Equity as a Crucial Component of Leadership Preparation and Practice

Abstract

As schools become more racially, socioeconomically, and linguistically diverse, there are increasing calls for educational leaders to be more representative of student demographics and be explicitly prepared to advance equity through culturally responsive/relevant leadership practices. We discuss how applying an equity lens to three key content areas taught in leadership preparation programs (building relationships, culturally diverse practices, and practical opportunities for learning) can lead to both improved student outcomes and educator retention, particularly for teachers of color. We close with questions for school districts and leadership programs—and for aspiring principals and superintendents—to consider in bringing to life equity-oriented educational leadership practices.

Keywords:

• Equity
• leadership preparation
• principals
• district administration

School leaders are critical drivers of educational improvement and are responsible for the creation and maintenance of positive school climates and cultures for students and faculty/staff. Leadership preparation programs, informed by standards outlined by the National Policy Board for Educational Administration (NCPBA 2017), teach aspiring leaders how to successfully implement strategies designed to support student learning and achievement, including coursework related to building strong relationships with students, families, and community organizations, prioritizing culturally diverse practices, and providing opportunities for practical application of learning.

In light of the increasing racial, socioeconomic, and linguistic diversity in schools, there are increasing calls for a re-imagining of what constitutes effective school leadership that particularly supports student success (Gooden and Dantley 2012). This re-imagining suggests that school and district leaders, first, be more representative of student and community demographics across the country, and second, be explicitly prepared to advance equity through culturally responsive/relevant leadership practices that support teaching and learning in diverse settings. As school leaders are second only to teachers in their impact on student outcomes (Leithwood and Seashore-Louis 2011), equity-oriented leaders must work effectively with diverse teacher workforces and student populations. Thus, we pose the following questions to both leadership preparation programs and school district officials: (1) who is (or is not) leading your schools? and (2) what knowledge, skills, and “mental models” must leaders possess to advance student success for diverse learners? One could argue these are not new questions for educational leadership preparation or practice. We echo Gooden and Dantley (2012) suggestion that an equity orientation for educational leadership may provide different answers and improved student outcomes.

Content areas in historically successful leadership programs

To date, high-quality leadership preparation programs typically highlight three key content areas to ensure that educational leaders are equipped to make a positive impact on their schools, districts, and communities.

Relationship building

Murphy, Louis, and Smylie (2017) explore a positive school leadership model that highlights leadership as a professional calling. This professional calling includes personal and professional ethics, character and virtue, consideration for others’ interests, personalized relationships, and empowerment and community building. Additionally, educational leaders are encouraged to build trusting relationships, demonstrate commitment to self-reflection, open feedback loops, and enhance their roles as instructional leaders (Thessin and Louis 2019).

Culturally diverse practices

Effective leaders can engage in culturally diverse educational practices and create inclusive and equitable learning environments that support the diverse needs of students. According to Collins-Ayanlaja, Brookins, and Taysum (2018), educators can equip themselves for leadership positions by prioritizing cultural literacy and leveraging it to foster parental engagement within their districts. Educational leaders can effectively celebrate cultural histories by basing their actions on evidence-informed positions, employing sound reasoning, and guiding their decisions with a strong moral compass to establish an ethical framework (Collins-Ayanlaja, Brookins, and Taysum 2018). As instructional leaders, administrators can support and develop teachers to use inclusive teaching strategies honoring varied learning styles and abilities. To ensure continual reflection and improvement, leaders can learn to solicit regular feedback from stakeholders, and use this feedback to inform: policy revisions, common practices, behavioral norms, traditions, customs, etc.

Opportunities for practical application

Finally, effective leader preparation considers the broader context and systems in which leaders operate (e.g. districts, communities, etc.). Practical application of leadership skills allows leaders to develop confidence and competence in their roles. Fowler and Cowden (2015) suggest immersing aspiring leaders in real-world settings where they will eventually operate. This involves establishing clear roles and responsibilities for leaders, creating accessible leader pipelines, providing career pathways, and aligning leadership development with organizational goals. In addition to developing a deep understanding of leadership practice, it is crucial for educational leaders to possess a comprehensive understanding of local and national educational policies, with their preparation encompassing courses focused on school law and significant judicial rulings that have transformative effects on the integration or segregation of marginalized groups (Collins-Ayanlaja, Brookins, and Taysum 2018). Transforming each course within a leadership program into a practicum offers emerging leaders a well-structured, mentor-guided experience directly relevant to their specific work situations.

