Educational Leadership - February 2011

Educational Leadership

Themes for 2011–2012

September 2011
Promoting Respectful Schools

Students who feel safe, valued, and hopeful in school are more likely to learn. This issue will explore how schools can promote respect for self and others—in both students and teachers.

Which programs reduce bullying and promote respectful relationships? How can schools address prickly issues related to race, culture, and religion and teach such crucial skills as empathy and cultural sensitivity?

We’re interested in articles from teachers who are making classrooms safe places where students can learn from mistakes and articles from school leaders who are making staff feel valued and supported. We welcome inter national contributions and reallife stories of how schools have created physically, emotionally, and intellec tually respectful learning environments.

Deadline: April 1, 2011

October 2011
Coaching: The New
Leadership Skill

Education policymakers today are focusing on teachers and administrators as the key to improving schools. Raising effectiveness, however, requires a new kind of professional development that is personalized, jobembedded, context specific, and collaborative.

This issue will explore how educators
can develop core coaching skills. How
can principals learn to conduct dif
ficult conversations with teachers that
change the school culture? How can
they combine the roles of evaluator and
coach—or should they? We welcome
stories from schools that have developed
effective instructionalcoaching or peer
coaching programs and those that have
integrated coaching into their overall
mentoring programs or professional
development plans.
Deadline: May 2, 2011

November 2011
Effective Grading Practices

Grading today is not as simple as A, B, C. Schools are adopting grading systems that go beyond the traditional letter grades or that use those letters in nontraditional ways. Some schools are abandoning letter grades in favor of standardsbased report cards. Others have eliminated the zero and the F. Still others are rethinking exactly what should be graded. How, for example, should student effort and participation factor into final grades?

This issue will explore the myriad grading practices schools have adopted. Articles may address report cards, homework grades, rubrics, and tests. We’re also interested in how schools and teachers have transformed their grading systems. How did you educate students and parents about the change? What was the response, and how has the change affected teaching and learning?

Deadline: June 1, 2011

December 2011/January 2012
The Resourceful School

Many schools are experiencing shrinking resources, hiring freezes, and continued accountability pressures— and are responding by using time, material resources, and educators’ skills in innovative ways.

We are looking for lessons from
schools that have successfully redirected
their efforts to improve and excel. What
lessons can educators whose schools
have struggled to make adequate yearly
progress share with colleagues? How
are schools not only raising basic pro
ficiency rates, but also providing a
rigorous, wellrounded, 21st century
education for an increasingly diverse
student population? What kinds of effi
ciencies and enrichment can technology
provide?

February 2012
For Each to Excel

High standards—personalization. Are these two education trends really in opposition? Because of today’s expec tation that schools bring all students to high levels of achievement, many edu cators believe that it is more important than ever to get to know students as individuals, identify their needs, and target instruction to each student’s strengths and interests.

This issue will explore how schools are personalizing learning to help all students reach common curriculum standards. We are looking for articles on new ways in which teachers are dif ferentiating instruction and providing student choice and challenge at all grade levels. What does neuroscience tell us about the power of personalized learning? What are the benefits of the common core curriculum, and how can standards and personalization mesh? And what new possibilities for cus tomized education are being created by technology, online courses, and virtual schools?