Better Leaders Make Better Schools: What Works

Better Leaders Make Better Schools

Strong school leadership sits beside teaching as a major in-school influence on student learning. Large syntheses show that effective principals are associated with higher achievement, lower absenteeism, and better teacher retention.

The pathway is indirect yet consistent: leaders shape the conditions that make great teaching common—clear goals, sound curriculum, useful feedback, and a climate of trust.

Investments in principal pipelines deliver gains at modest cost, and practical routines such as high-quality questioning, short data cycles, and focused coaching help a faculty move together.

Table of Content

1. Better Leaders Make Better Schools
2. Who Will Gain From This Guide
3. What Improves When Leadership Improves
4. Five High-Leverage Moves For School Leadership
5. Questioning Skills: A Small Habit With Big Effects
6. What The Evidence Says About Principal Impact
7. Principal Pipelines: Affordable Steps With System-Level Payoff
8. Professional Development That Sticks
9. Time Use: Where Effective Leaders Spend Their Day
10. Measurement That Guides Action
11. Equity-Focused Leadership
12. Distributed Leadership Without Losing Focus
13. Implementation Playbook: A 12-Week Start-Up Plan
14. Composite Examples From Real Schools
15. Common Pitfalls And How To Avoid Them
16. Key Takeaways For Fast Progress
17. Practical Tools You Can Use This Week
18. Conclusion
19. FAQs

Who Will Gain From This Guide

• School leaders and aspiring principals who want research-grounded steps

• Teacher leaders and coaches building collective expertise

• District teams setting up a principal pipeline and support system

What Improves When Leadership Improves

A two-decade synthesis for The Wallace Foundation finds that a one-standard-deviation shift in principal effectiveness links to meaningful gains in math and reading, with related benefits for attendance and staff stability.

Equitable access to strong instruction rises when principals focus on culture and coaching.

Leaders rarely change outcomes through charisma. Results move when leaders tighten curriculum coherence, guide professional development, and support teachers with timely evidence from classrooms.

Five High-Leverage Moves For School Leadership

1) Anchor The Work To A Small Set Of Learning Goals

Pick one or two student learning goals per subject. Define what success looks like in student work. Map units, assessments, and tasks so daily choices connect to those goals.

Keep the goals on every meeting agenda and visible in classrooms. This keeps conversations concrete and reduces initiative clutter.

2) Design Professional Development That Changes Daily Practice

The Education Endowment Foundation recommends building PD around mechanisms that shift teacher behavior: build knowledge, motivate, develop techniques, and embed practice through rehearsal, feedback, and action planning.

Spread learning across sessions, return to it in coaching, and check for application in lessons.

Quick PD frame

• Clarify the student learning problem with samples of real work

• Model a strategy; co-plan a short segment

• Rehearse with peers and agree on a simple evidence check

• Try the change; collect exit tickets or hinge questions

• Debrief with the team; adjust and repeat

3) Run Short Data Cycles That Inform Instruction

Adopt 3–6 week cycles. Begin with clear success criteria, review student work, identify misconceptions, agree on a reteach plan, and check impact with a short formative task. Keep dashboards minimal; let real work guide decisions.

4) Build Culture And Collective Teacher Efficacy

Schools strong on at least three of the 5Essentials—effective leaders, collaborative teachers, supportive environment, ambitious instruction, and strong family ties—are far more likely to improve. A persistent weakness in any one area lowers the odds of progress. Use a climate survey aligned to these domains and plan actions by domain rather than by a list of disconnected activities.

Research on collective teacher efficacy shows a strong positive relationship with student achievement across subjects and contexts. Leaders help this grow by securing quick wins, protecting collaboration time, and sharing evidence of impact.

5) Treat Talent As A Learning Engine

Hire for instructional fit and a growth mindset. Offer precise feedback tied to student work. Recognize improvement and keep strong teachers through practical supports, not slogans.

Small acts—coverage during assessments, reliable materials, predictable feedback cycles—build trust.

Questioning Skills: A Small Habit With Big Effects

Great questioning turns meetings, coaching, and lessons into thinking spaces. Two strands of research support this habit:

• Formative assessment raises attainment when teachers use in-lesson evidence to adapt teaching.

• Rosenshine’s principles highlight frequent questions, checks for understanding, guided practice, and clear success criteria.

