Over the last couple of years, in our individual coaching and long-term hybrid Instructional Leadership Collective work, the two of us have discovered a pattern. Regardless of which country we are working in, school and district leaders and their teams are focused on the same common themes when we engage them in cycles of inquiry to come up with a problem they want to solve.

In surveys with nearly 1,000 leaders we have worked with over the last couple of years, it has become clear that there are 11 problems educators are working really hard to solve. So, for this post in the new year, we wanted to highlight the problems, which we also refer to as critical issues. In our inquiry cycles, leaders tell us they have been working on them for multiple years.

This is by no means an exhaustive list of critical issues, nor is it written in any particular order of importance, but we have grouped them into three categories, which you will see below. As we know, politics, especially the divisive politics we are experiencing in the U.S., infiltrate our schools, but the reality is that none of the leaders who we work with talks about politics as one of their top priorities. Politics is merely something they have to navigate—the topic for a future blog post—so they can get to those other problems.

The Critical Issues
Student Outcomes

Equity - Equity has been a lightning rod word in recent years, but we are finding many leaders and teachers are persevering as they try to find strategies that will positively impact students. This opinion piece in Education Week offers some practical ideas.

Student Engagement and Belonging - Student engagement has been a critical issue for decades. In fact, researchers back in 1972 found two types of alienation that students feel: identification and powerlessness. Those researchers defined identification as a “student’s’ sense of belonging to his school.” Powerlessness is defined as a “student’s feeling of incapacity to affect the direction of his learning.”

Attendance and Chronic Absenteeism - Paying attention to student engagement and belonging is directly connected to attendance and chronic absenteeism. This Education Week Special Report focuses on that connection. Absenteeism is not just about students. This Brookings report from 2025 focuses on the increase in teacher absenteeism as well.

Multilingual Learners - Teachers and leaders are searching for effective methods for teachers to work with English learners. That has been a consistent theme when we work with individual leaders through coaching or within Instructional Leadership Collectives. This Education Week video offers some helpful tips for educators.

Tier 1 Instruction and MTSS Clarity - Tier 1 and MTSS have consistently come up as one of the top themes for leaders and teachers. In our Instructional Leadership Collective work in Washington state, Tier 1 is such a popular critical issue that three groups have homed in on the topic.

Data Use That Drives Instruction - We know that the idea of using data to drive instruction has been a familiar critical issue for decades. The reality is that beyond using data to drive instruction, leaders are focused on using data to drive their leadership practices as well. We engage in cycles of inquiry with them so they can use that data to help them develop more coherence in their practices. Read more here about cycles of inquiry.

Banning Technology - The last couple of years have also seen more and more districts banning cellphones, which you can read about here. Now there are calls to take a step further and take laptops out of classrooms, too, which you can read about here in The Screen That Ate Your Child’s Education. This will be a critical issue to follow in 2026.

Adult Capacity
Culture of Collaboration, Not Compliance - Another common theme that comes up in our work is that of creating better ways to collaborate. Leaders are seeing this as a critical way to solve their teacher-shortage issue at the same time providing a climate of deep learning for all staff. Both of us were school leaders who had the great benefit of collaborating with teachers, which made us better leaders. We recently wrote about how leaders and teachers can collaborate in deep ways.

Teacher Shortage - Public education has often been on the receiving end of negative anecdotes. The two of us are proud of our many years in the classroom and believe that teachers can have a lifelong positive impact on students. This story from Education Week shows that the teacher shortage is not just confined to the United States. Better pay, improving the mental health of students and adults, and a culture of collaboration would go a long way to lessen the shortage.

Leadership Systems
Prioritizing and Managing Overwhelming Demands - When we help school and district leaders focus on a problem of practice, most times we are politely confronted with the same question: “Where do we start?” It’s hard for leaders to focus on one area when they have so many others to worry about as well. It also explains the rest of this list that follows.

Leadership Capacity and Systems Building - Our work focuses on collective leader efficacy: the shared belief that through developing shared understanding around critical issues, engaging in joint work, and collecting evidence of impact, school and district leadership teams can positively impact the issues they face. That joint work is meant to help build capacity for teachers and contributes to distributed leadership. Read this research to learn more about the benefits of capacity building.

Call to Action
If we know these are 11 areas being focused on here in the United States and the several other English-speaking countries where we work, could we work in collectives to find better solutions for students? This would mean working in collective groups with leaders from different schools, districts, or states. It would certainly break down isolation and silos and embrace a united effort of collaboration.

Let us know which critical issues you are focusing on. Connect with us to share your thoughts on Instagram or BlueSky (Michael’s Bluesky and Peter’s BlueSky).