The Most Important Factor in Student Achievement
An interview with the coauthors of Leaders of Learning

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Richard DuFour and Robert J. Marzano. Two trailblazers in the journey towards redefining professional development. Ask them and they'd tell you that the most important factor in student achievement is the quality of instruction in the classroom.

Here, Richard DuFour tells us a little bit more about Leaders of Learning, and why the issue of leadership at the classroom, administrative, and district level is a critical one to consider.

Q. What is the link between leadership and student achievement?

A. The most important factor in student achievement is the quality of instruction in the classroom. The best teachers, like all great leaders, have a clear sense of what they want to accomplish. They are great communicators, help others believe in their ability to be successful, and persist until they accomplish their goals.

Effective school and district leaders are able to create conditions that promote more good teaching in more classrooms, and more time and systems to provide students who struggle with additional time and support for learning.

Q. Why did you decide to focus on leadership as a means to improve student achievement?

A. To demonstrate that educators at all levels—district, school, and classroom—can create conditions that promote higher levels of learning for all students if they embrace their role as leaders. Improving schools requires a collective effort rather than a series of isolated individual efforts, and it takes leadership at all levels to organize and implement that collective effort.

Q. Can you talk about how the different types of educational leaders—district, school, and classroom—should use this book?

A. The best way to use the book is to engage in the collective study of its message, encourage dialogue about that message, begin to implement its ideas, gather evidence of the impact of implementation, and learn how to get better at the PLC process by engaging in the process.

Q. What do you think is the most important message ofLeaders of Learning?

A. No single person has all the knowledge, skills, and talent to lead a district, improve a school, or meet all the needs of every child. It will take a collaborative effort and widely dispersed leadership to meet the challenges confronting our schools. Virtually everyone who has elected to enter the field of education has the potential to lead. The assumptions that drive the book include:

• Schools can only be as good as the people within them.
• Schools must utilize strategies that result in more good teaching in more classrooms more of the time.
• Schools and districts must use professional development strategies that are specifically designed to develop the collective capacity of educators to meet the needs of students.
• The best strategy for improving schools and districts is developing the collective capacity of educators to function as members of a professional learning community (PLC)—a concept based on the premise that if students are to learn at higher levels, processes must be in place to ensure the ongoing, job—embedded learning of the adults who serve them.

To learn more about this book and how to implement a personal learning network into your professional development plans, click here.