Meeting-Level Question Stems

• What in the student work tells us the strategy helped?

• Where did thinking break down, and what will we try next week?

• If we dropped one activity, which concept would suffer most?

Walkthrough And Feedback Stems

• Which prompt drew the most student thinking?

• What will you keep, tweak, or drop next lesson?

• What evidence will show the change worked?

Student-Facing Question Patterns

• Retrieval: What facts or rules matter here?

• Probe: Why does your approach fit this problem?

• Transfer: Where else would this method work?

These stems travel well across subjects and grades and take little time to learn. They make talk more productive and keep the focus on learning rather than on tasks.

What The Evidence Says About Principal Impact

• A comprehensive review links higher principal effectiveness with gains in math and reading, reductions in absenteeism, and stronger teacher retention. The effect is larger in schools serving students with higher needs.

• Leadership practices closest to instruction—coordinating curriculum, setting goals, and participating in teacher learning—show stronger associations with outcomes than broad motivational talk.

• Time spent on organizational management and high-quality instructional support correlates with better outcomes. Time spent on general “instructional” activities without clear purpose does not show the same pattern.

Principal Pipelines: Affordable Steps With System-Level Payoff

A RAND evaluation across six districts reported achievement gains and higher principal retention when systems invested in clear leader standards, selective hiring, preservice preparation, on-the-job support, and aligned evaluation.

The work cost about $42 per student per year, under 0.5% of district budgets.

Starter moves for any district

• Publish observable leader standards tied to teaching

• Use performance tasks and simulations in selection

• Fund coaching for new principals during the first two years

• Track placements, tenure, and student growth at each site

Professional Development That Sticks

Short workshops rarely shift daily practice. The EEF guidance points to PD built around mechanisms: motivate change, build knowledge, develop techniques, and embed the new routine.

Plan rehearsal, feedback, action planning, and spaced follow-up.

One 6-Week PD Arc (example for questioning skills)

1. Week 1: Define the learning gap with student work; agree on two question stems

2. Week 2: Model a mini-lesson; rehearse stems with peers

3. Week 3: Try in class; collect exit tickets with one transfer item

4. Week 4: Debrief patterns; refine stems; plan a reteach move

5. Week 5: Second trial; invite a peer to observe for five minutes

6. Week 6: Share evidence and decide whether to scale or switch focus

Time Use: Where Effective Leaders Spend Their Day

Studies of time use reveal a pattern. Leaders who devote more minutes to organization management—scheduling, staffing, resource alignment—and to targeted instructional support see stronger results. General walk-through minutes alone do not predict gains; precise feedback tied to student work does.

A weekly guardrail

• Five short feedback conversations (15–20 minutes) with next-step commitments

• Two hours for team facilitation and data meetings

• Ninety minutes for staffing, scheduling, and coverage decisions that protect teaching time

• A standing block for family communication

Measurement That Guides Action

The 5Essentials framework links climate and organization to long-term improvement. Schools strong on at least three essentials are many times more likely to improve; weakness in any single domain lowers the odds of progress.

Use a survey instrument aligned to these domains, review results twice a year, and connect each domain to one or two concrete actions.

Simple dashboard

• Process: % of teachers in an active coaching cycle; feedback turnaround time; % of teams with current unit maps

• Leading indicators: visibility of success criteria; use of hinge questions; climate items on belonging and safety

• Outcomes: growth on common assessments; attendance; on-track measures; course pass rates

Equity-Focused Leadership

The Wallace synthesis highlights the principal’s role in fair discipline, access to rigorous coursework, and consistent, high-quality teaching across classrooms.

Leaders can audit placement into advanced classes, review discipline data by subgroup, and check whether multilingual families receive timely information about learning goals and next steps.

Practical checks

• Compare enrollment in advanced courses with overall demographics

• Read a small sample of referrals; check patterns by time, teacher, and incident type

• Offer interpretation, translated notices, and family workshops on how to read student work samples and rubrics

Distributed Leadership Without Losing Focus

Shared roles can grow capacity when responsibilities are clear. Reviews caution that links to achievement depend on focus and follow-through.

A workable split assigns curriculum mapping, lesson study, and peer coaching to teacher leaders, while the principal holds strategy, hiring, evaluation calibration, and schedule control.

