The Instructional Leadership Practices of Elementary Principals of Average Needs/resource Capacity School Districts in New York State PDF Download

Author: Rebecca DeVries
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Educational leadership
Languages : en
Pages : 120

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Book Description
Due in part to higher demands for educational accountability at both the Federal and state levels, the role of the school principal has come to the forefront. Previous literature has considered the indirect ways in which school principals affect student achievement. Of particular interest has been the implementation of instructional leadership by school principals. This study advances the literature around the perception of school leader evaluation through the lens of instructional leadership. Through a quantitative survey, sent to both elementary principals and third through fifth grade teachers of average needs resource capacity school districts, the perceptions regarding instructional leadership and specific practices were illuminated as outlined by the Marzano, Carbaugh, and Toth (2015) School Leadership Evaluation Model. Although the Marzano et al. (2015) School Leadership Evaluation Model contains five primary domains, the one focused on within this work is the Domain 2, "Continuous Improvement of Instruction." Using data from the quantitative surveys, three separate research questions were analyzed. The first two research questions included the self-reported degree of adherence to the practices by elementary principals, as well as elementary teachers' perceptions of their principals' actions in relation to Domain 2 of Marzano et al.'s (2015) model. The third research question sought to consider whether a relationship existed between elementary principal adherence to the practices found within Domain 2 (Marzano et al., 2015) and student achievement outcomes as measured by the grades 3-5 New York State English Language Arts assessment. The findings illustrate that elementary principals and grade 3 through 5 teachers of average needs and resource capacity school districts perceive that, to varying levels of adherence, they are observing the 25 instructional practices found within Domain 2 of the Marzano et al. (2015) School Leadership Evaluation Model. However, contrary to expectations, there was no relationship between elementary principal adherence to the practices found within domain two (Marzano et al., 2015) and student achievement outcomes as measured by the grades 3-5 New York State English Language Arts assessment, excluding one instructional practice. A re-thinking of use of the model in connection with state and Federal policies related to accountability and principal evaluations at the local level are discussed. Recommendations for practice and use in school districts for elementary principals is also provided.