Case Studies on Educational Administration

This book immerses prospective administrators in the realities of practice and decision-making through the use of a wide range of open-ended case studies. Effective practice in school administration involves making decisions about management of schools and reform, including state deregulation, district decentralization, and school restructuring. Leaders need to think beyond management and consider how to affect school culture, professional development, and changing populations. The cases in this book will help leaders address those issues by honing three key skills: (1) How to identify and solve problems; (2) How to develop and evaluate alternative solutions; (3) How to continuously refine professional knowledge

Preparing Teachers to be Leaders: Barriers in the Workplace

Efforts to prepare teachers to be leaders are often impeded by a number of barriers in society and schools. Obstacles in the workplace are largely products of organizational cultures and climates that place teachers in subordinate roles. The argument is made that consideration of these barriers must be incorporated into revisions of teacher education curricula

Planning and Managing School Facilities

Theodore Kowalski addresses the administrative procedures associated with planning and managing school facilities. Practitioner interest in school facilities has been growing rapidly in recent years because decades of neglect, poor planning, and cost cutting have created a situation in which large numbers of America\u27s school buildings are in need of major repair or replacement. At the same time, the realization that costs related to repair and replacement have escalated significantly has fueled a new concern among school facility planning and management. Writing for school administrators, superintendents, and board members as well as graduate students in education, Kowalski discusses planning from the perspective of both individual facility projects and more comprehensive district-wide efforts. The responsibilities associated with administering school buildings are also approached from the individual school and district program perspective

Cultural Change Paradigms and Administrator Communication

Public school reform has taken three distinct turns over the past two decades. In the early 1980s, most policymakers blamed a lack of educational productivity on lazy students. Influenced by this argument, virtually every state legislature enacted laws lengthening the school year, lengthening the school day, and increasing high school graduation requirements. Within a relatively short period of time, however, the would-be reformers concluded that intensification of student experiences was insufficient to produce significant improvements. While not abandoning their original conviction, they shifted their attention to a second target-educators. The result was a flurry of proposals to revise or eliminate teacher education curricula and licensing standards. But these actions also proved to be incomplete, and by the early 1990s, the reformers identified a third target- the organizational configuration of schools (Bauman, 1996). Now that reform is focusing largely on school restructuring, cultural change has become a popular topic in school administration. This article explores the meaning of school restructuring and culture change paradigms. A nexus between institutional cultural and communication is proposed, and an argument is made that cultural change will not occur unless those leading the process possess necessary communication knowledge and skills

Job Evaluation

Knowing the factors used in the annual performance evaluation of superintendents is foundational to building a more effective process. The accompanying graph, based on AAS~s decennial survey of the field, shows how superintendents rank seven response options about the conduct of their own assessments by school boards. Critics claim current evaluation practices are plagued by ambiguous purposes, unrealistic expectations, uneven and subjective processes, and invalid outcomes. The overall quality of superintendent evaluations suffers from the variation in the bases of assessments and the number and competence of the evaluators. The limited application of national standards (such as those published by AASA in 1993) and state superintendent association guidelines is especially disturbing because such documents should include essential and validated job requirements. Greater uniformity in evaluation criteria, within and across states, would be a step toward ensuring more purposeful and objective outcomes

Contemporary School Administration: An Introduction

Contemporary School Administration presents a pragmatic approach to school administration as a career choice, offering a broad, comprehensive overview of educational leadership in both public and private schools. The initial chapters provide a foundation for understanding leadership and management, the primary components of administration. Common questions students ask regarding academic study, licensure, job opportunities, income, and career development are featured in the early chapters. The text is also unique in that it covers critical topics ignored in most other introductory books. Examples of these topics include private schools, women and minorities in administration, and communication. Content does not overlap with subject matter commonly covered in subsequent courses. Material at the end of each chapter can be used for individual and group assignments as well as for class discussions

The Role of Communication in Providing Leadership for School Restructuring

Educational reform now focuses largely on school restructuring. In this context, both transformational leadership and cultural change paradigms have become critical issues for school administrators. The argument is made that both concepts are inextricably linked to communication. Consequently, leadership for change requires both an adequate knowledge base pertaining to leadership and organizational theory and knowledge and skill in the area of communication theory. A research agenda for studying communication in schools and the inclusion of communication theory in the preparation of school administrators are recommended

Professional Qualifications and Gender

Literature comparing male and female superintendents rather consistently has reported differences in professional qualifications. Most notably, females have higher levels of professional experience, especially as teachers, before becoming a superintendent. Logically, authors studying this topic conclude that females usually must have superior credentials to enter the position. Two findings in AASA\u27s latest decennial study of superintendents, one pertaining to teaching experience and the other to age upon entering the position, suggest the conclusion remains valid. In 2010, 28 percent of males and 13 percent of females had fewer than 6 years of teaching experience. In 2000, those figures were 41 percent and 20 percent, respectively. Thus, the percentages of superintendents with limited teaching experience dropped over the decade, but the ratio between males and females with limited teaching remained essentially the same. As for age, in 2010 only 13.5 percent of females versus 36 percent of males became first-time superintendents before the age of 41

Public Relations in Educational Organizations: Practice in an Age of Information and Reform

This collection of readings addresses the greatest demand being placed upon educational administrators in this, the Age of Information — using technology to create two-way communication systems within their organizations and between their organizations and their communities. The author integrates theories and techniques taken from a wide variety of leading theorists and practitioners in both public relations and educational administration to provide an interdisciplinary, contemporary foundation for practice

Evolution of the School District Superintendent Position

Clearly, no issue is currently more crucial to the future of the position of school district superintendent than the battle being fought over professional preparation and state licensing. The intent of licensing professionals is to protect society and not the licensee. Consequently, a decision to deregulate a profession should not be made solely in political arenas in which self- and group interests are more likely to outweigh societal interests. This chapter is grounded in the belief that persons within a profession, regardless of their personal views, have a responsibility to ensure that policy debates of this magnitude will be objective and empirically based. As a first step toward meeting this obligation, the content of this chapter traces the evolution of the superintendency in the context of five role conceptualizations. The intent is to demonstrate the depth and complexity of the position\u27s knowledge base. In addition, the argument is made that future policy decisions will be enlightened if role conceptualizations are considered and critiqued in relation to the nature of local school districts, minority practitioner perspectives (both gender and race), and traditional approaches to professional preparation