Getting Serious About Leadership

By M. Christine DeVita

Lost amid the sea of reforms, reports, commentaries, and suggestions on how to improve the nation’s public education system is a simple truth: Underperforming schools are unlikely to succeed until we get serious about preparing and supporting school leaders. The importance of having high-quality teaching in the classroom is a given. But we often fail to recognize that it is the principal alone who can ensure that the teaching and learning in every classroom are as good as they can be.

This is especially true in underperforming schools. As the University of Toronto researcher Kenneth Leithwood and his colleagues put it in their landmark 2004 report “How Leadership Influences Student Learning” : “There are virtually no documented instances of troubled schools being turned around in the absence of intervention by talented leaders. While other factors within the school also contribute to such turnarounds, leadership is the catalyst.”

If leadership is in fact the critical bridge to having school improvements pay off for children, we need to understand how to better prepare principals to lead the increasingly complex institution we call school, so that all children can...