3.4 Reality check: designing a new leadership program for the 21st  (Page 5/15)

The plan provides professional development for existing school leaders and improving conditions at lowperforming schools to increase student achievement. Located on the northern shore of Lake Ponchatrain, Louisiana, populations withinthe partnership districts have grown since the natural disaster of Hurricane Katrina and thus the need for highly qualified school leaders is of foremost importance. Current issues of culture,diversity, social justice, and various socio-economic groups are prevalent in this area of the Deep South and add to the manychallenges faced in this era of high-stakes testing and high expectations. The partnership has attempted to design a leadershippreparation program that will foster conditions of success for leadership in a variety of schools.

LEAD Southeastern Louisiana has allied with other leadership preparation programs, professional organizations,and related educational groups around the country to maintain a current knowledge base of best practices in principal preparation,related policy issues, and licensure and professional development for school leaders. These schools and organizations include LEADFairfax in Virginia, the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP), The Gallup Organization, and the SREB.

In 1975, Hills (cited in Murphy, 1992) stated that the educational administrator of the future should understandand be able to use the skills of developmental psychology, socialization, cultural variation, teaching and learning,instructional methods and materials, and curriculum development. Murphy (1992) recommended that the preparation program shouldbecomprised of“the creation of learning communities that incorporate the understandings of the human condition; the infusionof content from a greater variety of areas, especially the humanities; and the use of instructional approaches that promotecooperative effort, dialog and reflection”(p. 146). According to Murphy, the goals for training school leaders should concentrate onthe development of model educators. Each school leader is able to articulate and model the use of (1) an explicit set of values andbeliefs, including a strong sense of social justice, to guide their actions; (2) developmental psychology, socialization, culturalvariation, and instructional and curricular methods and materials; (3) problem solving and inquiry skills; and (4) shared leadership.Murphy (1992) has encouraged universities to use different training models that are thematic-integrated seminars incorporating thecapacity to learn. Candidates should seek knowledge as a tool rooted in action and guided by cognition. Reading material shouldbe the most current gathered from original sources.

Creating the Plan for School Leadership Preparation

During the early stages of the redesign effort, EDL faculty conducted semi-structured informal interviewswith area principals. Many of the interviews took place at current practicum sites. The interviews were for the purpose of solicitingspecific input from principals, such as sequencing, scheduling, and delivery of courses, the cohort concept, and the groups’perceptions regarding needed content, skills and field-based activities prior to assuming an educational administrator role.Principals were asked in which management/leadership areas they felt most prepared as they assumed their first administrative joband in which areas they felt the least prepared. The purpose was to seek input on the sequencing of courses, scheduling and delivery ofcourses, the cohort concept, and their perceived needs regarding needed content and activities prior to assuming a school leadershiprole.