What Great Principals Really Do: 4 Leadership Behaviors that Contribute to Your School Success
A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves.
– Lao Tzu
INTRO
According to the article “What Great Principals Really Do,” “A school’s success is largely determined by the effectiveness of its principal—decades of research have made this clear. Less settled is the question of what principals need to know and do to drive positive outcomes in their schools.” The research findings of a 2021 report help narrow down “what principals need to know and do” into four themes all implemented through the lens of equity: Instructionally Focused Interactions, Building a Productive School Climate, Facilitating Collaboration, and Strategic Management.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand the 4 leadership behaviors that contribute to positive school outcomes
- Evaluate how you do and can apply each of the 4 behaviors (generally and/or with an MTSS focus) to drive your school’s success
Instructionally Focused Interactions
- leverage accurate, high-quality teacher evaluation that improves teacher practice and student achievement
- useful and timely feedback of observations teachers can use to enhance impact with students
- use data to:
- guide specific instructional decisions
- drive the school’s overall instructional program
- inspire action around improvement
- monitor the school’s progress toward its goals
Building a Productive School Climate
- help teachers feel empowered
- help students feel safe, valued, and supported
- draw on emotional and social intelligence to foster a school environment that promotes trust, collaboration, engagement with data, and continuous improvement
- support and affirm the local community’s culture, language, and traditions
Facilitating Collaboration
- encourage collaboration by ensuring common planning time for instructional teams
- set-up & maintain high-functioning professional learning communities (PLCs)
- explicitly connect PLCs to other learning opportunities for teachers (i.e. in-service trainings)
- leverage the expertise of others in the school to push PLC work
Strategic Management
- optimize how resources are used or allocated to support teaching and learning
- consistently hire strong teachers to see higher school growth
- make hiring decisions based on evidence about what makes teachers effective (i.e. grade levels, specific student groups, etc.)
- disrupt patterns of assignment inequity
- i.e. low-achieving and/or low-income students are more often assigned to less experienced and/or less effective teachers
- take steps to reduce overall teacher turnover in their buildings, especially among their best teachers
REFLECTION
- For each of the 4 Leader Behavior categories, list at least one behavior/etc. you are already implementing that is working well
- TIP: be very specific with what you are doing and the outcomes of this behavior/action).
- For each of the 4 Leader Behavior categories, brainstorm ideas for how they can help contribute to a powerful MTSS framework at your school and/or drive your school’s success generally (if you are not implementing MTSS)
- TIP: think of ideas already considered or shared with you as well as areas for improvement
Responses