HOW IS INSTRUCTIONAL LEADERSHIP BEING DEFINED?
When the school-reform movement began in the 1980s, the first consequence for school leaders was pressure to put student learning at the center of their jobs. Today, instructional leadership remains a dominant theme, but it is taking a much more sophisticated form. Initially, administrators qualified as instructional leaders simply by paying attention to instruction: setting curricular goals, monitoring lesson plans, and evaluating teachers. Today, instructional leaders immerse themselves in the “core technology” of teaching and learning, use data to make decisions, and align staff development with student learning needs. The Education Commission of the States, in analyzing how the No Child Left Behind Act will affect leaders, noted that they not only need a sophisticated understanding of assessment, they should be master teachers (or at least recruit master teachers) so assessment data can be used intelligently (Katy Anthes 2002). Unlike the 1980s, which dealt in images of lonely prin
