Connecting Principals’ Professional Development to Practice: The Mediating Roles of Context and Phronesis

• In Event: Roundtable Session 13
  In Roundtable Session: Development and Conception of Principals as Leaders

Abstract

This paper presents findings from a continuing study of principals’ acquisition, contextualization, and application of learning from professional development (PD). The purpose of this study was to validate and refine prior research findings suggesting a progressive and recursive thinking process used by principals to mediate between the acquisition and application of new knowledge. This qualitative case study addressed three questions: (1) how do principals process PD learning, (2) how do principals apply PD learning, and (3) what makes PD useful to principals. Results confirmed findings from the prior research and added to those findings in several ways. This research offers a theory into practice model for understanding how principals acquire and integrate new knowledge into practice.

Author

• Pat A. Schroeder, Texas A&M University