Positive Leadership Philosophy

The importance of effective leadership and its impact on improving student achievement are evident in today’s schools (Leithwood, Louis, Anderson, and Wahlstrom, 2004). While the school principal is traditionally thought to be the school leader, Glickman (1989) proposes that “the principal of successful schools is not the instructional leader but the educational leader who mobilizes the expertise, talent, and care of others” (p. 8). Lumpkin, Claxton, and Wilson (2014) contend that helping “each school fulfill its mission and energize and expand the professionalism and professional contributions of teachers, the expertise of all teachers, especially teacher leaders, is needed” (p. 59). Teachers directly impact student learning, and

The importance of effective leadership and its impact on improving student achievement are evident in today’s schools (Leithwood, Louis, Anderson, and Wahlstrom, 2004). While the school principal is traditionally thought to be the school leader, Glickman (1989) proposes that “the principal of successful schools is not the instructional leader but the educational leader who mobilizes the expertise, talent, and care of others” (p. 8). Lumpkin, Claxton, and Wilson (2014) contend that helping “each school fulfill its mission and energize and expand the professionalism and professional contributions of teachers, the expertise of all teachers, especially teacher leaders, is needed” (p. 59). Teachers directly impact student learning,

Through introspection and from experiences and observations of past and current administrators as well as the readings from the courses I have taken in the Leadership Program, my leadership philosophy has evolved and it conveys the core values and beliefs that I think form the foundation for an effective educational leader. The foundational tenets for my leadership philosophy include: a visionary leader that sees the big picture and sets clear, specific goals by developing a shared vision that depicts the school’s values through open communication among all stakeholders; building a purposeful community through shared leadership and working collectively as a team by facilitating PLCs in addition to empowering all stakeholders to have a sense

As the leader of a 21st century school one must embody the qualities that best reflect the ever-changing face of education. Traditionally, the leader of a school focused a large portion of time and energy on typical managerial functions within the school. These tasks, although important, will not propel a school to achieve excellence. Today’s school leaders must be visionaries who create a sense of purpose driven unity. As a transformational leader, one must also be the beacon of learning in establishing and effectively cultivating professional learning communities. One must recognize and further develop the leadership skills of those within the school in order to ensure the vision and mission of the school is achieved. Keeping in

Within the last 30 years or more there has been a greater shift of emphasis of attention by educational scholars to the role of leadership in schools. This has included examining what is meant by leadership as well as how the influence or power that comes from leadership is used, shared and devolved.

Effective leadership is a must in any employment, especially in the school system. Principals must be very attentive at all times. Safe schools and a positive environment will enhance any student learning ability. Administration work very hard to help students stay on track in a positive manner. A single problem can lead to school disruptions and hurt the students ' learning environment. One principal experienced firsthand, how effective leadership makes a difference during school uniform policy implementation.

Without leadership, the simplest of things can be frustrating. John C. Maxwell, author of 21 Irrefutable Law of Leadership, once said, “A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.” Leadership is everywhere. Leadership can start from a plethora of places. From school, clubs, home, church. We can be leaders in everything we do. Leadership is not following the in-crowd. In education, leadership can sometimes be lacking. It is the principals, teachers, or sometimes the students themselves. Anyone can learn to be leaders. It is not going to be easy, but once we, as leaders, or teachers, get to where we are going, it is the most amazing thing ever. There are different laws of leadership to learn, but we are not going to name any of the laws. We are just going to learn the main ideas in all twenty-one laws. Each law can stand alone. If you apply the laws then people will follow you. If you do not apply the laws you will not be able to lead anyone. Once the laws are learned, practice them and apply the laws to your live as a teacher. For starts, we have to get a game plan.

This paper is a review on the pillars of school leadership as discussed in School Supervision class. One occurring question is what does it mean to be a leader in one of our urban school system today is a questions asked repeatedly in our class reading? The qualities of a leader are courage, flexibility and confidence.

