Best Practices, Best Thinking, and Emerging Issues in School Leadership

Featuring the leading figures in educational leadership, this new resource from Owings and Kaplan connects best thinking with best practices and emerging issues in school leadership. The contributing authors―including Michael Fullan, Linda Darling-Hammond, Alan November, Robert Marzano, Gerald Tirozzi, and Gene Carter―present leading research and key considerations to assist in making decisions about new programs and new directions for your school.

This book highlights:

• Future Trends
• Recruiting
• High-Stakes Testing
• Teacher Quality
• Technology
• Curriculum and Instruction
• Special Education
• School Law
• Political Environment
• Building-level Change
• Parent/Community Relationships

Best Practices, Best Thinking, and Emerging Issues in School Leadership unites the ideas of these leading educators and researchers with the perspectives of practicing principals, reconciling theory and fieldwork with recommendations for best practice―truly applying research-into-practice into one manageable, accessible guide.

William A. Owings was Emeritus Professor of Educational Leadership at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia.  Owings had worked as a public school teacher, an elementary school and high school principal, assistant superintendent, and superintendent of schools. His scholarly publications, co-authored with Leslie S. Kaplan, included books on educational leadership and school finance as well as articles in National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) Bulletin, Journal of School Leadership, Journal of Effective Schools, Phi Delta Kappan, Teachers College Record, the Journal of Education Finance, and the Eurasian Journal of Business and Economics. Owings had served on the state and international boards of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) and was a member of the Journal of Education Finance Editorial Advisory Board. He also reviewed articles for the NASSP Bulletin Educational Administration Quarterly, Eurasian Journal of Business and Economics, Asia Pacific Journal of Education, and International Journal of Education Research. He was a frequent presenter at state and national conferences and a consultant on educational leadership, school finance, and instructional improvement. The National Education Finance Association honored Owings with its 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award and in 2014, recognized him as a “Distinguished Fellow of Research and Practice.”  Owings and Kaplan share the 2008 Virginia Educational Research Association Charles Edgar Clear Research Award for Consistent and Substantial Contributions to Educational Research and Scholarship.