The course is designed to ground the participant in theories and practices related to the field of leadership, educational administration and supervision/with emphasis on instructional supervision, at the introductory level and the advanced levels for candidates seeking initial certification. Participants will explore local, state, and federal governance in order to analyze different frames for decision making and advocating for excellence and equity in schools. Finally, the course culminates with each aspiring principal naming their vision, mission, and values for a future school and detailing the systems and structures that will organize the community to center equity in the work of the school.

n this course, participants define the role of principal as instructional leader. Through observation and planning, instructional leaders build a mental model of instructional excellence and equity that will guide strategic planning, school improvement, and teacher evaluation. Participants will apply protocols and models that effectively improve teacher teams’ capacity to plan and implement excellent and equitable instruction within a curriculum that is culturally relevant and aligned to standards. Additionally, the course content will ask instructional leaders’ to create schoolwide systems for interventions and accelerations as an equitable practice that ensures all students are supported and challenged. Throughout this course, participants will determine how to organize a school community around instruction so that students are able to thrive academically.

This course provides an overview of the school system business administration. The course helps the student of educational leadership in urban schools to explore and understand the issues of efficiency and equity in educational resources management. Offered in spring and summer.

In this course you will examine the role of the principal as a leader in building a school culture where all students are able to thrive academically, intellectually, socially, and emotionally. We will start by defining the specific leadership actions for school culture in New Leaders’ Transformational Leadership Framework, a research-based conceptual framework designed to support school leaders in identifying concrete actions to: ● Promote collective efficacy and high expectations for learning across classrooms ● Build a school environment that is focused on the talents and assets of the students ● Leverage the wealth of the community to meet shared goals To chart the path to a vision for racial equity and excellence in education, you will use the course content presented in the modules to define school culture through adult leadership, student experience, and community engagement. The module content will focus on the connection between resource allocation and a vision for racial equity and excellence in education. You will leave this course ready to implement and practice the leadership actions under School Culture in the Transformational Leadership Framework.

School leaders need to have a solid understanding of the laws and legal structures that govern their daily actions and decisions. Rather than learn everything about school law in one course, topics will be spread throughout the fellowship courses as part of your asynchronous learning. The school law content provides an overview of the topics most likely to come up on a day-to-day basis for school leaders. Each assignment and assessment aims to provide you with opportunities to learn about school case law and examine key legal issues, apply your understanding of school law to other situations in a school, and discuss and problem solve scenarios with your fellow participants. Across the readings and scenarios, you will analyze issues through the lens of the law layered with an approach to leadership focused on dismantling inequities and providing more opportunities for historically marginalized students.

Provides opportunities to explore effective school leadership, forming partnerships with various stakeholders, school culture, afternoon programs,and instructional programs aimed at Student engagement and student social behavior.

Provides opportunities at local school sites to synthesize and apply knowledge over two semesters in diverse educational settings. The field experience requires 218 contact hours including scheduled reflective seminars. Offered in fall, spring, and summer.

The fundamental purpose of this course is to prepare critical thinking candidates who can practice the art of leadership in a variety of educational settings, thus bridging the gap between theory and practice and ensuring that all children, regardless of background, have the opportunity to become productive citizens with a wide range of talents and skills to influence appropriate change in society for the good of humanity. Throughout the course, you will be paired with a Leadership Coach. These experienced practitioners and educators will help you foster your critical thinking skills and refine your leadership practice. During the clinical experience, you will work with your Leadership Coach on a monthly basis to complete a series of job-embedded assessments aligned to the program standards and competencies. This type of authentic practice will help you prepare for the principalship and build your capacity for transformational leadership. The course assignments will ask you to engage with your school site principal to collaborate on your projects, get feedback on implementation, and reflect on leadership practice that centers racial equity. The projects and assessments within this course will focus on school culture, personal leadership, and your Action Research Project. The work within Practicum I will help shape your Capstone Presentation at the end of the fellowship program. During the Capstone Presentation, you will present all that you have accomplished and learned as an aspiring leader, in addition to your vision for schools that center equity and excellence.

The fundamental purpose of this course is to prepare critical thinking candidates who can practice the art of leadership in a variety of educational settings, thus bridging the gap between theory and practice and ensuring that all children, regardless of background, have the opportunity to become productive citizens with a wide range of talents and skills to influence appropriate change in society for the good of humanity. Throughout the course, you will be paired with a Leadership Coach. These experienced practitioners and educators will help you foster your critical thinking skills and refine your leadership practice. During the clinical experience, you will work with your Leadership Coach on a monthly basis to complete a series of job-embedded assessments aligned to the program standards and competencies. This type of authentic practice will help you prepare for the principalship and build your capacity for transformational leadership. The course assignments will ask you to engage with your school site principal to collaborate on your projects, get feedback on implementation, and reflect on leadership practice that centers racial equity. The projects and assessments within this course will focus on school culture, personal leadership, and your Action Research Project. The work within Practicum I will help shape your Capstone Presentation at the end of the fellowship program. During the Capstone Presentation, you will present all that you have accomplished and learned as an aspiring leader, in addition to your vision for schools that center equity and excellence.

The fundamental purpose of this course is to prepare critical thinking candidates who can practice the art of leadership in a variety of educational settings, thus bridging the gap between theory and practice and ensuring that all children, regardless of background, have the opportunity to become productive citizens with a wide range of talents and skills to influence appropriate change in society for the good of humanity. Throughout the course, you will be paired with a Leadership Coach. These experienced practitioners and educators will help you foster your critical thinking skills and refine your leadership practice. During the clinical experience, you will work with your Leadership Coach on a monthly basis to complete a series of job-embedded assessments aligned to the program standards and competencies. This type of authentic practice will help you prepare for the principalship and build your capacity for transformational leadership. The course assignments will ask you to engage with your school site principal to collaborate on your projects, get feedback on implementation, and reflect on leadership practice that centers racial equity. The projects and assessments within this course will focus on school culture, personal leadership, and your Action Research Project. The work within Practicum I will help shape your Capstone Presentation at the end of the fellowship program. During the Capstone Presentation, you will present all that you have accomplished and learned as an aspiring leader, in addition to your vision for schools that center equity and excellence.

