ABSTRACT
The author is the building-level principal of a magnet middle school in the Southeastern United States and a 25-year veteran educator with National Board certification and K–12 experience as a teacher, counselor, and administrator. From that perspective, the author offers a critique of recent research that used the Developmentally Responsive Middle Level Leadership (DRMLL) model to analyze the practices of a sample of middle level school principals in Canada. After discussing the current roles of middle level school administrators, the author advocates for an emphasis on instructional leadership and offers suggestions for improving the practice of instructional leadership in today’s middle level schools by focusing on evidence, impact, and video analysis.
