Principal Effectiveness: Assistant Superintendent Perspectives and Implications for Leadership Preparation

The increasingly complex and challenging demands of school leadership require principals who are well-positioned to succeed in leading their schools. To better prepare our school principals for the job, there is a need to align the expectations of principals in the field with the standards that govern principal preparation programs in preparing future school leaders. Using a phenomenological approach and thematic analysis, we sought to determine how principal supervisors perceived successful principals and aligned their shared perspective to the Texas Administrative Code §241.15, which are the standards for principal preparation and certification. The findings of this study revealed that the Leading Learning standard was the most highly perceived indicator of successful principals. Implications for principal preparation program coursework and school district action plans were imparted.