This study focuses on the understudied connection between teachers' and students' perceptions of school culture. Utilizing a longitudinal sample of approximately 130,000 students and 9000 teachers in 225 New York City traditional public schools, we investigate how professional culture among teachers intersects with students' collective emotional…

Monica Higgins is the Kathleen McCartney Professor of Education Leadership at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), where her research and teaching focus on leadership development and organizational change. Drawing on a background that combines organizational behavior, business, and education, she works with senior education leaders…

"Achieving Coherence in District Improvement" focuses on a problem of practice faced by educational leaders across the nation: how to effectively manage the relationship between the central office and schools. The book is based on a study of five large urban districts that have demonstrated improvement in student achievement. The…

This study draws upon theory and methods from the field of organizational behavior to examine organizational learning (OL) in the context of a large urban US school district. We build upon prior literature on OL from the field of organizational behavior to introduce and validate three subscales that assess key dimensions of organizational learning…

While much of the debate around Teach For America (TFA) in recent years has focused on the effectiveness of its nontraditional recruits in the classroom, the real story is the degree to which TFA has succeeded in producing dynamic, impassioned, and entrepreneurial education leaders. From its inception as Wendy Kopp's senior thesis project at…

Charter schooling continues to grow apace. The nation's four-thousand-plus charter schools now enroll more than a million students and are approaching (or have exceeded) traditional district enrollment in communities like Dayton, Ohio; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Washington, D.C. Many of the most successful charter school providers are embarking…

Dynamic new ventures like the Knowledge is Power Program, Teach For America, and New Leaders for New Schools, are increasingly being asked to step in to assist struggling school districts. While promising, these ventures have thus far typically been characterized by "one-off" examples of success that are extraordinarily reliant on talent and…

School districts are moving toward a new form of management in which superintendents need to form and nurture leadership teams. A study of 25 such teams in Connecticut suggests that a team's effectiveness is maximized when the team members are coached by other team members, not the superintendent, and when they are coached on task-related…

Given the desperate plight of urban schooling and the disheartening track record of conventional reform, dynamic new ventures like the KIPP Academies, Edison, or Green Dot Public Schools are increasingly being asked to stand in for failing district schools. While promising, these ventures have thus far typically been characterized by "one-off"…

A study of 138 lawyers who had not yet made partner (49% female, 23% minority) showed that more developmental relationships (mentoring) and developmental assistance resulted in greater job satisfaction. A high amount of psychosocial assistance from just one person was associated with high work satisfaction. (SK)

Drawing on the mentoring, education, and social psychology literatures, this longitudinal study examines how the persistence of developmental relationships from an elite graduate school influences subjective career outcomes during early career. Participants (n=136) were surveyed about their developmental networks--a group of individuals who take…