Principals as Teachers: Measures of quality & distribution in the school leadership labor supply

Abstract

Although school leadership is widely recognized as an essential component of highly effective schools, we know little regarding the qualities and characteristics of the teachers who choose to become school leaders or how these qualities and characteristics correspond to the types of schools they choose to lead. An examination of the existing research on effective leadership, effective teachers, and effective schools suggests that, upon moving to administrative positions, highly effective teachers or teachers who worked in highly effective schools may be more likely to display the leadership behaviors associated with improving student outcomes. It follows then, that introducing measures of school and teacher quality to analyses of administrative labor supply may yield fresh insights regarding school leadership. Results show that teacher and school quality are positively associated with matriculation into school leadership when comparisons are made among all teachers. However when comparisons are made among only teachers with administrative certificates these quality measures are not longer significant. Results also show that high quality teachers and teachers from high quality schools are more likely to move into leadership positions in other high quality schools. Additional descriptive findings are discussed, as are policy implications and possibilities for future research.