This study examined the leadership practices of seven rural superintendents, selected via a sampling strategy which identified disadvantaged rural districts that had experienced marked increased in test scores during the superintendent's tenure. Researchers examined how the practices of these superintendents were linked to Waters and Marzano's…

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to provide a better understanding of how instructional leadership responsibilities are distributed in International Baccalaureate (IB) schools in East Asia. Research Design: Case studies were conducted in five international schools located in Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong, and China. These schools were selected…

This study investigated how three instructors developed their professional learning of beliefs, knowledge, and practice by examining their professional learning processes using constructive, social constructive, and transformative theoretical perspectives on learning. It also focused on their challenges and supports in developing their…

The purpose of this study was to identify the career and psychosocial functions that mentor teachers and their protege teachers believed occurred during the 2008-2009 mentoring relationship. This comparative survey study was conducted in a suburban middle-sized Florida school district. The target population for this study involved one group of…

The current study investigates how college students expect to react to inequity in blended friendships. Blended friendship is defined as a friendship that involves interaction at work and outside of work. Data from undergraduate students (N = 185) showed that liking and relational importance were found to be lower in underreward and overreward…

Developing systems and opportunities for effective dialogue is critical if schools wish to help teachers work collectively. One school used Socratic seminars, structured conversations about selected texts. These seminars helped teachers to build relationships, share practice, and change curriculum and policy. The seminars also were critical to…

This case introduces Karen, a middle school literacy coach attempting to navigate the myriad tasks she performs. As she aims to satisfy everyone's needs Karen struggles to prioritize and focus her work. The accompanying teaching notes utilize the International Reading Association's "Standards for Middle and High School Literacy Coaches" to…

This report describes a problem based learning project focusing on the cultural elements of a high performing school district. Current literature on school district culture provides numerous cultural elements that are present in high performing school districts. With the current climate in education placing pressure on school districts to perform…

"Irreplaceables" are teachers who are so successful they are nearly impossible to replace, but who too often vanish from schools as the result of neglect and inattention. To identify and better understand the experience of these teachers, the authors started by studying 90,000 teachers across four large, geographically diverse urban school…

Today's healthcare can be characterised by the increasing importance of specialisation that requires cooperation across disciplines and specialities. In view of the number of educational programmes for interdisciplinary cooperation, surprisingly little is known on how learning arises from interdisciplinary work. In order to analyse the learning…

Successful educational leadership is not a random phenomenon, but an executed success which leaves clues whereby one can discover them. These clues lead to a desired destination--higher student achievement. Essential, non-negotiable elements have been identified. That is, each element has been systemically embedded at schools that have turned from…

Four years ago, a group of teachers lingered after a district meeting, sharing a conversation about encouraging social responsibility in the school district of Tenafly, New Jersey. That conversation led to the eventual formation of a teacher study group, a grassroots professional learning community that has impacted its members and the school…

This article takes issue with the notion that professional learning communities need to be more focused on teacher expertise through the use of online videos of lessons taught by expert teachers that are aligned with the Common Core State Standards. The authors argue that the use of externally developed, research-based, and standards-aligned…

This article makes a number of interconnected arguments. First, spatially and temporally distributed project teams constitute a new form of interprofessional work and, as a corollary, a new site for interprofessional learning. Second, researchers in cultural-historical activity theory have generated some concepts and methods, for example,…

To improve student achievement schools need the leadership of knowledgeable, highly skilled, and visionary principals and superintendents. Exemplary school leadership doesn't develop in isolation, however. Strong leadership grows from dynamic, collaborative, and intentional interactions between superintendents and their principals. These savvy…