Leadership Challenges in High Schools: Multiple Pathways to Success - Hardcover

Principals are responsible for an increasing range of duties in an era of school reform, standardized testing, and more. These responsibilities are even greater in high schools, which are many times larger and more complex than elementary and middle schools. Yet little has been written on the special challenges of high schools and their leadership. This book fills the gap by exploring the challenges specific to high schools, including their size and complexity, the special difficulties in improving instruction, the crucial role of high schools for students' futures, adolescent behavioral issues, and many more. Grubb shows how principals and other leaders can address the complexities of multiple pathways, or efforts to create theme-based trajectories through high school - one of the most promising high school reforms. Looking to the future, he offers alternative ways of preparing professionals for high schools, and the responsibilities of districts for improving high schools and their leadership.

W. Norton Grubb is the David Pierpont Gardner Professor in Higher Education at the University of California, Berkeley. He is also the faculty coordinator of the Principal Leadership Institute, a program to prepare principals for urban schools. In addition to conducting wide-ranging research, he provides workshops for secondary and community college instructors and administrators, presenting different approaches to reform. He has also participated in public policy efforts such as the California Master Plan Commission and National Research Council Committee on high school motivation. His recent books include The Education Gospel: The Economic Power of Schooling; Honored But Invisible: An Inside Look at Teaching in Community Colleges; and Learning to Work: The Case for Reintegrating Education and Job Training.