Leadership Supports

SchoolWorks leadership development is a summer program focused on helping all school leaders establish effective instructional leadership practices, whether they are new in their role or veteran school leaders. Through the program, participants will develop their understanding of high quality instruction, identify a priority instructional focus for their school, and align all support systems in the school to focus on this area. Principals leave the program with a clearly articulated action plan ready to implement in the Fall.

SchoolWorks leadership coaching begins with an assessment of a school leader’s skills and capacities. The assessment includes interviews, diagnostic testing, and instructional walkthroughs. The SchoolWorks coach and school leader collaboratively develop a coaching plan with specific objectives based on this assessment. Coaching plans are designed to address school needs while building leadership capacity. In our experience, the provision of leadership coaching can also lead to our provision of SchoolWorks instructional supports.

SchoolWorks offers a support for leadership team members in a single school that builds capacity at scale – the EPIC (Evaluation, Planning & Implementation Cohort) Program.  A school leadership team (i.e., a principal, assistant principal(s), instructional leader(s), and key administrators) form a cohort. The cohort agrees to an annual schedule of 6-to-7 in-person facilitated workshops. Sessions in the first six months of the program focus on the creation of an annual plan. Extensive data are collected and analyzed about the school, and participants perform a “gap analysis” of the data to identify and prioritize areas of need that will be strategically addressed. The plan is collectively developed, and cohort members commit to administer the outlined strategies. As workshops continue, the cohort is supported and held accountable for the implementation of the plan. During these sessions, participants are guided through the process of monitoring the results of their strategic interventions and pivoting their actions as necessary. In some cases, SchoolWorks will administer a mid-course School Quality Review in order to provide direct feedback on the implementation of the action plan. At the end of the process, progress toward the identified goals is clearly mapped via the achievement of benchmarks in the action plan.

Learn more about SchoolWorks EPIC Program.

Download our Leadership Supports fact sheet here.