Training, Retaining Principals.

• Author: Idrees, Ashley
• Position: TRENDS

Ask anyone over age 35 how they remember their school principals and you're likely to hear words such as "authoritarian," "powerful," "strict," "unapproachable." The role of the school principal has historically been associated with these characteristics.

Today, the principal's role has evolved, and these leaders play an ever greater part in a school's success. For example, in a recent survey, conducted every 10 years by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, today's leaders expressed much more concern over students' mental health, family financial status, degree of adult supervision and physical safety than they did in previous surveys. Principals are now synonymous with leadership, instructional support and student advocacy. They have become change agents for all who enter their buildings.

Yet, despite principals' vital role in student success, job turnover rates continue to rise. Through its "Principal Pipeline Initiative," a recruitment, retention and preparation program for school leaders, The Wallace Foundation is just beginning to understand why: Although preparation is key to building strong leaders, hiring and placing those leaders are just as important to their retention.

Wallace developed the Leader Tracking System, a set of webpages, dashboards and tools that catalogs candidates' experience, performance and competency to improve the likelihood of matching novice principals with appropriate schools. Determining the "perfect fit" when hiring principals may in fact be key in retaining them, according to Wallace research.

The Education Finance and Policy journal published a study in January examining the relationship between principals' effectiveness and turnover rates. It revealed that turnover is higher, on average, among both less effective and highly effective principals than it is among average leaders. The...