Learnings from RAND Research with Susan Gates
21m | Feb 21, 2024How has a culture of openness among academia has led to a fertile ground of collaboration? How did the pandemic change everything from methods of education to the percentages of principals staying on or leaving the job?
On this episode of In the Lead with UCEA’s podcast series on the University Principal Preparation Initiative (UPPI), UCEA Executive Director Dr. Mónica Byrne-Jimenez talks with Susan Gates, a senior economist at RAND who applies economic theory and methods to help policymakers identify effective practices and make better decisions on a wide range of topics.
In the Lead with UCEA is produced by University FM.
Episode Quotes:
The importance of understanding the principal preparation
09:54: Another surprise was to see the development of models for universities to collaborate with districts other than the state's large urban school districts. One of the challenges we've observed through our earlier research in this space of principal preparation is that everybody understands that principal preparation relies on access to authentic learning environments in schools and districts. And that these principals are being prepared to work in school districts. Therefore, universities need to partner with school districts to stay up-to-date on what's going on in the school districts and what it means to be a principal today to provide those hands-on learning opportunities.
On changing the traditional principal selection criteria
13:36: The UPPI programs all shifted their selection criteria to rely more heavily on district input and focused explicitly on whether, based on a person's work in the district, they were a good candidate for a principal preparation program at this time. So, it was less academic and based on things like test scores and grades and more oriented toward the authentic work of a principal and a person's ability to succeed not only in an academic program but also on the job as a principal.
On navigating trust and roles
04:09: One challenge from a research perspective was just building that trust: What would we be documenting? What would we be saying? Another challenge that I hadn't really run up against in prior research studies, which in the education field had typically focused on efforts within school districts because this initiative was bringing representatives from universities and specifically university faculty to the table; they are researchers. And so they wanted to be involved in the research. I was sort of like, "Well, wait a minute, we're the researchers here." So, I would say that was one of the biggest unexpected challenges that we had to navigate as we went along.
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