Implementation Playbook: A 12-Week Start-Up Plan

Weeks 1–4: Listen, Map, Set Guardrails

• Hold brief listening sessions with staff, students, and families

• Publish one learning goal per subject with sample student work

• Freeze low-value meetings and protect collaboration blocks

• Share a one-page calendar for PD, observations, and check-ins

Weeks 5–8: Launch PD And A Short Data Cycle

• Pick one routine—questioning or retrieval practice

• Model, rehearse, try, and review student work within three weeks

• Begin five weekly feedback conversations and schedule follow-ups

• Post weekly wins on a shared board (patterns, not people)

Weeks 9–12: Refine And Normalize

• Narrow the observation focus to one or two look-fors

• Adjust schedules where collaboration time still gets squeezed

• Publish “working norms” for meetings, feedback, and data use

• Invite two families per team to a short showcase of student work

Composite Examples From Real Schools

Small Rural Secondary

A new principal moved staff meetings into classrooms once a month. Each meeting opened with two student work samples tied to a common learning goal.

Teams used three question stems to study misconceptions and plan next steps. Within two cycles, writing responses showed clearer claims and evidence, and teachers reported smoother lessons.

Large Urban Campus

A dean set up a weekly “questioning lab.” Teachers rehearsed prompts with peers for five minutes, tried them during the week, and returned with exit tickets.

Algebra classes logged more student talk during problem solving and fewer blank responses on transfer items.

Newly Merged K–8

A leadership team used 5Essentials data to target “Collaborative Teachers.” Schedules shifted to protect grade-level planning, and peer observation launched with a narrow lens: success criteria and hinge questions. Attendance rose and on-track rates climbed.

These sketches show how small routines—question stems, visible goals, tight schedules—compound when repeated and shared.

Common Pitfalls And How To Avoid Them

• Too many goals: pick one learning problem per subject

• Feedback without follow-up: schedule the next touchpoint before leaving the room

• Initiative overload: if you add something, retire something

• Long meetings, little practice: put rehearsal and student work at the center

• Survey results with no action: assign one owner per domain and publish the next small step

Key Takeaways For Fast Progress

• Keep the aim tight: one or two student learning goals with visible success criteria

• Use PD that includes rehearsal, feedback, and classroom trials; plan the follow-up, not only the session

• Invest time in organization management and targeted instructional support; track minutes on your calendar

• Measure conditions with a predictive tool such as 5Essentials and connect results to actions

• Treat questioning as a whole-school craft anchored in formative assessment and Rosenshine’s principles

Practical Tools You Can Use This Week

Instructional Leadership Checklist

• One clear learning goal per subject posted in planning docs

• Unit maps link to tasks and assessments

• Coaching logs show five short feedback conversations per week

• Teams schedule a three-week data cycle with a hinge question

Questioning Toolkit (Starter Set)

• Retrieval prompt: “What do we already know that helps here?”

• Probe: “Why does this step work?”

• Transfer: “Where else would this approach fit?”

• Turn-and-talk: 30 seconds, then cold-call with wait time

Culture & Climate Moves

• Start meetings with student work, not announcements

• 2×10 relationships: two minutes with a focus student for ten days

• Share three schoolwide wins each Friday that tie to learning goals

Conclusion

Better schools grow from disciplined leadership. Keep the aim tight, choose a routine that lifts thinking, and protect time for the work that moves learning. Evidence favors a blend of coherent curriculum goals, practical PD, short data cycles, and steady coaching.

Districts that back this with a pipeline see gains without heavy spending. Start small this week—one learning goal, one rehearsal, one evidence check—and repeat.

FAQs

1) What single habit should a new principal start today?

Block daily time for five short feedback conversations tied to student work. Track the minutes and schedule the follow-up before you leave the room. Research on time use links this pattern to stronger outcomes.

2) How much does a principal pipeline cost, and is it worth it?

A multi-district study found about $42 per student per year, under 0.5% of budgets, with gains in achievement and principal retention.

3) Which survey tool has strong links to improvement?

The 5Essentials suite has long-term evidence that strength on at least three domains ties to higher odds of improvement.

4) What classroom routine should a school standardize first?

Questioning and checks for understanding. They are quick to learn, work across subjects, and sit on a strong research base.

5) How do I make PD stick without long training days?

Use short arcs with rehearsal, feedback, classroom trials, and a return visit. EEF’s guidance lays out the mechanisms that make change last.