Leadership development programs: investing in school principals

Considering that some university-based principal preparation programmes may not be properly training principals for leadership roles, “grow your own” leadership development programmes have become more popular across the US. This study provides a contribution to previous research in terms of the specific components a district leadership development programme may incorporate into its curriculum in order to positively influence school principals’ effectiveness as school leaders. A purposeful sample of second-, third- and fourth-year campus principals working in a large urban school district in the south-west region of the US who had participated in their district’s leadership development programme were administered the Principal Effectiveness Survey and participated in semi-structured interviews to examine the influence of the programme on the participants’ effectiveness as leaders. Survey results indicated that principals consider training activities related to human capital, executive leadership, school culture and strategic operations as having a “high” influence on their effectiveness as school leaders. In addition, interview data revealed the importance of supervisor support and building relationships with peers as critical to their continued success as leaders.     

An evaluation model for innovative individualized programs

Program evaluation may be described as a tri-level process. At one level there is diagnostic and developmental evaluation of the learners. At a second level, there is evaluation of the program against its own objectives. And, at a third level, there is evaluation of the program as compared against a criterion program. Traditional programs can be evaluated successfully at each of three levels. However, innovative programs present obstacles to effective evaluation at two levels: (I) learner diagnostic and development; (II) and, (III) relative program effectiveness. It is only at Level II, where the innovative program is judged against its own objectives, that traditional evaluation methods are productive.The purpose of this paper is to describe the tri-level process model used in the evaluation of an innovative secondary program and to discuss the deficits of the model as suggested by the case study reported here. In addition, implications for the evaluation of innovative programs is discussed against a background of the Tyler (1971) model for instructional evaluation.     

The evaluation of faculty development programs

This article reviews literature pertinent to the evaluation of faculty development programs and presents data from several studies conducted at two institutions. These data were consistent with those previously reported in that faculty participants consistently expressed satisfaction with development services. In addition, one study found that most faculty members voluntarily took some action to improve their instructional effectiveness, though only a minority pursued these efforts in depth. Volunteers who worked intensively with a faculty development consultant improved more on objective measures of effectiveness than did those who were only superficially involved in improvement efforts; those who received no consultative assistance failed to improve significantly. Evidence from a final study provided a control for faculty motivation and led to the conclusion that improvement was contingent both on faculty desire to improve and on the availability of professional assistance.     

少数民族神山旅游开发初探

保护完整的少数民族神山生态系统是原始先民对自然崇拜的一种表现形式，也是人与自然和谐共处的集中体现。神山良好的自然生态系统和深厚的历史化积淀为旅游活动的开发提供了可能；合理的生态旅游开发又可以保护神山生态系统。神山自身的资源特色有助于神山旅游产品的个性塑造，神山旅游开发是一个自然——化——经济复合系统的开发，必须在生态学理论的指导下进行。     

Learner-centered Leadership: An Agenda for Action

Institutions are attempting to revitalize undergraduate education through the shift of the dominant pedagogy to a learner-centered focus. While this is encouraging, it is crucial to acknowledge that most of the efforts and literature on the learner-centered paradigm have necessarily focused on strategies for faculty. It is, however, equally important for administrators to consider the impact of the paradigm shift on their roles. Professional development and leadership training that takes into account the need for both a technical shift and shift in perception is key to the success of the transition to a new paradigm. Roxanne Cullen holds a Ph.D in English from Bowling Green State University with a specialization in Rhetoric, and she is a professor of English at Ferris State University. She has held various leadership positions at the University, including serving as the first director of the University Writing Center, the Academic Head of the Department of Languages and Literature, Interim Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, Assistant Vice President for Academic Affairs and most recently Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs. Dr. Michael Harris received his Ph.D. in public policy from Indiana University, his master’s degree from Tel-Aviv University, and his undergraduate degree in economics and business administration from Bar-Ilan University. He is a graduate of the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Institute For Educational Management (IEM) and the Management Development Program (MDP). Dr. Harris serves as the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs at Kettering University. Dr. Harris specializes in public policy and political economy, and he serves as a political commentator to a variety of broadcast and print media in the United States and Israel.     

Partnership for Faith-Based Leadership Development: An Educational Model

Parochial school leaders traditionally rise from the ranks of the teaching staff into the principal position, even if unprepared. Through a unique collaborative model, an outside partner and a university developed a program for formally preparing individuals to be Jewish day school leaders. The process of creating this model resulted in a reconceptualization of school leadership.     

