The answers to four essential questions will
help principals determine whether the results they
are getting indicate their instructional practices are working.
W 8 Leadership
hether you are an expe- rienced, new or aspiring principal, it is important to recognize that your
most important responsibility – aside from providing for the safety of the students and adults on campus – is to build and sustain a culture of continuous improvement at your school. An environment in which teach- ers continuously broaden and deepen their skills and knowledge is what leads to im- proved student outcomes. Put simply, the only reason to think that
student academic achievement will improve over time is because the teachers in your school will identify what is working, what is not working, what they need to do differ- ently and what different things they need to do, and then make the necessary changes. Without continuous improvement in
instruction, there is no reason to think that students will do any better this year than they did last year, or any better next year than they did this year. As journalist and
author Thomas Friedman (2008) wrote: “If all you ever do is all you’ve ever done, then all you’ll ever get is all you ever got.”
The Overarching Question At the heart of a culture of continuous
improvement is a fundamental question: Based on the evidence, is there any reason to think that I should continue to do what I am doing? Another way to think about this question is: Do the results I’m getting indicate that the instructional practices I’m using are working as I intended? If you are intent on establishing a culture
in which teachers are inspired to continu- ally improve their effectiveness, you will need a broad range of knowledge and skills, an assortment of tools and strategies, and a willingness to challenge teachers to evalu- ate the effectiveness of their instructional practices. This “challenge” must be posed
By Dennis Fox
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