According to Stewart-Banks, Kuofie, Hakim & Branch (2015), good leadership tends to follow three basic steps (a) setting a direction (b) developing people so that they can head in that direction; and (c) redesigning the institution around instruction. It’s less about leaders possessing a compelling shared vision and more about helping “people figure out the shorter-term goals on the way to achieving that vision and then setting high expectations for people in accomplishing those.” When it comes to school leadership, being willing to change is the name of the game whether it’s (a) restructuring the school day so teachers are able to observe teaching of the highest order or, (b) allocating enough

Exactly how these teacher leaders might be selected, or otherwise identified, and how they might begin to achieve the goals (briefly) set out above, is more difficult to establish. There are, however some broad recommendations for teacher leaders presented in related literature that sketch out a roadmap for educational leaders to guide them toward effective leadership (and describe what effective leaders should be expected to competently achieve). Teacher leaders should, for example, help to organize learning institutions in such a way as to emphasize instructional improvement and support this with a jointly developed and clearly articulated vision of quality instruction (Supovitz, Sirinides, & May, 2010). The most effective educational leaders, one can assume, would be those who are able to act judiciously and sensitively, tempering the need for progress with a genuine concern for the wellbeing of educators – taking contextual peculiarities and the unique challenges accompanying any local educational enterprise into account.

Leadership in education should be embraced and the challenge should be taken with great pride and integrity. The belief that you are an agent of change is the essence of teaching. Faith in progress and value in every student embody the schools culture and morale. Learn from veterans and carry the importance of education to the next generation. Be courageous, challenge inequality and allow every student to have the same opportunity learn. A leader is fair, firm, friendly, and on a mission to transform boys and girls into productive and contributing members of society.

Effective School Leaders are key to continuous school improvement. School districts are required to be fiscally responsible in decisions made to improve schools and districts. Principals are given instructional professional development in their career; however, limited resources are spent developing principals’ leadership skills as an individual. The concept of coaching for the principal is to have the guide on the side to develop leaders who are able to step back and take a bird’s eye view for their organization, focus on the greater goals so leaders can see the road ahead and not just their feet in front of them. It is crucial for school districts to develop their leaders for districts to have highly

Educational leaders have been trained by universities to become visionary leaders, curriculum leaders, management leaders, cultural leaders, ethical leaders, and political leaders, which will help them create and maintain a school that promotes student learning. Recently, educational leader preparation programs have been focused on teaching the proper dispositions to be used in creating a school environment that promotes student achievement. These dispositions are seen throughout the ISLLC Standards for educational leaders to follow and guide them throughout their career. In addition, several dispositions are mentioned in the Conceptual Framework, such as, “promoting positive change, open to diversity and innovation, and culturally responsive.” Focusing on the ethical dispositions, educational leaders must “act with integrity, fairness, and in an ethical manner” (ISLLC 5). Educational leaders who are able to promote a positive and fair environment should gain the respect

Nowadays it is paramount to appreciate the teacher leadership idea. When school leaders demonstrate skills that promote teacher leadership functions that are focused on instructional proficiency to enable faculty and staff to work as a system focused on student learning, it not only makes students progress academically, but it also makes the job of any school leader much easier. Hitherto, some school leaders prefer to organize their schools by centralizing most of the decision around them. Danielson (2007) wrote that successful schools have administrators who incentivize teachers to become leaders and which makes students learn more than those schools that do not. To embrace this idea, I will welcome the teacher leadership concept and give the appropriate support so my schools may achieve great success and teachers are able to present their full talent.

I learned a lot about this area of leadership by completing the activity on effective school correlates. I learned that many of the successful schools are alike in that they all implement common effective practices. I also learned that to be an effective school, you should have a mentality of continuous school improvement. Things may be going good for your school, but to be an effective school you will continue to look for how to do the good things better, or you will look at what areas you still need to improve on to help all students learn.