Impact of Evaluations on Principal's Instructional Leadership Capacity Assignment

Impact of Evaluations on Principal's Instructional Leadership Capacity - Assignment Example Nevertheless, we review what we have gathered for their validity and reliability and identify from the research the direction for future research. Validity refers to the ability of a particular research instrument to measure what it purports to measure (Cohen et al., 2005, p. 105). Cohen et al. (2005, p. 105) clarified, however, that there are several types of validity. According to Cohen et al. (2005, p. 105), some of the concepts of validity relevant for research are as follows: content validity, criterion-related validity; construct validity; internal validity; external validity; concurrent validity; face validity; jury validity; predictive validity; systematic validity; catalytic validity; descriptive validity; interpretative validity; theoretical validity; and evaluative validity. Many of the concepts of validity mentioned are discussed in Cohen et al. (2005, p. 105-117). Meanwhile reliability refers to consistency and replicabilty over time (Cohen et al., 2005, p. 117). Accordi ng to Cohen et al. (2005, p. 117), reliability is also concerned with precision and accuracy. They emphasized that â€Å"for research to be reliable it must demonstrate that if it were to be carried out on a similar group of respondents in a similar context, similar results would happen (Cohen et al., 2005, p. 117). Some of the other concepts related with reliability are stability, equivalence, and internal consistency (Cohen et al., 2005, p. 117-120). According to Cohen et al. (2005, p.120-133), validity and reliability should be simultaneously considered in education research. My review of research done on evaluation systems for principals indicate that further research on evaluation systems for principals should be along these lines: 1. Identifying the elements of the principal evaluation systems adopted by schools making great progress in instruction work and the role played by principal evaluation. 2. Identifying whether there is a correlation between academic performance of s chools and the evaluation systems they have adopted for principals. 3. The role played by VAL-Ed or the Vanderbilt Assessment of Leadership in Education or VAL-ED in improving school performance, if any. The VAL-Ed supposedly met the high standards for content validity and reliability among the principal evaluation systems investigated by the New Leaders for New Schools in 2010. 4. The constraints encountered by schools in implementing a good evaluation system for principals. II. Sun and Youngs (2009) Sun and Youngs (2009, p. 2) described their work to have used hierarchical multivariate linear models â€Å"to investigation the relationships between principal evaluation purpose, focus and assessed leadership activities in 13 school district in Michigan†. Sun and Youngs (2009, p. 2) argued that their study found that â€Å"principals were more likely to engage in learning-centered leadership behaviors when the purposes of evaluation included principal professional development , school restructuring and accountability†. However, Sun and Youngs (2009, p. 2) also clarified that when the focus of evaluation was related to instructional leadership in the school setting, the thrust of the school principal activities have been in curriculum design, teacher professional development and evaluation, and monitoring student learning. In