Characteristics of Teachers Nominated for an Accelerated Principal Preparation Program

This article reports the initial evaluation results of a new accelerated, job-embedded principal preparation program funded by a Race to the Top Grant (U.S. Department of Education, 2012a) in Florida. Descriptive statistics, t-tests, and chi-square analyses were used to describe the characteristics of a group of potential applicants nominated to the program by their principals. Demographic and education-related variables for the group were compared to a group of self-selected students enrolled in an existing educational leadership master’s program at the same public university. Initial statistical analysis revealed that more than two-thirds of the nominated teachers belonged to a minority group and had not majored in education as undergraduates. These findings have immediate implications for this new program and for research related to the identification of potential future educational leaders. DOI: 10.4018/javet.2012040104 36 International Journal of Adult Vocational Education and Technology, 3(2), 35-46, April-June 2012 Copyright © 2012, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. school director, etc.) (Herrington & Wills, 2005; McGuire, 2002). In July, 2009, as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), United States President Barack Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced $4.35 billion in competitive funds for an initiative titled the Race to the Top (RTTT) (White House, 2012). This major new educational initiative leveraged the availability of hundreds of millions of new funding dollars to encourage states to demonstrate their openness to substantially change their educational laws and policies to advance a specific Federal government-backed educational agenda. Some of the long-term outcomes of the agenda would directly impact systems in place, mostly at colleges of education, to train educational leaders – principals and assistant principals. By August of 2010, the U.S. Department of Education had awarded Race to the Top (RTTT) grants to 11 states and the District of Columbia. Florida received $700 million (U.S. Department of Education, 2012b). RTTT emphasizes the following reform areas: designing and implementing rigorous standards and high-quality assessments, attracting and keeping highly-effective teachers and leaders, supporting data systems that inform decisions and improve instruction, using innovation and effective approaches to turn-around struggling schools, demonstrating and sustaining education reform. The “sustaining education reform” aspect of the initiative includes plans to promote “other conditions favorable to innovation and reform” (White House, 2009, p. 1). This initial study is focused on the leadership reforms promoted by the RTTT initiative. This focus on leadership reform in schools is not new to the profession. Critics and reformers have been paying increased attention to improvement needs in educational reform. The critics contend that college and university-based educational leadership programs are too timeconsuming, too theoretical and are out of touch with the day-to-day realities faced by front line educators and school leaders (Levine, 2005). Furthermore, the critics state that the recruitment of applicants is faulty, with few effective systems in place to assure that high-quality candidates are recruited to apply for advanced educational degrees that lead to certification and entry into educational leadership positions. Along with the federal government, national organizations such as the National Governors Association and the Chief State School Officers have challenged school district human resource professionals and their college and university colleagues to work together to fundamentally alter existing pre-service and in-service programs for current and future teachers and educational leaders. This article is about the first stage of evaluation of a new and innovative partnership between a state university and a large urban school district that have received a $3.5 million grant to create a new kind of educational leadership preparation program, one that has been structured to respond to Federal and state requirements and to conform with what research indicates are effective methods with which to train educational leaders. Information derived from this report can serve not only to inform local program improvement efforts, but may provide helpful information to developers or prospective developers of educational leadership programs in other parts of the country and the world.