The Pathways Leadership Project (Pathways) builds on the California School Leadership Academy, a program that has been in place for 20 years. A primary goal of this new initiative is to implement a comprehensive district-based school leadership model that will give successful program completers a California preliminary administrator credential. Over the three-grant period Pathways will expand to include mentor coaches and job-embedded internships for participating candidates. Candidates will also participate in seminars, workshops, and institutes supported by the internships and mentor coaches. All courses and candidate evaluations are based on the California Professional Standards for Educational Leaders. Project partners include the Compton Unified School District and the Alternative Schools, Court Schools, Special Education Schools in LACOE as well as Pepperdine University, Cal Poly Pomona, and the University of California at Irvine.

The 3 R's of School Leadership: Recruit, Retain, Revitalize (coordinated with the New Jersey State Action for Educational Leadership Project), is a project that will pilot new state policies and initiatives intended to improve educational leadership and student achievement in the project's high-need school districts. The 3 R's project is developing, implementing, and piloting: a) innovative recruitment strategies and succession planning for school leaders that target underrepresented populations (minorities and women) in high need-school districts; b) non-traditional, standards-driven, performance-based school leader certification programs that provide streamlined alternatives to traditional master's degree programs; c) a comprehensive two-year induction program for new school leaders supported by trained mentors and job-embedded leadership development activities; d) diversified program models for leadership development; e) models for standards-based evaluation of school leaders; and f) diversified distributed leadership models that align governance and authority structures to improve conditions of leadership practice at district and school levels. The project will also create an Evaluation, Research, and Dissemination Center that will support evaluation of the project, field testing of program models in pilot districts, scientifically based research studies, and dissemination of the research on effective school leadership models.

The Metropolitan Center for Urban Education at New York University (NYU) is partnering with selected New York City schools to provide an intensive professional development program for practicing assistant principals. Activities will include ongoing seminars/workshops and an extended summer institute designed around needs and issues identified by the participants. Participants will be organized into cohorts working together in learning communities supported by Center staff, NYU faculty and trained mentor coaches.

Lehigh University, in partnership with the Philadelphia, PA School District and the National Association for Elementary School Principals, is implementing an urban leadership development program. The objectives for the program are to recruit and prepare aspiring principals and to provide professional development support for Philadelphia's practicing principals. Aspiring principals will serve one-year, full-time residencies with experienced principals. Trained mentors, university faculty, and a series of job-embedded, professional development seminars will be provided for both the aspiring and practicing principals. The participating urban principals and national experts assisted in the design and development of the university courses and professional development seminars. Courses are offered on weekends and during the summer using on-site and on-line delivery strategies. Features of the program are its partnership with the school district that includes sharing the cost of the one-year, full-time residencies for the aspiring principals as well as training and support activities that are performance based and linked directly to the needs of the participating schools. A third party evaluator will conduct the program evaluation.