Reshaping the Principalship

Joseph F. Murphy is the Frank W. Mayborn Chair and associate dean at Peabody College of Education at Vanderbilt University. He has also been a faculty member at the University of Illinois and The Ohio State University, where he was the William Ray Flesher Professor of Education. In the public schools, he has served as an administrator at the school, district, and state levels, including an appointment as the executive assistant to the chief deputy superintendent of public instruction in California. His most recent appointment was as the founding president of the Ohio Principals Leadership Academy. At the university level, he has served as department chair and associate dean. He is past vice president of the American Educational Research Association and was the founding chair of the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium (ISLLC). He is co-editor of the AERA Handbook on Educational Administration (1999) and editor of the National Society for the Study of Education (NSSE) yearbook, The Educational Leadership Challenge (2002). His work is in the area of school improvement, with special emphasis on leadership and policy. He has authored or co-authored 18 books in this area and edited another 12. His most recent authored volumes include Understanding and Assessing the Charter School Movement (2002), Leadership for Literacy: Research-Based Practice, PreK-3 (2003), Connecting Teacher Leadership and School Improvement (2005), Preparing School Leaders: Defining a Research and Action Agenda (2006), and Turning Around Failing Schools: Lessons From the Organizational Sciences. Karen Seashore Louis is the Rodney Wallace Professor of Educational Policy and Administration at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. Her area of expertise includes improvement in K-12 leadership and policy over the last 30 years, particularly in urban secondary schools. Louis also conducts research on organizational changes within higher education, with particular attention to faculty roles, and on international comparative policy in educational reform. A past president of Division A of the American Educational Research Association (AERA), she is a widely published author in the field. Recent books include Organizing for School Change, Leadership for Change and School Improvement: International Perspectives, Handbook of Educational Administration, Second Edition, and Organizational Learning in Schools. Louis earned a bachelor's degree in History from Swarthmore College and a doctorate in sociology from Columbia University.

PART ONE: SETTING THE STAGE Reconstructing the Principalship - Joseph Murphy and Lynn G Beck Challenges and Possibilities Transformational Change and the Evolving Role of the Principal - Joseph Murphy Early Empirical Evidence PART TWO: CASE STUDIES The Principal as Mini-Superintendent Under Chicago School Reform - R Bruce McPherson and Robert L Crowson Transformational Leadership and Teachers' Commitment to Change - Kenneth Leithwood, Doris Jantzi and Alicia Fernandez School Leadership and Teacher Quality of Work Life in Restructuring Schools - Sheila Rosenblum, Karen Seashore Louis and Richard A Rossmiller Ninety Degrees from Everywhere - Nona A Prestine New Understandings of the Principal's Role in a Restructuring Essential School From Attila the Hun to Mary Had a Little Lamb - Philip Hallinger and Charles Hausman Principal Role Ambiguity in Restructured Schools Cultivating a Caring School Community - Lynn G Beck One Principal's Story Voices of Principals from Democratically Transformed Schools - Carl D Glickman, Lewis R Allen and Barbara F Lunsford Changes in School Governance and Principals' Roles - Kent D Peterson and Valli D Warren Changing Jurisdictions, New Power Dynamics, and Conflict in Restructured Schools Ten Propositions for Facilitative Leadership - David T Conley and Paul Goldman PART THREE: CONCLUSION The Evolving Role of the Principal - Karen Seashore Louis and Joseph Murphy Some Concluding Thoughts