The Practicum II course is a continuation of intentional application of leadership practices with a specific focus on instructional leadership and school improvement within a K-12 setting. The major assessments of the course are Coaching and Observation, Diagnosing Learning and Teaching, School Profile, and the final Capstone Project. During the course, participants must schedule a time to shadow a principal serving different grade bands within K-12 and time to meet with a district-level leader. The purpose of this field experience is to observe practices across a variety of school settings and observe the larger leadership practices and policies of the K-12 system within their district.

This course will center concepts of data-driven instruction. Participants will examine methods used to measure and evaluate student progress, including formative and summative assessments, and how the information gathered through these processes can be used to inform decisions about students, programs, activities and teacher practice. Participants will learn how to construct multiple choice items, true-false items, sentence completion items, short-answer questions, essay questions, projects, portfolios, etc., in relation to lesson planning, the process of teaching and supervision for effectiveness.

The Educational Research for School Improvement course will guide students through basic research skills needed to locate and evaluate educational research and the utilization of those skills to solve problems that arise in the school setting through the application of action research. The course will leverage New Leaders’ 4-Part Action Planning Process as a foundational framework for school improvement. These steps include: 1. Diagnosing the current state: Get the full picture, use year-end data across academics, school culture, operations, talent management, etc. One helpful tool is the New Leaders School Diagnostic Tool. 2. Prioritizing the highest-leverage areas of opportunity to address: What are the highest-leverage areas of opportunity to address to move the school closer to a vision of instructional excellence and equity? Return to the Transformational Leadership Framework to select potential leadership or school actions. 3. Setting SMARTER goals, identify strategies and name action steps: Determine both short-term and long-term goals for the year. Match strategies to your diagnosis, determine measures of accountability and progress, and be prepared to distribute responsibilities. 4. Determining how you will monitor, evaluate and adjust the plan: Maintain a focus on year-long goals, but be prepared to adjust your plan as needed using the mid- and short-cycle action plans.

Reviews contemporary administrative and organizational models at the system level in American public schools and considers their impact on urban school policies and practices. Offered in spring and alternate summers.

Introduces students to the concept of systemic school reform and the challenges facing educational change initiatives. Considers methods and issues of planning large school interventions. Offered in fall and alternate summers.

Focuses on teaching/learning process and provides the administrator knowledge, skills and attitudes in supervising the curriculum and instructional program. A primary emphasis is on improvement of instruction in urban schools. Direct support of teacher, group development, professional development, curriculum development and action research will be emphasized. Offered in fall and alternate summers.

Studies student personnel problems in public schools. Offered in fall and alternate summers.

Studies principles and practices needed in recruitment of personnel and maintenance of school personnel programs. Offered in spring and alternate summers.

Provides analysis of pervasive equity issues facing urban schools. In-depth consideration of economic and financial challenges of ensuring equity for all students. Offered in fall and alternate summers.

Introduces students to the theory and practice of community education and the role of education in urban community development. Offered in spring and alternate summers.

Provides a variety of field-based experiences for education specialist and doctoral candidates over two semesters in diverse settings at school districts, state education departments or higher education. The field experience requires 218 contact hours including scheduled reflective seminars. Offered in fall, spring, and summer.

Evaluates school level organizational units and instructional programs through application of social system model of organization and planning instruments. Offered in fall and alternate summers.

Examines methods of researching problems in organizations and develops instruments for measurement of variables in school organizations. Offered in spring and alternate summers.

Utilizing social systems theories, students will examine the issues of systemic change in educational organizations. They will review relevant literature, formulate research questions and design frameworks for interpretation and analysis. Offered in spring.

Students will examine school reform issues from the perspective of curriculum and instructional leadership. They will review relevant literature, formulate research questions and design frameworks for interpretation and analysis. Offered in fall.

Utilizing the perspective of transformational leadership, students will examine organizational decision making and the problems of organizational change. They will review relevant literature, formulate research questions and design frameworks for interpretation and analysis. Offered in fall.

Examines effects on educational policies of political behavior at national, state, local and institutional levels with particular focus on implications for urban schools. Offered in fall and alternate summers.

Develops a framework for analysis and decision making in education policy, analyzes selected issues of current significance and introduces students to educational policy research methodology. Offered in spring and alternate summers.

Analyzes issues of leadership and governance as they relate to the larger political, social and cultural context of urban schools. Students will review relevant literature, formulate research questions, and design frameworks for interpretation and analysis. Offered in spring.

Students will learn how to construct a variety of quantitative research designs, identify and use appropriate statistical tools and techniques, analyze, interpret and report research results using narrative, tabular and graphic forms. Prerequisite: Computer Literacy. Offered in fall.

Develops compentencies in designing and developing research proposals.

Assists doctoral students in developing theoretical framework from which qualitative inquiry emerges. Aims, assumptions, methods and strategies of qualitative research are addressed. Offered in spring.

Maintains status of students for preparation and writing comprehensive examination and/or prospectus or for making corrections of dissertation after final defense. Prerequisite: Approval of Department Chair. Offered in fall, spring, and summers.

Provides guidance on research for and writing of the dissertation. Prerequisites: Satisfactory completion of all required courses and the comprehensive examinations. Minimum six (6) hours required. Offered in fall, spring, and summers.