New principal standards omit any mention of social justice, ethics, cultural responsiveness

The latest revision of school leadership standards which guide the training and professional development of principals, eliminates social justice, cultural responsiveness, and ethics. Aside from that, they're perfect.

The proposed new version of the principal standards—known as the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium Standards, written by the Council of Chief State School Officers and supported by corporate reform groups like New Leaders, is scheduled to be released next week.

Murphy

Joseph Murphy, an education professor and expert on education leadership at Vanderbilt University, who wrote the original standards in 1996, said that it was “problematic and outrageous” that those three sections and other key language were removed. Once the language is erased from the standards or the actions that accompany those standards, he said, they will not be incorporated into state laws and district policies or programs that build on the standards. Murphy is the past vice-president of AERA.

He said that while he does not object to some revisions, he and the two educators who helped him lead the rewrite—Margaret Terry Orr, a professor of educational leadership at Bank Street College of Education in New York City, and Mark Smylie, a retired professor at the University of Illinois, Chicago—do not support the current version of the standards.

Look for a battle over this one. At least, I hope so.