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Teachers’ Assessment of “Implementation Leadership” during a new Social Emotional Learning Initiative

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Abstract

School leadership has been identified as a factor related to successful implementation of school-based interventions. Brief, pragmatic tools to monitor implementation leadership may help school psychologists facilitate new initiatives. This pilot study adapted the Implementation Leadership Scale (ILS) to report on teacher-perceived change in implementation leadership across an academic year. Participants were 45 teachers from four elementary schools, implementing a social and emotional learning intervention. Cronbach’s alphas were adequate. The proactive leadership subscale was most differentiated between schools. Levels of implementation leadership were significantly higher in the fall than the spring. The ILS shows some promise for assessing implementation leadership in schools.

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Acknowledgements

This project, and the associated data collection and analyses, was enabled through the support of the Stuart Foundation. The authors wish to acknowledge all of the teachers, staff, and administrators who participated in this project, and specifically Fred Brill, Ammar Saheli, Barbara DeBarger, Katarin Jurich, Neal Bloch, Moises Hernandez, Kathleen LaCome, Denise Landry, Kimberly Yearns, Wendy Garner, Gail Drake, Ruben Olivares, and Elisa Garcia-Rojas. The authors also wish to thank Brittany Schmitt and colleagues at the Center for Prevention Research in Social Welfare (CPRSW) who played essential roles in the completion of this work. The authors are appreciative for consultation from Mark Collin and Chuck Fisher on the TOOLBOX program.

Author's note Since completing this work, Sarah Accomazzo has changed her institutional affiliation. She now conducts research at Seneca Family of Agencies.

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Correspondence to Valerie B. Shapiro.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Shapiro, V.B., Ziemer, K.L., Accomazzo, S. et al. Teachers’ Assessment of “Implementation Leadership” during a new Social Emotional Learning Initiative. Contemp School Psychol 24, 174–180 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40688-019-00230-7

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