What Are Effective School Leaders, and How Can States and Districts Develop Them? (Fact Sheet)

In recent years, the job of the school principal has evolved from administrative oversight to include more complicated responsibilities. Principals today are expected to create collaborative environments for staff, provide effective instructional leadership, make strategic decisions, and ensure academic progress.

Recent research has demonstrated that principals are essential to student achievement—principals’ effects in this area are almost as large as teachers’. Given the central importance of school leadership, it’s important to ask what makes for an effective principal.