Collectively, the nation's nearly 14,000 school boards are responsible for the well-being of 52 million children, the expenditure of $600 billion per year, and the supervision of six million employees. Despite the magnitude of this…

The author recently had the same conversation about local school reform with two superintendents--one from a large, urban district in the East and the other from a small district in the Midwest. Both superintendents were working with their respective boards to approve, design and fund reading initiatives consistent with the new federal guidelines.…

Calls for the elimination of state licensure requirements for public school principals and superintendents. Argues that such action will increase the pool of those qualified to be school leaders. (Contains 2 tables, 1 figure.) (PKP)

Study of reform activity in 57 urban school districts found the typical urban district had launched almost 12 significant initiatives from 1992 to 1995. The problem is not too little reform, but too many high-profile initiatives and transitory superintendents. Quick fixes are inimical to sustained improvement and distract attention from such…

In decentralized districts like Houston's, principals and superintendents, formerly serving as managers responsible for executing policy directives, are assuming ceremonial and policy-making roles. Superintendents use their symbolic "headship" to build community at banquets, lead crisis-intervention efforts, and motivate underachieving…

Much of what ails urban education is actually the result of continuous or fragmentary reform efforts. A study of 57 school districts shows how political pressures drive reform, and suggests ways to nurture a more focused agenda for urban schools. The chapters are: (1) "The Politics of Urban School Reform"; (2) "Organizational and Personal…

While considerable attention is paid to training and development for teachers, not enough is paid to the training of educational leaders, this paper contends. The aim of this paper is to provide an analytical groundwork and comprehensive direction for reform of educational leadership training to help policymakers design specific solutions to…