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Executive Summary

In an era of accountability, where school leaders are expected to demonstrate bottom-line results and use data to drive decisions, the skill and knowledge of principals matter more than ever. Amidst the efforts to prepare principals for this new world, little scholarly attention has been paid to the content of what principals are actually reading in the course of their studies or whether their texts are preparing them for the rigors of accountable management. We examined 11 of the 13 educational administration texts most frequently assigned in a sample of 210 core syllabi from a national sample of 31 programs. We tracked the attention devoted to a number of concepts central to school leadership. The texts were sorted into three broad categories: specialized texts, general texts, and foundational texts. We found that:

•  Somewhat surprisingly, educational accountability was mentioned only about five times per 100 pages. Of those mentions, 57% were neutral, 23% were negative, and less than 1% included guidance on its use or implementation. Overall, less than one page per 1,000 in the texts included guidance on its use or implementation. 
• On the whole, the texts tended to be positive or neutral about the value of data collection and analysis. References to the value of data were positive 50% of the time, neutral 48%, and negative just 2%. Discussions of “data” were much more likely than those of accountability to include suggestions for effective use, though it was still the case that only 30% of discussion included any direction regarding its use. 
• Teacher termination and dismissal were mentioned only three times per 100 pages of text. When these terms were discussed, 94% of the time the tone was neutral and professional. However, there was not a single case in which removing ineffective faculty was depicted as potentially positive for a school. 
• The term “efficiency” appeared six times per 100 pages. Of those mentions, 38% cast efficiency in a positive light, 49% discussed it neutrally, and 13% were critical. Less than one page out of 100 offered prescriptions or suggestions for promoting efficiency.
• While some critiques suggest that education school curricula are ideologically progressive or liberal, examination of these texts found that the notions “diversity” and “multicultural” appeared only infrequently. Variations on the term “diversity” appeared just four times per 100 pages and those on the term “multicultural” surfaced less than once per 100 pages.

On balance, the texts endorse the value of data and the appropriateness of focusing on student achievement but are much more skeptical when it comes to using results to make tough decisions. The texts focus heavily on school culture while devoting limited attention to utilizing accountability, terminating poor performers, or promoting efficiency. We propose three suggestions for ensuring that principals are exposed to the full array of essential skills: authors broadening discussion in existing texts, publishers issuing new texts, and faculty taking steps to assign texts on tough-minded management. Ultimately, unless efforts to refashion programs, internships, and courses of study are coupled with efforts to ensure that principals are learning the skills they need, it is not at all clear that these ambitious reforms will produce more effective principals.

Frederick M. Hess is a resident scholar and the director of education policy studies at AEI. Andrew P. Kelly is a research assistant at AEI.