Unprecedented Executive Training Offered to State and District Education Leaders

The Wallace Foundation awards $5 million grant to Harvard University to draw on faculty expertise from graduate schools of education, business, and government

Leadership teams from Kentucky and Ohio to form Harvard's first cohort

The Wallace Foundation and Harvard University jointly announced today the launch of an unprecedented executive training program--drawing on the multiple perspectives of faculty from Harvard's graduate schools of education, business, and government--for senior teams of state and district education leaders, beginning this summer.

In an era when education leaders are held accountable for raising the academic performance of all students, the job of leading today's schools has seriously outpaced the available training, especially for state and district leaders who set policy for and lead complex urban districts. The Executive Leadership Program for Educators at Harvard University in association with The Wallace Foundation will emphasize midcareer development of teams of high-level education leaders that share responsibility for making changes in their organizations and across their states to broadly improve school leadership and its impact on student achievement.

Wallace awarded a grant of $5 million for up to five years to Harvard University to have the Harvard Graduate School of Education, Harvard Business School, and the John F. Kennedy School of Government jointly offer their varied leadership perspectives and expertise to create an unmatched training opportunity. A second $5 million grant will also go to the University of Virginia (U.Va.), involving its graduate schools of education and business.

"School leadership is as demanding a profession as any business or public sector job, especially in an era of rising public expectations and greater accountability for results," said Robert Schwartz, academic dean at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and chair of the Executive Leadership Program steering committee. "The Wallace Foundation grant will enable us to provide the kind of high-quality training for district superintendents, state education chiefs and their senior teams that corporate and governmental leaders receive in other Harvard executive education programs. What makes this initiative special is our ability to follow participants back into their home settings to provide ongoing support throughout the life of the program."

"There are many training programs for school principals, but few exist for top state and district education leaders who establish policies, incentives, and cultures that enable those principals to succeed in lifting student achievement," added M. Christine DeVita, president of The Wallace Foundation. "Wallace recently commissioned a survey that reveals a strong demand for this kind of executive training, particularly if it can overcome barriers of cost and time. These unprecedented Harvard and U.Va. programs aim to address the barriers, while offering a quality experience for very busy people to greatly improve public education in their states and districts."

Harvard and U.Va. will each work with two states, and four urban districts within each state, to form the first cohorts of leaders to participate in the programs. Leadership teams from Kentucky and Ohio will participate in Harvard's program; and teams from Delaware and Indiana will attend the program at U.Va. All states are currently participating in the Wallace education leadership initiative.

The executive leadership training programs will provide an opportunity for participating state and district teams to work more collaboratively in such areas as leading change and team development, leadership for instructional improvement, methods to accelerate leader performance, addressing stakeholder engagement around critical state and local issues, and sustaining improvements in school and student achievement.

The Harvard and U.Va. programs may also provide valuable lessons to other colleges and universities on how to build sustainable leadership programs--drawing on the expertise of their education, business, and other schools--that can fill the unmet demand for high-quality, job-relevant training to senior education leaders, while being feasible in terms of the time and cost to participants.

The Program at Harvard

Over the next five years, Harvard will provide training to three cohorts of 50 to 70 participants each, for a total of up to 200 participants from six states and up to 24 districts from those states. Each cohort will consist of five eight-member teams of state and district leaders, which will include chief state school officers, state board members, district superintendents and their senior staff, school principals, board members, and possibly civic and union leaders.

The program will build on Harvard's existing leadership programs, including the Public Education Leadership Program (PELP) (a joint initiative of Harvard Business School and the Harvard Graduate School of Education), and the Superintendent Leadership Program at the Kennedy School, in which the Graduate School of Education also participates. This initiative marks the first time that all three schools--education, business, and government--will work together in a single venture. A 12-person steering committee chaired by Schwartz; Christine Letts, associate dean for Executive Education at the Kennedy School; and Allen Grossman, M.B.A.'57, professor of management practice at the Harvard Business School, will lead the initiative.

Beginning in the summer of 2006, the Kentucky and Ohio teams will attend a five-day institute at Harvard in each of the two summers of their participation. Two two-day training sessions and ongoing organizational coaching in participants' home states during the school year will be provided in order to help them apply their training and set and carry out priorities to improve student achievement. There will also be transition activities such as online support and occasional opportunities to meet during the third year after the formal training concludes.

The program will use case-study methodology, customizing cases already developed at Harvard's leadership programs. By the end of two years, the goal is for each state and district team to have well-trained leaders who have had extensive practice in effective problem-solving approaches and to apply them in ways that result in significant improvements in education leadership practices and student learning at the state, district, and school levels. Harvard's plans envision sustaining the program after Wallace funding ends through a mix of public and private revenue.

The Wallace Foundation seeks to support and share effective ideas and practices that expand learning and enrichment opportunities for all people. Its three current objectives are:

• Strengthen education leadership to improve student achievement
• Enhance out-of-school learning opportunities
• Expand participation in arts and culture

For more information and research on these and other related topics, please visit the Knowledge Center at www.wallacefoundation.org.

Contacts: Jessica Schwartz
Senior Communications Officer
The Wallace Foundation
212-251-9711
jschwartz@wallacefoundation.org

Jill Anderson
News Officer
Harvard Graduate School of Education
617-496-1884
andersji@gse.harvard.edu