Leslie Kaplan

Troops to Teachers as School Administrators: A National Study of Principal Quality

The United States has a scarcity of capable principals ready to successfully lead schools in an era of outcome-based accountability. This is especially true in high-poverty, high-minority schools. Policy makers welcome opening the principal pipeline to untraditional leaders. Research finds that teachers who have entered education through Troops to Teachers funding make a measurable impact on student learning and tend to work in high-poverty schools. This study suggests that they also may be highly effective principals.

Troops to Teachers Update: Changing, but Still Pleasing Principals with High Teaching Quality.

Prior research on Troops to Teachers (TTT) affirms that TTTs are effective instructors likely to work in high-poverty, high-minority schools, teach high-demand subjects, use research-based instructional and classroom management practices linked with student achievement, and plan to stay in the profession. A nonexperimental, mixed method design incorporating quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis was used. A total of 4,157 TTT completers and 517 administrators responded to surveys. The 2012-2013 follow-up study finds that TTTs are meeting most—but not all—the same high benchmarks. In addition, 92% of principals rate their TTTs as well-prepared to meet the needs of diverse learners in varied learning environments.

Betsy DeVos's Education Reform Agenda: What Principals--and Their Publics--Need to Know.

Betsy DeVos, the new U.S. Secretary of Education, has a reform agenda to advance school choice. Her track record includes enabling charter school growth in Michigan at taxpayers’ expense with little oversight or accountability. Although an effective advocate, DeVos represents a broader policy movement to privatize American education, much of it happening beneath public awareness. Understanding Ms. DeVos’s policy goals, how the President and Congress are supporting these, and how privatization is occurring in states can help principals and education leaders recognize the stakes, learn what to watch for, and take appropriate actions to preserve and strengthen America’s public schools.