Who Leads Turnaround Schools? Characteristics of Principals in Tennessee's Achievement School District and Innovation Zones

Purpose: While previous research has examined the impact of school turnaround models, less is known about the principals who lead these turnaround schools. This study examines the personal demographics, experience, educational background, prior school performance, salaries, and turnover of principals who led two turnaround models in Tennessee's lowest performing schools: a state-run Achievement School District (ASD) that has not yielded positive nor negative effects and local Innovation Zones (iZones) that averaged positive effects on student achievement over six years. Methods: We analyze longitudinal, administrative data from the Tennessee Department of Education from 2006–2007 to 2017–2018 to compare pre- and post-reform means and trends in principal characteristics between ASD, iZone, and similarly low-performing comparison schools. Results: ASD schools had higher principal turnover rates and lost principals whose schools performed higher while iZone schools retained more principals and lost principals whose schools performed lower. Moreover, iZone schools employed more experienced principals, more Black principals, and principals with higher graduate degree attainment and paid their principals more than ASD schools. Salary differences between ASD and iZone schools were not explained by principals’ characteristics, such as years of experience. Implications: Our findings reveal differences in leadership characteristics between iZone and ASD schools that were consistent with differences in the effectiveness of the two turnaround approaches.

Effects of Principal Turnover on School Performance

This study asks: What is the relationship between principal turnover and school performance? We use data on all Colorado public schools for the years 2013 and 2018 to examine the relationship between turnover and school performance. Analyses included difference-in-difference and ordinary least squares regression after first differencing. Results indicated almost 50% of schools experienced principal turnover. The number of turnover events ranged from zero to three. Results showed no significant differences in school performance based on turnover status or number of leadership changes.

Policy and principal turnover: The impact of the Texas special education cap

Accountability policies in education play a significant role for the principals tasked with facilitating the implementation of these reforms at the school-level. While these policies are most often intended to improve student outcomes, this is not always the case. In some instances, these policies can prove detrimental to schools, yet principals are still responsible for compliance. In Texas, a federal investigation found the Texas Education Agency (TEA) was restricting access to special education services by incentivizing districts to enroll fewer than 8.5% of students, utilizing these numbers as a measure of district performance. The implementation of the “8.5% cap” in 2004 resulted in a sharp decline in special education enrollment. Employing a sample of all principals in Texas before and after the 2004 law, this paper examines how the 8.5% cap impacted school leader attrition during its implementation. Prior to the implementation of the cap in 2004, we find little association between the proportion of students receiving services and principal turnover. After its implementation however, we find that principals in schools enrolling more than 8.5% of students in special education had a .39 higher odds ratio of switching districts and a .14 higher odds ratio of exiting the profession. We conclude by highlighting the scarcity of school labor market research that accounts for state-level education policies and note that policy may be more associated with principal turnover than student characteristics themselves.

The Principal-Teacher Churn: Understanding the Relationship Between Leadership Turnover and Teacher Attrition

Purpose: Principals are critical to school improvement and play a vital role in creating inclusive and high-performing schools. Yet, approximately one in five principals leave their school each year, and turnover is higher in schools that serve low-income students of color. Relatedly, high rates of teacher turnover exacerbate challenges associated with unstable learning environments. Our study examines the extent to which principal turnover influences teacher turnover. We build on past work by exploring how the relationship between teacher and principal turnover differs in urban, high-poverty settings and by examining the effects of chronic principal turnover. Research Methods/Approach: We draw on a student- and employee-level statewide longitudinal dataset from Texas that includes all public K-12 schools from school years 1999–2000 to 2016–17. We estimate teacher-level models with school fixed effects, allowing us to compare teacher turnover in schools leading up to and immediately following a principal exit, to otherwise similar schools that do not experience principal turnover. Findings: Teacher turnover spikes in schools experiencing leadership turnover, and these effects are greater among high-poverty and urban schools, in schools with low average teacher experience, and in schools experiencing chronic principal turnover. Implications: Improving leadership stability, especially in urban schools experiencing chronic principal turnover may be an effective approach to reducing teacher turnover. Principal and teacher turnover and their relationship with each other requires further investigation. The field would benefit from qualitative research that can provide important insights into the individual decisions and organizational processes that contribute to principal turnover.

Principal Turnover: Using Teacher-Assessments of Principal Quality to Understand who Leaves the Principalship

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to estimate the relationship between principal quality and turnover. Principals can have potentially large effects on student outcomes. When school leaders leave their roles, they cause disruptive effects to the school’s climate. If effective principals are more likely to leave, the negative effects of principal turnover are likely exacerbated. Relatively little, however, is known about the quality of principals who leave the principalship. Research design: We use teachers’ perceptions of their principals as a measure of principal quality to understand the quality of principals who leave schools. We address this research question in New York City public schools from 2013 to 2016, and then replicate it at the national level using the Schools and Staffing Survey data from 2008 to 2012. To understand how principal quality relates to principal turnover, we run linear probability regressions of principal exits on (teacher-assessed) principal quality, controlling for a set of teacher, principal, school, district/state, and time characteristics. Findings: We find that higher quality principals are less likely to leave their schools. This finding persists across school contexts and time, lending robustness to our results. Conclusions: Findings suggest that inasmuch as principal turnover is a concern, it is not driven by higher quality principals. Districts should therefore focus on recruiting more higher quality principals as opposed to focusing on reducing overall principal turnover. Moving forward, research should focus on differential attrition patterns so that efforts to retain principals can be better targeted.

Assistant Principal Mobility and Its Relationship With Principal Turnover

Assistant principals (APs) are important education personnel, but empirical evidence about their career outcomes remains scarce. Using administrative data from Tennessee and Missouri, we provide the first comprehensive analysis of AP mobility. While prior work focuses on promotions into principal positions, we also examine APs exiting school leadership and transferring across schools. We find yearly mobility rates of 25% to 28%, with 10% of APs leaving school leadership, 7.5% changing schools, and 7.5% to 10% becoming principals. We also document a strong relationship between AP mobility and principal turnover, where higher-performing APs are substantially more likely to replace their departing principal. Finally, principal transitions appear to increase the likelihood that APs exit school leadership and change schools.

Which Principal is the Right Principal? Student Achievement, School Finances, and Community Stakeholders

When a struggling high school may be placed on turnaround status during a bid for a school bond, the district considers replacing a beloved principal with a record of low test scores with an unpopular principal whose record shows increased student achievement. The school board must decide whether to prioritize finances, community support, student achievement, or state-level demands. This case presents many difficult decisions schools and districts are required to make. Key factors discussed in the case include principal turnover, student academic achievement, teacher retention, school culture, and power.

Your Pay or Someone Else's? Exploring Salary Dispersion, Position, and Principal Turnover

This study explores ways in which salary can be structured to reduce leadership shortages by investigating how comparative wage dispersion and position alter the relationship of salary to principal turnover. Using a seventeen-year longitudinal dataset covering over sixteen thousand principals in Texas, discrete-time hazard models demonstrate that principals are highly sensitive to salary comparisons over and above basic salary. Higher comparative position is associated with significantly reduced turnover risk, while wider dispersion is associated with a significantly increased turnover risk. Interactions demonstrate that dispersion and position act in tandem to create conditions where principals have particularly high turnover risk. These results have implications for strategies to address turnover through district salary structures, as well as broader notions of how wage tournaments operate in the principal labor market.