Abstract
Leadership practice is located in many arenas of practice. Leaders coach, mediate, advocate, encourage, promote, sponsor, and support members of the school community to reach shared and valued goals. The ongoing question for preparation programs and professional development is how best to teach and support aspiring leaders do this. In this issue of Journal of Research on Leadership Education (JRLE), we address two complimentary aspects of leadership preparation that contribute to the growing knowledge base. The first addresses instruction, specifically instructional leadership (Boston, Henrick, Gibbons, Berebitsky, and Colby) and instructional supervision (Stark, McGhee, and Jimerson). The second attends to the ethical development of preservice principals (Mullen), the ways in which EdD students cultivate new identities as leaders and researchers (Buss and Avery), and how practitioners conduct educational research and evaluation (Mansfield and Stacy).
In the first article of this issue, Boston, Henrick, Gibbons, Berebitsky, and Colby (“Investigating How to Support Principals as Instructional Leaders in Mathematics”) explore the ways in which principals can become instructional leaders for mathematics. After addressing how the knowledge principals have about mathematics tasks and instruction can be enhanced and how principals’ actions in supporting high-quality instructional tasks in mathematics might be fostered, the authors wisely consider how principals’ professional learning might support instruction in other content areas. They determine that even short professional development efforts can have strong effects when paired with other district initiatives designed to support student learning. They note that as district focus shifts between initiatives, principals’ efficacy wanes suggesting that coherence of effort matters for long-term instructional leadership.
Our second article by Stark, McGhee, and Jimerson (“Reclaiming Instructional Supervision: Using Solution-Focused Strategies to Promote Teacher Development”) focuses on the ways instructional supervision can be enhanced by the implementation of solution-focused strategies. In this conceptual piece, the authors posit a blended model that equips instructional leaders with nondirective and collaborative strategies to honor and build on teachers’ classroom strengths. Nondirective strategies include attention to listening, clarifying, encouraging, and reflecting on practices that have proven themselves to be effective in the classroom. Collaborative strategies for facilitating growth include presenting ideas and practices, brainstorming and problem-solving, and negotiating resolutions.
Clearly, instruction and instructional leadership lie at the heart of leadership practice. Yet, good leadership encompasses more than instructional practice. Without solid preparation, an understanding of the knowledge base that underscores the field, and clarity concerning how to evaluate progress toward goals, leaders are limited in their effectiveness. Our next collection of articles addresses these very issues. Mullen (“What’s Ethics Got To Do With It? Pedagogical Support for Ethical Student Learning in a Principal Preparation Program”) explores the research on ethics in leadership education and offers direction for teaching about ethical leadership. Reporting results of a yearlong qualitative study of pedagogical practice, Mullen offers guidance for further research and program practices that foster aspiring leaders’ ethical identity, growth, and development.
Buss and Avery (“Research Becomes You: Cultivating EdD Students’ Identities as Educational Leaders and Researchers and a ‘Learning by Doing’ Meta-Study) also look to program data as they explore identity development of EdD students as they strive to become leaders and researchers. Utilizing a quantitative and qualitative data set, they suggest that early and ongoing efforts toward developing knowledge and skills in both leadership and research matter—if lasting, robust gains are to be realized. In addition, the importance of program faculty attention to the development of new professional identities is stressed, suggesting that, if EdD students are to gain the insights faculty wish them to, it is incumbent upon instructors to directly support such learning.
The Mansfield and Stacy article (“Preparing Practitioners to Conduct Educational Research and Evaluation: What the Research Says and What Our Experiences Taught Us”) takes on the challenge of examining the on-the-ground realities of teaching practitioners to conduct educational research. Focusing on their work in teaching practitioner-scholars, they describe how attention to adult learning (andragogy), team teaching, locating and addressing challenges as they arise, and employing a strengths-based cohort model provides preparation program faculty necessary tools for the creation of engaging, authentic pedagogy. Key to gains is reflection upon practice and learning, a finding echoed by all three of these studies.
The issue concludes with a book review of Brooks and Brooks’s (2015) volume Urban Educational Leadership for Social Justice: International Perspectives. The volume provides a comprehensive review of the construct of social justice through an international lens. The volume broadens our definitions of social justice and provides exemplars of what practices in the field look like beyond the borders of the United States.
In total, this issue addresses important areas of the work concerning leadership preparation and offers much to think about for our work.