Schools face numerous pressing challenges, from chronic absenteeism and falling grades to more structural problems like retaining teachers and workforce development. District and state-level leaders have approached these problems separately, but often they neglect the most strategic lever in the education system: principals.
Effective principals, in both high- and low-performing schools, play a critical role in retaining teachers, improving students’ academic outcomes, and maintaining a positive school culture, according to a new report by the Learning Policy Institute, a California-based research organization and think tank. Released in May, the report, titled “The Principal Effect: How Investing in School Leaders Is Key to Solving Education’s Challenges,” synthesizes several studies on principal effectiveness and school performance.