A staff and organizational development program was designed to foster the use of research to improve instructional effectiveness at the elementary level by monitoring and managing key classroom variables related to student achievement. A classroom improvement program, called the Basic Skills Instructional Improvement Program (BSIIP), was developed in 1977-1981 and expanded in 1981-1984 to focus on the implications of research on effective schools, effective school districts, and also on the literature on educational change. The outcome was known as Achievement Directed Leadership (ADL). Description of the BSIIP focuses on: (1) key perspectives and understandings shaping program development; (2) classroom variables warranting regular monitoring by teachers and administrators, including prior learning, student engaged time, criterion content coverage, and daily success, mastery, and review; (3) a four-phase improvement cycle for using research findings to improve instructional effectiveness and student performance on focal classroom variables; (4) strategies for developing and implementing BSIIP centering on transportability and enhancing positive participation of administrators and teachers; (5) conclusions reached as a result of developing and implementing the BSIIP; and (6) inclusion of BSIIP in Maryland's program for School Improvement Through Instructional Processes. Evaluation of program implementation and its apparent effects in three school districts indicates gains in student achievement across all grades in reading and math. (RH)