Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Leadership and learning: the critical connection -- Part 1. School leadership that matters for students -- 2. Collective leadership: the reality of leadership distribution within the school community -- 3. Shared and instructional leadership: when principals and teachers successfully lead together -- 4. Distributed leadership in action: a complex pattern of people, tasks and goals -- 5. Core practices: the four essential components of the leader's repertoire -- 6. An up-close view of instructional leadership: a grounded analysis -- Part 2. The broad and unique role of districts in the school improvement business -- 7. How to harness family and community energy: the district's role -- 8. Confidence for school improvement: a priority for principals -- 9. Principal efficacy: district-led professional development -- 10. Succession: a coordinated approach -- 11. Data use: an exploration from the district to the school -- 12. The district difference: a new perspective on the local challenges for improvement -- 13. Case studies: district responses to state leadership.

Linking Leadership to Student Learning clearly shows how school leadership improves student achievement. The book is based on an ambitious five-year study on educational leadership that was sponsored by The Wallace Foundation. The authors studied 43 districts, across 9 states and 180 elementary, middle, and secondary schools. In this book, Kenneth Leithwood, Karen Seashore Louis, and their colleagues report on what they found. They examined leadership at each organizational level in the school system―classroom, school, district, community, and state. Their comprehensive approach to investigating school leadership offers a balanced understanding of how the structures within which leaders operate shape what they do. The results within will have significant implications for future policy and practice.