Advancing equity in educational leadership preparation and practice

Today’s leaders face new and exciting challenges in the face of the evolving needs of students of diverse demographics, transitions back to school following the COVID pandemic, and ongoing national discourse around racial equity and social justice. Leadership programs and school districts are now called to consider how they can evolve their approach to developing and supporting school leaders to engage in meaningful ways for today’s communities. We offer two questions for both leadership preparation programs and school districts to consider: (1) who is (or is not) leading your schools? and (2) what knowledge, skills, and “mental models” must leaders possess to advance success for diverse learners? We pose these questions to both entities as there are increasing numbers of partnerships between districts and university preparation programs designed for graduates to be eligible for a leadership position (Williams and Welsh 2017). Encouraging school districts and leadership preparation programs to work together to understand the nature of today’s challenges and to apply an equity-oriented lens when considering solutions may more directly advance school improvement efforts.

Racially diversifying the principal pipeline

Neither the teacher nor the leadership workforce has kept pace with the growing racial diversity evident in public schools. In 2021, 55% of public school students nationally identified as a student of color (with Hispanic/Latine students comprising the greatest percentage at 28%; NCES 2023b), while 80% of teachers and 78% of principals identify as white (NCES 2023a; Taie, Lewis, and Spiegelman 2022). The educator workforce has remained predominantly white after thousands of Black teachers were fired and Black principals were demoted when the US Supreme Court ruled segregated schools unconstitutional in the 1954 Brown v Board of Education ruling (Tillman 2004). Despite efforts to diversify the teacher workforce (Bristol and Martin-Fernandez 2019; Carver-Thomas 2018), as of 2021, only 9, 6, 2, and 1% of teachers self-identified as Latine, Black, Asian, or American Indian/Alaskan Native/Pacific Islander, respectively (NCES 2023a).

Although people of color tend to teach for longer before moving into the principalship (Bailes and Guthery 2020), the lack of diversity in school and district leadership is further complicated by broader racialized patterns in hiring and placement. According to human resources scholarship, people often hire employees who look like them (Giuliano, Levine, and Leonard 2009). Furthermore, when disaggregating between assistant principal and principal placements, white graduates of leadership preparation programs had higher rates of placement directly into the principalship, while Black and Latine graduates were more likely to be placed into an assistant principal position (Fuller, Hollingworth, and An 2016).

Training and hiring principals of color is not simply a numbers game to reflect the growing racial diversity of the nation’s public schools—students of color have higher student achievement in schools led by principals of color (Bartanen and Grissom 2019; Jang and Alexander 2022). If teachers of color play significant roles in fostering greater academic outcomes for students generally and for students of color specifically (Dee 2004; Gershenson et al. 2017; Villegas and Irvine 2010), and teachers of color, particularly Black teachers, are more likely to be hired by same-race principals (Bartanen and Grissom 2019), then the need for a diverse principal pipeline is clear.

Data about gender in educational leadership also provides important considerations. Almost 60% of all principals nationally are women (regardless of race), and most lead elementary schools. Men, of all races, are more likely to hold the high school principalship (65%; Taie, Lewis, and Spiegelman 2022), a position viewed as a more direct line to the superintendency (Maranto et al. 2018). When race is aggregated with gender, stark disparities appear. For example, Black women hold only 5% of all secondary principal positions nationally (Jang and Alexander 2022)—for reference, there are currently over 23,500 secondary schools across the country (NCES 2022). Of the responses to a national survey distributed by AASA, the National Superintendency Association, 67% identified as white men, and another 21% identified as white women (Thomas et al. 2022). These data highlight a continued need to reflect upon who is getting “tapped” to enter the pathway into the principalship (and at which grade level) and the superintendency. Unfortunately, however, demographic data about aspiring and sitting principals and superintendents are not easily accessible. Perrone, Young, and Fuller (2022) call for improved state and national data collection about principal preparation, licensure, and placement, which can greatly improve decision-making by both districts and leadership preparation programs.

