While considerable attention is paid to training and development for teachers, not enough is paid to the training of educational leaders, this paper contends. The aim of this paper is to provide an analytical groundwork and comprehensive direction for reform of educational leadership training to help policymakers design specific solutions to problems brought on by the lack of qualified educational leaders. The paper argues that many current approaches to leadership training and selection of leaders are far from sufficient to meet the challenges at hand and, in some cases, work at cross purposes with efforts to improve student achievement. After an opening discussion on what the paper refers to as the educational leadership crisis, it proceeds in two parts. First, it analyzes the current licensure system, including its history, costs, and the presumptions it rests on. The shortcomings of current reform strategies such as seeking only nontraditional candidates or further raising the bar to licensure are also discussed. The second part describes a new leadership agenda and the related challenges and opportunities in greater detail. (Contains 92 endnotes, many of which are references.) (WFA)