The Successful Middle School Leader

Author: Cedrick Gray, Ed.D.

Member: $23.99
Non-Member: $29.99Your price

Item #: 1439
Publisher: AMLE
Page Count: 282
ISBN: 978-1-56090-012-2

School leader is not a job description with a checklist of actions or skills. It is a way of being. Now more than ever, each school, classroom, and team needs a living organism at the helm—one with all its parts strong, healthy, and functioning together. The successful middle school leader has a distinct anatomy that enables them to join with others in working relationships to produce the results students deserve.

This companion guide to The Successful Middle School: This We Believe will help school leaders in various leadership roles to develop and sustain effective, visionary leadership. The book is presented in three parts:

• Leading from the Heart—tapping into deep knowledge of themselves, their scholars, and others in the school community; attending to the emotional and personal aspects of leadership, building relationships, and inspiring and motivating those they lead.
• Leading from the Head—leading with intentional thoughtfulness and reflection to consider every angle and possibility, sharpening discernment and decision making, building collaborative systems to make action plans, and acting only after serious contemplation.
• Leading from the Hand—leading by visibly doing—demonstrating expected behaviors, setting a tone of accountability, establishing protocols that make it easy for things to get done, and leading with a can-do spirit.

Each part contains the leadership traits or behaviors resulting from the leadership source as well as a robust collection of hands-on leadership strategies with practices to develop and use that leadership source.

Praise for The Successful Middle School Leader

"As a school administrator, I have read numerous books about effective school leadership, but this one is outstanding for two reasons: the credibility of its author and the practicality of the lessons conveyed. Dr. Cedrick Gray has occupied every position imaginable in a school system, and the experience that he has gained from each of these roles comes out vividly in The Successful Middle School Leader. Dr. Gray’s ideas are authentic, practical, and usable. School leaders who are seeking genuine ideas to effect change in their schools will find Dr. Gray’s lessons tremendously impactful. The Successful Middle School Leader is a tool to transform schools and enhance student achievement."
-Antoine F. Gnintedem, ED. D., PH.D.
School leader
Author, Doom, Gloom, and the Pursuit of the Sun (2018) and Alien at Home (2022)

"If you are looking for abstract philosophies about leadership, you came to the wrong place. This wonderfully practical book is filled with “heart leadership” strategies that will be of use to every leader. Whether you are in your first year as a leader or 30th year, we all need renewal and encouragement, and those qualities are in abundance on every page. Dr. Gray’s national reputation as a leader or leaders makes him especially well qualified to share his knowledge in these very practical and specific pages. This is a book to be studied and shared. Aspiring principals should also read this before they take the plunge into school leadership. They will learn that leadership is simultaneously joyful and incredibly difficult, rewarding and often frustrating, a source of immense satisfaction and exhaustion. I hope that you will follow Dr. Gray’s wise counsel as you embark on the next stage of your career."
-Douglas Reeves
Author, Fearless Schools