Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortiums Standards

Isllc Standards at Work

ISLLC Standards

The most recent set of Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium (ISLLC) Standards for School Leaders were published in 2008 (CCSSO, 2008). The purpose of the old and new standards was to improve the learning environment for children through leadership, but the new standards differ from the old because they focus on policy. This policy focus is a reflection of the wide acceptance and use of the standards by most of the states (Derrington and Sharratt, 2008, p. 21) and an abundance of research results over the past few decades that have substantially altered the role of education leadership (CCSSO, 2008).

More specifically, the ISLLC standards are intended to provide a framework for creating school leadership policy, training program performance standards, life-long career development goals, and system support (CCSSO, 2008, p. 13-14). If the six ISLLC policy standards could be reduced to a single word or short phrase, they would be vision, academic culture, management, community engagement, professional ethics, and cultural sensitivity. These standards are intended to be used to guide school administrator and principal training programs, school officials, and legislative representatives during the process of establishing state standards for education leadership.

ISLLC Standards in New Jersey

In 2010, New Jersey began a pilot program for principal practice evaluations for the 2012-2013 school year (N.J. Department of Education, 2010). The evaluation instrument will incorporate the 2008 ISLLC standards for assessing practice and performance criteria. This pilot program is intended to validate a proposed evidence-based program for state-wide adoption if it proves to be feasible and effective. Half of the evaluation will assess professional practice performance, including financial management and teacher recruitment and retention. The other half of the evaluation will be based on student performance, as evaluated by standardized test scores and school-specific student achievement goals.

Given that this pilot program probably represents the future of school leader performance and practice evaluation standards in New Jersey and other states, it seems important to view real-life problems encountered in schools through the lens of ISLLC standards. Locally, some of the more important problems encountered are low parent involvement and student underachievement. In addition, the academic environment is being unduly affected by the endemic poverty and crime in the community.

ISLLC standard 4 encourages educational leaders to reach out to parents and other caregivers and establish a collaborative relationship (CCSSO, 2008, p. 15). The overall goal is to help parents stay informed about student performance and to inform educational leaders of their needs and problems. Depending the on the needs of parents and caregivers, a principal may be required to become an advocate for these families to meet the guidelines of standard 6. As a student and family advocate, a principal could bring their needs to the attention of local and state education officials, thereby influencing the learning environment and student performance. Depending on the circumstances, it may be necessary for the principal and administrators to become informed about, and sensitive to, the ethnic and social makeup of the community (standard 4).

Community crime and poverty seems to be a prevalent problem in most major cities and Newark, New Jersey is no exception. According to standard 3, education leaders are responsible for providing a safe environment within which to learn. This standard implies that the safety of students and staff should be protected, which may mean implementing a security plan to create a security strong barrier between the campus and the rest of the community. Additionally, an inner city school in a poor neighborhood should receive the same funding resources as a public school in a wealthy neighborhood, but this is rarely the case and under standard 3 the education leadership must manage what resources are available to focus on the areas of greatest need. If safety is paramount, then funding for other less-essential resources may need to be reduced or cut.

If the above measures fail to improve student achievement to acceptable levels, then additional measures may need to be taken. Since the overall goal of all six standards is related to student achievement, they all apply. First, a vision and mission must be defined to provide the intellectual framework for addressing student underachievement (standard 1). This would involve assessing the academic learning environment for weaknesses and shortcomings (standard 2), including any ethical and/or professional shortcomings inherent to the educational leaders (standard 5). In short, a vision and mission should first be defined and then data collected to analyze the learning environment. Once problems have been identified, then plans can be created to address them. Plan efficacy would be reevaluated periodically and changed if found wanting. If this process is implemented and followed faithfully, then based on the ISLLC standards, which are evidence-based, student achievement should improve.