CEO, NYC Leadership Academy
Our vision of the principal’s role is that of transforming education to maximize the promise and potential of every child, and especially of the children whose life opportunities rely on schools the most. The mission of the NYC Leadership Academy, therefore, is to prepare and support visionary, passionate educators who have the knowledge, skills, capacity and dispositions to lead schools that orient all their activities around accelerating student learning and academic growth.
Our focus on outcomes-oriented leadership springs from the fact that successful principals are more than administrators—they are innovators who ignite a sense of urgency and excitement about teaching and learning, who inspire and lead teachers, students, and parents, and the broader school community, and who are accountable for student outcomes. To foster successful school environments, leaders must have a solid grounding in how both students and adults learn, in organizational improvement, and in how to leverage all available resources, both inside and outside the school, to maximize learning.
Since 2003, the Leadership Academy has offered innovative, comprehensive leadership development programs for educators seeking to become New York City public school leaders and for those currently serving as principals. Our programs seamlessly bridge theory, research and practice-based expertise. We are deeply connected to the day-to-day realities of school leadership; employing teamwork, simulations and job-embedded learning opportunities that allow participants to explore new paradigms, improve their practice, and interrogate their assumptions about how schools accelerate learning. Through our programs, aspiring and current school leaders are able to leverage their vision, passion and commitment and develop the complex set of skills necessary for transforming schools.
Right now, 15 percent of New York City public schools—most of them identified as high-need—are led by graduates of our nationally recognized Aspiring Principals Program. Collectively, they serve more than 108,000 children. Early-career principals in existing or new schools have relied on our coaches, all veteran school and/or system leaders, for individual support, competency development and sustained professional learning. Since our inception, more than 1,000 early-career principals have worked with our dynamic team of coaches to focus on areas of skill development and leadership practice.
The demand for transformative school leaders continues to grow. In order to meet this demand, we have crafted rigorous and responsive programs the provide inescapable learning opportunities, powerful peer networks, and highly skilled, dedicated coaches to help aspiring and current principals do the real work of school leadership. The work we do requires an unflinching willingness to confront reality in the pursuit of social justice and an acute awareness that we must continually assess what we do and how we do it for the purpose of maximizing human potential. It is our perpetual dissatisfaction with the status quo that pushes us farther and challenges us to reach higher; as long as there is a single child in New York City who cannot read on grade-level, our work is not done.
I invite you to learn more about how we partner with principals to accelerate student progress. I hope you will spend some time on this Web site, reading about our programs, meeting some of our graduates, faculty and coaches. Ultimately, I hope you’ll join us in the work of transforming schools through strong, purposeful leadership.