Practical strategies to help principals manage their time more effectively are offered in this guidebook. Because superintendents' expectations of principals' duties often contrast with the amount of time principals actually expend in performing various duties, this lack of understanding and time results in the "hurried principal syndrome."…

This report draws from a study being conducted by William Massy and Andrea Wilger for the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE). The study examines how academic departments work in order to identify organizational incentives that can improve productivity. The brief offers some definitions of productivity in higher education and…

The School-Based Improvement Project (SBIP) is a cooperative venture between the Office of Community Education of the Massachusetts Department of Education and the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents (MASS). SBIP is a multiyear professional-development initiative designed to improve the leadership of superintendents who are engaged…

Findings of a study that examined the key elements necessary for administrative instructional leadership in elementary schools are presented in this paper, with a focus on the conflict between the use of power and collaboration. Interviews were conducted with 8 elementary school principals (3 men and 5 women) who were identified as exemplary…

This paper presents findings of a study that investigated the size and composition of the corps of school district administrators in North Carolina. Findings suggest that most North Carolina school districts are staffed traditionally with regard to administration--concentrating on district operation, the instructional program, and federal or state…

The challenge of creating site-level support for teacher involvement in collaborative inquiry and reflective discourse is examined in this paper, which asserts that this process is an important component of school leadership in general and instructional leadership in particular. In considering the amount of "sense-making" to be…

This paper describes a proposed five-phase model for assessing the instructional leadership of rural school administrators. In phase one, assessors conduct a structured interview to determine participants' understanding of the skills and functions required of the instructional leader. Phase two allows participants to review and evaluate video…

The effectiveness of assessment centers in evaluating desirable criteria for the principalship is examined in this report, with a focus on the identification of the most effective evaluation criteria. This study explored a variety of factors in the preparation of school personnel for assessment, the actual National Association of Secondary School…

Thailand has dramatically increased access to education in the past 25 years; however, like many other developing nations, the country now faces the pressing need to improve educational quality--especially at the primary level. To improve Thailand's primary school quality, the quality of teaching and school administration must be improved. Some…

A survey of Oregon school administrators explored the relationships among demographic characteristics, school building and school district constraints, and leadership impact. Methodology involved a mailed survey of 420 administrators, which yielded 319 responses, or a 70 percent response rate, and in-depth personal interviews with 144 respondents.…

Management by wandering around (MBWA) is the catalyst that brings teachers, aides, parents, and administrators together in the pursuit of excellent schools. This book, based on common sense and hundreds of years of experience, offers specific strategies and techniques for using MBWA to obtain excellence. The building blocks of school excellence,…

An exploration of the process by which newly hired high school principals learn instructional leadership roles is presented in this paper, which focuses on the effect of faculty and superintendent expectations on principals' leadership behavior. A triangularized methodology includes indepth interviews with new principals, (n=28) from a midwestern…

Identification of the dimensions of effective supervisory practice is the focus of this literature review of the past 15 years. The two main objectives are to identify the knowledge, attitudes, and skills for effective educational supervision and to verify the importance of the knowledge, attitudes, and skills from a sample of practitioners. The…

Issues involved in improving administrator preparation programs are described in this ERIC Digest. A literature review identifies appropriate skills and methods for administrator training and summarizes recommendations such as application of theory to practice and development of full-time internships, school/university collaboration, mentorships,…

This paper describes the range of variation in the key working conditions of 13 new teachers in 6 different high schools in California. A prologue tells the stories of "Alex" and "Michael" to show how two equally promising young teachers may encounter working conditions as different as a cradle is from a crucible. The second…