ABSTRACT
One approach to the study of leadership is to ask, leadership of what, for what? Educational leaders should be leading a community and an institution that is committed to the growth of human beings as human beings, as they engage in the work of the school. Granted that the policy agenda speaks of all children meeting high standards of academic achievement; granted that states and the profession are calling teachers to meet high standards of content knowledge and sophisticated pedagogy-nonetheless, that academic achievement and those professional standards will be met by human beings serving human purposes. High standards are not ends in themselves. Rather, they are policy goals intended to ensure the development of those human competencies that will enrich and further the growth of communities of free, creative, and responsible humans who participate in their raising of coming generations, in their work, in their neighborhoods and community involvements in furthering the multiple varieties of human fulfi llment within a social and political context.
