Since 2005 there has been an explosion of interest and debate about alternative futures for the doctorate in education. The authors take the debate from the abstract to the concrete by describing a signature pedagogy in doctoral education that combines theory, applied scholarship, and the wisdom of practice in new ways. They describe "leader-scholar communities," whose goal is to assist and support students to conduct applied research in local educational contexts. They argue that leader-scholar communities are particularly useful for helping doctoral students persist to graduation, become socialized into a new identity as leader-scholars, and bridge the gap between what is learned at the university and what is practiced in schools.