Principal Supervision
What do principal supervisors do when they help principals grow as instructional leaders?
Principal supervisors can help principals grow as instructional leaders— those who relentlessly ensure equitable teaching and learning in every classroom every day—but not all forms of principal supervision help realize those results.
For over a decade, DL2 researchers have been walking alongside principal supervisors capturing how they work day-to-day, results for principals, and conditions that support their success. In districts ranging in size from a few thousand to over a hundred thousand students, findings show that principal supervisors help principals grow as instructional leaders when they take a teaching-and-learning approach.
- Support principals in leading their own learning in partnership with their principal colleagues, and
- Coach principals one-on-one and in professional learning communities using particular teaching-and-learning moves like modeling and differentiation.
- Principal supervisors support their own success when they lead their own learning to improve their teaching-and-learning approach.
- Chief Academic Officers and other supervisors of principal supervisors are also essential supports.
RESOURCES
Principal Supervision
ORDER BOOK: From tinkering to transformation: How school district central offices drive equitable teaching and learning (2023)
ORDER BOOK: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership: A Teaching and Learning Approach (2020)
ARTICLE: A Teaching-and-Learning Approach to Principal Supervision (2020)
ARTICLE: Supporting Principal Supervisors: What Really Matters? (2019)
ARTICLE: Research Use as Learning: The Case of Fundamental Change in School District Central Offices (2017)
ARTICLE: How Schools Districts Can Support Deeper Learning (2015)
ARTICLE: Central Office Leadership in Principal Professional Learning Communities: The Practice Beneath the Policy (2014)
ARTICLE: District Central Office Leadership as Teaching: How Central Office Administrators Support Principals’ Development as Instructional Leaders (2012)
ORDER BOOK: From tinkering to transformation: How school district central offices drive equitable teaching and learning (2023)
ORDER BOOK: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership: A Teaching and Learning Approach (2020)
ARTICLE: A Teaching-and-Learning Approach to Principal Supervision (2020)
ARTICLE: Supporting Principal Supervisors: What Really Matters? (2019)
ARTICLE: Research Use as Learning: The Case of Fundamental Change in School District Central Offices (2017)
ARTICLE: How Schools Districts Can Support Deeper Learning (2015)
ARTICLE: Central Office Leadership in Principal Professional Learning Communities: The Practice Beneath the Policy (2014)
ARTICLE: District Central Office Leadership as Teaching: How Central Office Administrators Support Principals’ Development as Instructional Leaders (2012)
ORDER BOOK: From tinkering to transformation: How school district central offices drive equitable teaching and learning (2023)
ORDER BOOK: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership: A Teaching and Learning Approach (2020)
ARTICLE: A Teaching-and-Learning Approach to Principal Supervision (2020)
ARTICLE: Supporting Principal Supervisors: What Really Matters? (2019)
ARTICLE: Research Use as Learning: The Case of Fundamental Change in School District Central Offices (2017)
ARTICLE: How Schools Districts Can Support Deeper Learning (2015)
ARTICLE: Central Office Leadership in Principal Professional Learning Communities: The Practice Beneath the Policy (2014)
ARTICLE: District Central Office Leadership as Teaching: How Central Office Administrators Support Principals’ Development as Instructional Leaders (2012)
Central office transformation for equitable teaching and learning: Self study guide version 1.0 (2024)
Principal Supervisor Performance Standards (PSPS) Version 3.0
Professional Growth Planning (PGP) Tool
Central office transformation for equitable teaching and learning: Self study guide version 1.0 (2024)
Principal Supervisor Performance Standards (PSPS) Version 3.0
Professional Growth Planning (PGP) Tool
Central office transformation for equitable teaching and learning: Self study guide version 1.0 (2024)
Principal Supervisor Performance Standards (PSPS) Version 3.0
Professional Growth Planning (PGP) Tool
PODCAST: Principal coaching to lead their own learning. A podcast of AASA, The School Superintendents Association (2024)
PODCAST: Principals as co-authors of their own learning (2022). The American Association of School Administrators (AASA)
INTERVIEW: Remote Support of Principal Supervisors “Not Different” from Pre-COVID Times (2020)
REVIEW: Marshall Memo 858: A Weekly Round-up of Important Ideas and Research in K-12 Education (2020)
REVIEW: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership: A Teaching and Learning Approach (2020)
INTERVIEW: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership (2020)
PODCAST: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership (2020)
PODCAST: Principal coaching to lead their own learning. A podcast of AASA, The School Superintendents Association (2024)
PODCAST: Principals as co-authors of their own learning (2022). The American Association of School Administrators (AASA)
INTERVIEW: Remote Support of Principal Supervisors “Not Different” from Pre-COVID Times (2020)
REVIEW: Marshall Memo 858: A Weekly Round-up of Important Ideas and Research in K-12 Education (2020)
REVIEW: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership: A Teaching and Learning Approach (2020)
INTERVIEW: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership (2020)
PODCAST: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership (2020)
PODCAST: Principal coaching to lead their own learning. A podcast of AASA, The School Superintendents Association (2024)
PODCAST: Principals as co-authors of their own learning (2022). The American Association of School Administrators (AASA)
INTERVIEW: Remote Support of Principal Supervisors “Not Different” from Pre-COVID Times (2020)
REVIEW: Marshall Memo 858: A Weekly Round-up of Important Ideas and Research in K-12 Education (2020)
REVIEW: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership: A Teaching and Learning Approach (2020)
INTERVIEW: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership (2020)
PODCAST: Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership (2020)
Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership: A Teaching and Learning Approach
“Supervising Principals for Instructional Leadership is a brilliant, inspiring, clear book that nails what it means to supervise school leaders for growth and helps the reader reimagine the role of the central office. Read this book, and use it immediately!”
—Michael Fullan, professor emeritus, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto
“What does it look and sound like to support principals to lead learning? Honig and Rainey share their research-and-practice-tested wisdom, which combines the imagination to break free of conventional supervision with clear examples of what to do and what not to do, and a bundle of tools to make it happen.”
—Elizabeth A. City, senior lecturer on education, Harvard Graduate School of Education
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