Equity- and justice-oriented knowledge, skills, and “mental models”

Diverse representation in the principalship is necessary but is not sufficient for realizing improved student personal and academic outcomes. The discourse about what components, skills, and dispositions are necessary for “good leadership,” extends beyond organizational management, fiscal responsibility, hiring, and teacher supervision and includes an understanding of how equity can and should be a central component of leadership practice for all school leaders. Drawing on the existing strengths of leadership preparation programs, we explore the need for an equity- and/or justice-oriented focus for each one.

Building relationships

Given school leaders’ influence on culture, climate, and school improvement, developing equity- and justice-oriented knowledge and skills helps school leaders to create positive school climates for both students and faculty. We draw particular attention to building relationships with and creating positive school climates for teachers, particularly teachers of color. Effective teachers are still a primary school factor shaping student performance, yet chronic teacher turnover and teacher shortages are persistent challenges for public schools (Sutcher, Darling-Hammond, and Carver-Thomas 2016). Teacher turnover is acutely problematic for teachers of color who report higher rates of turnover than their white peers (Carver-Thomas 2018). In a survey of more than three thousand teachers, Black and Latine teachers were more likely to report plans of leaving the profession or retiring early at 62 and 59%, respectively. They described feelings of burnout deriving in part from a lack of organizational support, and not an inability to manage stress (Jotkoff 2022), highlighting the importance of a positive school climate for educators of color. Logically, if teachers of color leave schools or the profession at high rates, there will be fewer leadership candidates of color available to enroll in preparation programs. These consequences are potentially reinforcing, as fewer leaders of color in public schools are associated with adverse workplace conditions for educators of color, including lower levels of trust, satisfaction, and retention (Grissom and Keiser 2011; Bednar and Gicheva 2017; Viano, Rodriguez, and Hunter 2023).

Current trends support longstanding evidence that teachers indeed leave schools–and not students–due to organizational characteristics and perceptions of school climate, in which principals play a prominent role (Burkhauser 2017; Johnson, Kraft, and Papay 2012; Ladd 2011). Teacher perceptions of school leadership (one primary indicator of working conditions) were found to be the strongest predictor of turnover for teachers of color (Bednar and Gicheva 2017; Lindsay and Egalite 2019). Two studies from North Carolina shed additional light on this relationship. First, results from a biannual survey on teacher working conditions linked to principal placement data indicate that principals impacted school environments in four ways, including teacher’s ability to focus on teaching (time use), the physical environment of the school, opportunities for teacher leadership, and teacher professional development (Burkhauser 2017). Second, using the same statewide survey data on teacher working conditions in North Carolina, researchers found that the race/ethnicity of principals was a salient factor that shaped teachers’ levels of trust, as teachers of color reported higher levels of trust with principals who shared their racial/ethnic identity (Brezicha and Fuller 2019). Studies using nationally representative data found similar effects of principal-teacher racial congruence on job satisfaction and turnover for teachers of color (Olsen and Huang 2019; Goff, Rodriguez-Escutia, and Yang 2018; Viano and Hunter 2017). Importantly, however, researchers caution that the benefits of racial/ethnic congruence between teachers and principals should not be interpreted as only about principals and teachers of the same race/ethnicity working together effectively, but rather that principals should reject racial blindness that prevents awareness of, and conversations with educators, students and parents about, the ways that race and racism continue to structure experiences in school and society (Brezicha and Fuller 2019).

Overall, while learning how to build relationships has been a central component of effective preparation programs, fostering strong relationships across race/ethnicity is particularly important in a workforce that is predominantly white, especially as districts make public efforts to diversify their workforces. Preparation programs can be effective drivers of practices that teach leaders how to foster relationships with and build positive and inclusive school climates for students and teachers of color alike.

Culturally diverse practices

Preparation programs are incorporating coursework that advances culturally responsive leadership practices. In the past, learning to support culturally diverse practices meant supporting teachers’ culturally responsive teaching practices. Now, social justice (Theoharis 2007), antiracist (Diem and Welton 2020), and culturally responsive (Khalifa 2020) leadership practices as well as community-based equity audits (Green 2017) help aspiring school and district leaders to operate from affirming and asset-based perspectives and center the needs of students from historically marginalized backgrounds (including race, socioeconomic class, gender identity, sexual orientation, language spoken at home, and disability status).

