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Principals' Voices: Leaders' Views of Their Preparation and Development

Sat, April 6, 12:20 to 1:50pm, Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Floor: 200 Level, Room 201C

Abstract

This paper presents the results from a survey of 900 randomly selected California principals about their preparation and professional development experiences. Using the extensive body of research on effective principal preparation and development, this paper investigates the proportion of California principals who receive high quality supports and California principals’ unmet professional development needs.

It is clear that principals matter and that strong preparation and professional development are important for their success and retention in the profession. However, there has been little to no research documenting the proportion of principals that receive learning supports associated with positive school outcomes. This paper informs researchers, policymakers, and practitioners about the preparation and development experience principals currently receive so that policymakers and practitioners make informed investments to support school leaders.

To create our sampling frame, we matched every California school in the Common Core of Data with the publicly available California school directory database that includes administrator names and contact information for each school in California. To maximize the response rate, we then matched these principals to records from the Association for California School Administrators (ACSA) membership database to identify high probability respondents, defined as principals from schools where the principal name in the California school directory matched a principal record in the ACSA database. Two-thirds of the sample was randomly selected from these high probability respondents identified using the ACSA database. The other third was randomly selected from the remaining non-ACSA population of principals. The sampling weights reflect the sample design by accounting for the stratification and differential selection probabilities, and include adjustments for differential response rates and adjustments for matching population totals for certain demographic characteristics. After the completion of data collection, we performed a nonresponse bias analysis (NRBA) as a robustness check. The analysis of the data is mostly descriptive with the goal of investigating California principals’ learning experiences. The survey was powered to make basic descriptive point estimates with a +/- 5% confidence interval.

The results include an analysis of principals’ learning experiences and needs in a number of areas, including: supporting classrooms focused on deeper learning (e.g. implementing new standards, conceptual understanding of content, problem solving and research skills, social emotional development); developing adults as members of an instructional team; redesigning school organizations to better support student and adult learning and community connections; and managing change. Our findings include information on both principal preparation and professional development experiences as well as career satisfaction and plans to leave or stay in the profession.

This paper fills a gap in the literature on principal preparation and professional development by quantifying the amount, focus, and quality of training a large population of principals receive. By understanding principals’ actual learning experiences and needs, policymakers can target federal and state funds to fill the gaps, and principal development programs can design their programs to address high-need areas. This paper will contribute to the improvement of principal preparation and professional development by enabling program administrators and policymakers to make evidence-based decisions about principal learning.

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