Principal Leadership for Special Education: An Ethical Framework

A constructive home-school relationship is an integral component of a child's educational success. Parents must be equal partners in this relationship. One way to find out what parents' needs are is to ask them. Bryan (1992) asked parents of students in different class settings (regular, resource, and self-contained) for their opinions about homework, testing, and grading practices. On the back of each survey, a space was provided for additional comments. We analyzed unstructured parental comments regarding homework, tests, and grades using qualitative meth- odology to identify patterns. The comments contained eight broad themes: (a) complaints, (b) traditional beliefs about education, (c) alternative beliefs about education, (d) communication issues, (e) beliefs about involvement, (f) stress factors, (g) involvement depends on child characteristics, and (h) compliments. Although some differences emerged between parents of children in resource and self-contained classrooms and parents of children in regular classrooms, parent comments across groups were more similar than different. We discuss homework as a means to bridge home and school and suggest further research in the realm of home-school expectations and communication.     

An Internet-Based Course: Leadership Issues

It comes as no surprise that persons in leadership roles face many decisions related to providing distance learning experiences, especially ones centered on the Internet. In this paper we will try to focus upon leadership issues that arose during the creation and offering of an Internet-based course for high school chemistry teachers. One of us served as the department chair, another as the professor of record and course designer, and the third as a researcher who developed a systematic case study of the course.     

Comprehensive evaluation model: A tool for the evaluation of nontraditional educational programs

The Comprehensive Evaluation Model is a tool which can be used for the evaluation of nontraditional programs. This Model is useful in helping an educator address issues related to program quality, cost-effectiveness and program improvement. The Model is utilization focused, that is, in applying the Model one assesses who needs evaluative information, and for what purpose. There are four levels of program effects which the evaluator can choose to evaluate. The levels are: 1) participant reaction, 2) participant learning, 3) participant transfer of learning, and 4) organizational impact of the program.     

Ubuntu Leadership: An African Panacea for Improving School Performance

Ubuntu-inspired leadership is substantial for responding, in an African way, to the needs of schools seeking to improve their performance. Evoking practices, such as letsema and social cohesion, underpins an African panacea in executing work for desired outcomes. With little extant research on the concept of ubuntu leadership, this article reports on a pioneering study that examined the extent to which infusing the value of ubuntu influences the practices of schools seeking to improve their performance. The objective was to explore measures that ubuntu leadership could take to instil values that would bring about the desired performance. Adopting an ethnographic approach, enquiring conversations were held with principals (individually), focus groups involving parents, other managers and teachers. This resulted in the triangulation of observations (formal and informal) and document analysis. The findings revealed three aspects epitomising ubuntu leadership, namely: holistic ubuntu deportment in leadership practice; cohesive oneness embodied by ubuntu and values within; and voluntarism as an enterprising exercise of letsema. The article concludes by chronicling a leadership charter towards harvesting the cliché simunye or esprit-de-corps.     

Declining Support for Higher-Education Leadership Preparation Programs: An Analysis

University-based leadership preparation programs no longer enjoy a near monopoly on the right to prepare school principals and other administrative leaders, and now compete with a growing number of alternative providers. This article utilizes the new institutionalism literature to analyze this shift. Practitioners and policymakers demanded reforms beginning in the 1980s. Two alternative state responses are discussed—increased regulation alongside deregulation. University-based providers have been weakened by value disagreements, inability to monitor quality, and weak research on program effectiveness. Strategies are discussed for creating a market of providers that is more strongly regulated around quality.     

A conceptual framework for the development,implementation, and evaluation of formal mentoring programs

This research was supported, in part, by the Family and Consumer Sciences Research Institute, College of Family and Consumer Sciences, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, 50011. Journal Paper No. 541. Funding was also provided through the Iowa State University Research Grants Program.     

Priorities for evaluation of nontraditional degree programs

The request to evaluate a nontraditional degree program sounds simple enough. But what does it mean “to evaluate the program?” This article identifies twelve major areas seeming to require evaluative attention according to the perspectives of a number of different groups of people. In addition to identifying these areas, the study suggested priorities for the areas in terms of their long-term, overall importance in a complete evaluation plan and their immediate or short-term importance in the early stages of program implementation.