In this empirically based paper, we discuss educational leadership preparation as it relates to social justice, the concept of advocacy and the standards that guide leadership and counselling, respectively. To reveal how preservice leaders conceptualize advocacy as understood in professional standards, we draw on our research with 11 preservice students about the current US Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium standards and its relationship to what educational leaders should be able to know and do. Based on the insights students shared, we looked to the school counselling field to see how explicitly advocacy and social justice are defined for preservice counselors in standards and competencies for practice. We suggest that leadership programmes can look to school counselling and other disciplines to further inform them in preparing leaders for advocacy. We discuss why including more definitive advocacy and social justice language in leadership standards carries implications for future educational reforms. With more explicit and intentional definitions and examples of advocacy and social justice in education leadership standards, the better the likelihood that once students step into a school leadership role, they are prepared and willing to use their skills and knowledge in action.