Developing and Empowering Leaders for Collective School Leadership
Leadership has long been recognized as a critical component of effective P 12 schools (Hallinger Heck, 1996; Neumerski, 2013; Spillane, Halverson, Diamond, 2004) Because leading contemporary schools requires careful attention to myriad and often complex tasks (Blase Blase, 2006; Katzenmeyer Moller, 2009; Mangin Stoelinga, 2010) a principal must be a "leader of instructional leaders" (Glickman, 1989, p. 6) who actively engages with teachers to supervise curriculum development and instruction, assess student learning progress, implement school improvement initiatives, and monitor impact of those efforts (Knapp et al. 2003; Marks Nance, 2007; Marks Printy, 2003; Marzano, Waters, McNulty, 2005) This learningcentered leadership enacted collaboratively by administrators and teachers "relies on complex, organic interrelationships" (Murphy, Elliott, Goldring, Porter, 2006, p. 1) as well as shared responsibility for outcomes (Demarest, 2010; McCombs Miller, 2007) The "extent of influence that organizational members and stakeholders exert on decisions" (Leithwood Louis, 2012, p. 11) within a school community is known as collective leadership. Collective instructional leadership practices, defined as setting directions, developing people, redesigning the organization, and improving the instructional program (Leithwood Louis, 2012) require coordinated and engaged efforts by administrators and teachers working and learning together (Collinson Cook, 2007; Muijs Harris, 2003; Murphy, 2005)