The amplification of justice-oriented leadership practices has also influenced redesign activities. The National Policy Board for Educational Administration (NCPBA) redeveloped their professional leadership standards to explicitly name equity and cultural responsiveness in their National Educational Leadership Preparation standards for aspiring school leaders in preparation programs (NCPBA 2018) and the Professional Standards for Educational Leaders for sitting school leaders (NCPBA 2017). The Quality Measures Center for Program Assessment and Technical Assistance has supported preparation programs’ self-assessment since 2004, and thus far, almost 100 principal preparation programs and 60 school districts have participated in the self-assessment process (EDC n.d.). In supporting the push for more justice-oriented efforts in principal preparation programs, the 11th edition of the self-study toolkit (EDC 2022) draws explicit attention to equity, suggesting that preparation programs, first, promote equity-focused experiences for their candidates, and second, prepare them to be equity-focused leaders following graduation and placement.

Practical opportunities

There is evidence that districts are creating practical opportunities with an explicit equity focus. For example, Jefferson County Public Schools (KY) has developed a leadership academy designed to recruit and prepare those interested in becoming a principal or assistant principal and offers them mentoring and networking opportunities as tools to retain them in the district (“JCPS plans to start school leadership program,” 2021). This program operates in tandem with two local principal preparation programs, where aspiring leaders earn graduate degrees while participating. What separates the Jefferson County Leadership Academy from traditional “Grow Your Own” principal programs or district-university partnership programs is the district’s very public and sustained commitment to racial equity. In 2019, the district’s school board approved the Racial Equity Plan, “aimed at creating parity and accessibility to educational programs, resources and opportunities for all students throughout the district” (Jefferson County Public Schools 2019, para. 1). Thus, aspiring JCPS school leaders (regardless of race) who apply to the JCLA program are committing to learning to lead their school communities from an equity-oriented perspective and participate in hands-on experiential learning. This also signals to sitting principals as well as to parents, students, and community stakeholders the district’s vision for the future.

Conclusion

The notion of what knowledge and dispositions a “good” educational leader should now expand beyond traditional management skills to include someone who values equity and leads from an anti-racist, anti-oppressive perspective (Radd et al. 2021). By embedding equity-oriented practices in leadership development programs, while simultaneously making concerted efforts to diversify principal pipelines, the responsibility for shifting school cultures and climates toward equity and justice cannot and should not fall on the shoulders of teachers and leaders of color. Equity-oriented practices can and should be the responsibility of all principal candidates, program graduates, and leadership program faculty, regardless of demographic identity.

Below, we offer some questions for consideration to preparation programs and school districts that bring to life equity-oriented educational leadership. We also suggest aspiring principals and superintendents reflect on these same questions as they make decisions about the leadership programs and/or school districts to which they might apply:

• Leadership Preparation Programs.

• How does your preparation program center equity in teaching and learning?

• Has your program participated in the equity-focused Quality Measures self-assessment? If not, consider reviewing course syllabi, course materials, and student assessments to (1) identify which research and literature, and written by whom, are being shared with program candidates, and (2) to explore how well equity is embedded throughout the program of study.

• How, and from where, does your program recruit candidates? How often do you review enrollment demographics?

• What is the relationship between the preparation program and local district partners, and how can it be strengthened? How does your local and/or state’s political and economic context shape principal preparation-district relationships?

• School District Central Office.

• What are your district’s equity goals for student learning, school climate, leadership recruitment, hiring, mentoring/support, and retention?

• Does your district review patterns in district-level data for trends in leaders’ recruitment, hiring, and placement? Equity goals can be systematically and routinely monitored so that gaps can be identified and addressed. For example, do the same proportion of Black, Latine, Asian, and Native American educators move through the hiring process into leadership placement as their white colleagues? For women and nonbinary/genderfluid educators as for men? Into which schools (including grade level considerations) and neighborhoods are leaders being placed? Are there places in the process where racial/ethnic, and gender gaps emerge? What mentorship opportunities are available?

Equity perspectives in leadership preparation complement and extend the content areas traditionally taught in historically successful programs. An equity lens applied to educational leadership practice can improve outcomes for today’s students, schools, and communities as well as educator retention. Equity-oriented leadership development sits at the nexus of research, policy, and practice and its success depends on sustained collaboration (whether formal or ­informal) between school districts and preparation programs.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).