School Leadership Pipelines for Low Performing Schools: Influencing District Change Without Permission

Abstract

When a school has been persistently low performing, it is unlikely that the school will improve without expert leadership. Principals serve as a key lever in the quest to improve low performing schools, but many districts struggle to recruit, hire, and develop principals to take on some of the most challenging and persistently low performing schools. The focus of my work in Boston Public Schools was to establish the foundation for a pipeline of leaders poised to enter low performing schools ready to engage in the work of dramatic improvement. Building leadership pipelines into low performing schools for a large urban district ultimately has both technical and adaptive challenges, and facing both in the context of unclear authority can be challenging. In the capstone that follows, I unpack the work that my team set out to accomplish and the challenges we faced along the way, as well as the evidence of progress and work that remains. I close with recommendations for other school districts seeking to build their leadership pipelines.