Transformational Leadership Initiatives Driving P-12 School Change

In this chapter, educational leaders who are driving school change through transformational leadership initiatives share their stories. The authors range in their respective roles with an elementary school classroom teacher, a math-science departmental supervisor, a high school principal and a district superintendent. Each case study describes the implementation of a transformative leadership project from the main idea and impetus driving each project to the implementation methods and outcomes of each respective endeavor. The first project describes a teacher's addition of cultural-driven morning meetings to an elementary school classroom. The teacher discusses the necessity and how-to of implementing culture-driven morning meetings in the classroom and reflects on the overall impact on her students. A school superintendent leads the reader through his process of increasing rigor at the start of high school through the implementation of Advanced Placement (AP) courses for ninth-grade students. Next, a high school principal discusses an innovative blended learning program in a low socioeconomic district including the special challenges experienced. Finally, a high school math supervisor describes the school-wide implementation of Khan Academy for SAT preparation.

Preparing for High-Stakes Admissions Tests: A Moderation Mediation Analysis

For decades researchers have examined the effects of SAT preparation, but only recently have they begun to explore the factors that inform successful test preparation (Appelrouth & Zabrucky, 2717). In their regression analysis of the factors of successful SAT preparation, Appelrouth, Moore, & Zabrucky (2015) found significant effects of homework completion, instructional hours, practice and official testing, distribution of study, and timing of test preparation. The current study builds upon that research in constructing a functional model of SAT preparatory factors. It was hypothesized that direct and indirect relationships would exist between preparatory factors, and that some of these relationships would be moderated by student characteristics such as gender and socioeconomic status. Archival data from 1,933 students were analyzed, and significant direct relations were reported between tutoring start time and the following variables: session distribution, individual tutoring hours, group tutoring hours, homework completion, number of official tests, number of practice tests and total SAT increase. Commencing test preparation earlier yielded positive direct and indirect effects, and session distribution, individual and group tutoring hours, and official SAT and practice SAT tests all mediated the relationship between start time and SAT score increase. School type and socioeconomic status moderated the relationship between start time and individual tutoring hours, and school type also moderated the relationship between homework completion and score increase. The results of this analysis have implications for the thousands of high schools and educational entities that offer SAT coaching programs. By encouraging earlier program start times, adequate instructional hours, distribution of sessions and practice effects, administrators can create more effective SAT preparation programs to serve their college-bound students.