How do we break cycles that send promising young educators out of the profession too early? Veteran teacher Henry Seton reflects on the school year that challenged his commitment to the classroom and the support and solutions that renewed his reasons to stay.

Coach and ASCD author Cathy Toll knows that principals can face resistance and competing priorities when trying to make changes in schools. "Whole-staff coaching" is one tool to get all educators on the same page by putting teachers in control of planning, implementing, and evaluating change--and principals in charge of facilitating it.

Many school leaders see teacher buy-in as a prerequisite for implementing meaningful change. But professor of educational leadership, Robert Feirsen, argues that the emphasis on buy-in overshadows a deeper and more community-driven form of participation among teachers--psychological ownership--that facilitates more effective school improvement…

The pandemic has prompted many school leaders to better leverage digital learning and management. The switch to remote learning in March 2020 forced many administrators to embrace and adapt to technology. The lessons they learned and practices they adapted are continuing to influence their work today.

With more states and districts turning to veteran and retired school leaders to mentor and support new principals, the role of training for these leadership coaches is increasingly critical. Gill, a freelance journalist, highlights examples of training programs for principal coaches in Hillsborough County, Florida, New York City, and Prince…

Familiar and deceptively efficient instructional strategies can be tempting to new teachers who must keep students productively engaged in structured, yet flexible, learning environments. Under the pressure of new responsibilities, novice teachers who are trying to cover the curriculum and manage a classroom of students often end up duplicating…

Being a new teacher is especially stressful and overwhelming: classroom management challenges, lack of administrator support, work-related stress, and feelings of isolation are pushing some to leave the profession all too soon. There are five actions, however, that principals can take to make new teachers a priority now, explain the authors of…

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.

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…

The logic behind "continuous improvement" sounds simple--but it takes a skillful leader to make the process pay off. While the logic behind the popular "continuous improvement" process seems simple, the authors' study of schools using approaches based on continuous improvement revealed that skilled leadership is as important as…

A school's success is largely determined by the effectiveness of its principal--decades of research have made this clear. Less settled is the question of what principals need to know and do to drive positive outcomes in their schools. A recent report funded by The Wallace Foundation provides evidence on the connection between school principals and…

While collective teacher efficacy has potential to improve teacher practice and student learning, there's a risk this concept will be used to further burden teachers through assuming a positive, confident attitude can overcome all barriers to learning--even without good conditions for teaching in place. France argues that collective efficacy must…

When it comes to educational equity, we are all part of the problem--and we can all be part of the solution. Here, Shane Safir describes how instructional leaders can put the "warm demander" coaching model into practice. "Warm demanders," she explains, expect a great deal of their colleagues, convince them of their own capacity…

Many school leaders are committed to providing coaching to teachers, but coaching doesn't come together in their school because they haven't taken time to communicate a clear definition of coaching to the school and, especially, set up a clear structure for a coaching program. Aguilar, an education consultant and respected author on coaching,…

Administrators are often removed from the daily instructional realities in classrooms, while teachers aren't given enough opportunities to lead in their schools, write Christina Steinbacher-Reed and Sam A. Rotella Jr. The result is a wall that prevents the two parties from collaborating in a way that improves school culture, teaching practices,…