0.5 Why is school leadership preparation so complex  (Page 5/11)

New Research Initiatives

As part of the ongoing search for the“holy grail”for evidence of successful leadership preparation, several promising initiatives are currently underway. First, acollaborative effort among the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA), National Council of Professors ofEducational Administration (NCPEA), and American Education Research Association (AERA)-Division A are producing a Handbook onLeadership Research edited by Gary Crow and Michelle Young. Ten domain leaders are working with other scholars to contributechapters on a variety of leadership preparation topics investigating the links between preparation and successfulpractice. The primary aims of this effort is to (1) provide a foundation about existing research and theory in the field ofleadership preparation; 2) identify gaps and new directions for research and leadership preparation; 3) stimulate more, betterquality research in the field of leadership preparation; 4) encourage new and experienced researchers to undertake research inthe field; and 5) provide a community of scholars for on-going conceptual and methodological work (Orr, 2006). Other initiativesare the new UCEA Journal of Research on Leadership Education (JRLE), the new School Leadership Review (SLR) published by theTexas Professors of Educational Administration (TPEA), and the NCPEA Educational Leadership Review. Unless, more compellingevidence is found linking preparation to successful practice, graduate programs in educational administration could face evengreater scrutiny by professional administrator associations, university administrators, and policy makers at state and nationallevels. Unless research directs greater efforts to reveal more reliable evidence that the course work and related clinicalexperience prepares more effective school leaders other providers will fill the void with on-line and less expensive degrees andcredentials. . The Broad Foundation, on-line universities, i.e., Phoenix, Devry, and others are making claims that their programsfor preparing school leaders are as successful as the traditional graduate schools and departments and at less cost and greaterconvenience to school administrators in full-time jobs who claim time constraints bar them from entering traditional, research-based, on-campus graduate programs.

Educational administration is not alone in lacking convincing research evidence that their graduate programsproduce successful graduates. Graduate programs in business administration, public administration, hospital administration,health administration, and sports management suffer from a lack of solid research evidence that their graduates becomesuccessful as a direct result of their graduate studies. Programs in architecture,medicine, agriculture, computer science, and engineering, and other professional schools claim to have tighter links betweenpreparation and practice due to the more measurable skills and performance expectations of meeting professional standards. Thus,while educational administration continues to question which set of preparation standards are superior measures of successful practice,the gap remains between what skills are taught and what skills really make for successful practice. An expert panel was appointedin 2006 to revisit the ISLLC standards since 44 states have either adopted the standards or adapted them to meet state certificationand degree requirements. Recent on-going inquiry into leadership preparation by UCEA, NCPEA, and AERA and individual researcherswill provide greater insights into the preparation-practice gap. This writer with the assistance of Professor Mario Torres of TexasA&M University will investigate possible links to the gap during 2006-2007. First, we will visit 6 of the top 10 graduateprograms in educational administration (ranked by U.S. News and World Report), to conduct interviews with graduate faculty,full-time students, and successful practicing principals and superintendent who graduated with doctorates from these top sixprograms in educational administration/policy/leadership. We will gather data on student admission, selection, and faculty mentoringprocedures, curriculum requirements, instructional processes including the balance between traditional classroom anddistance/web-based instruction, independent and group research activities, extent and variety of field/clinical requirements,types and extent of student progress assessments including course, entrance, preliminary, and final exams.