Priority Areas

Educational Leadership

In response to the U.S. Department of Education's charge to serve as the lead Regional Educational Laboratory for Educational Leadership, LSS has identified three focus areas that will advance the knowledge base needed to achieve the overall goal of transforming low-performing schools into high-performing learning communities:

• Capacity building at all levels to promote student learning and higher performance. LSS aims to advance procedural "know how" and provide technical assistance and evaluation support to state and district boards of education to develop policy initiatives, refine existing practices, and assess the impact of reform on teaching and learning. At the school-site level, the work of the LSS Services to the Field Unit will greatly expand the knowledge-based professional development and outreach program in the region and nationally.

• Leadership development through principals, leadership teams, and small learning communities that focus on content knowledge and pedagogy that promote student learning success. Widespread consensus on outcome-based accountability has created new challenges for educational leadership. Policymakers and practitioners have yet to agree on a common strategy to transform low-performing schools into high-performing learning communities. LSS's strategies includes the use of best practices in curriculum and instruction from early childhood through high school; broadening parental and community engagement to foster a supportive learning environment for at-risk students; and strategies to raise student engagement, reduce apathy, challenge students' academic interests, and facilitate ongoing support for teachers' knowledge development and collegial exchange.

• Synthesizing the existing knowledge base on school reforms and gather firsthand information on the design and implementation of alternative governance practices. Parental preferences and school autonomy are seen as the driving force to improve low-performing schools. Regardless of one's position on these emerging alternatives, there is an urgent research need to find out whether and how these new strands of service delivery are working.

projects for the Educational Leadership task

Supporting Schools for High Achievement

The work in this area advances the knowledge base needed to transform low-performing schools into high-performing learning communities, while improving teacher quality. The following design principles guide LSS projects that address this critical area: (a) scientifically-based resilience research, both on individuals (e.g. students and teachers) and institutions; (b) collaboration with "strategic partners" to provide information and technical assistance for informed decision making and planning for implementation to meet reform needs; and (c) networking to contribute directly to capacity building at all levels to ensure student success in meeting state and local standards and utilize the procedural knowledge to scale up school reform efforts focusing particularly on low-performing schools with a high concentration of students from educationally and economically disadvantaged rural and urban communities. Three key areas of LSS's work in this area of teacher quality and supply include: (a) reengineering schools and colleges of education to increase the region's capacity to improve learning, both for children at rural and urban schools and for pre-service teachers; (b) developing a regional database that will detail the similarities and differences between states with regard to licensing, recruitment, and certification practices; and (c) formulating policies that will support an intensive common approach to these issues.