E-Portfolios for Educational Leaders: An ISSLC-Based Framework for Self-Assessment

In E-Portfolios for Educational Leaders, Barbara Nicholson offers suggestions for educational administration programs aiming to reduce the theory-practice gap in the preservice preparation of school principals. Based on the standards of the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium, the book's focus is both programmatic and individual in scope. At the program level, Nicholson examines strategies for reforming the field dimensions of preservice practice, requiring more interaction with practitioners in schools and encouraging their active participation in the preparation of principals. She also provides an in-depth discussion of conventional assessment practices and explores the reasons for shifting to a more student-centered process. The individual focus is on assisting graduate students who are constructing electronic portfolios as both a program exit requirement and a foundation for eventual performance appraisal. More a detailed, comprehensive narrative than a minimalist guide, E-Portfolios for Educational Leaders develops fully the conceptual rationale behind the program reforms it describes.

Educational administration programs aiming to reduce the _theory-practice gap_ in the pre-service preparation of school principals will find plenty of suggestions in this text. Strategies for reforming the field dimensions of pre-service practice and an in-depth discussion of conventional assessment practices along with the reasons for shifting to a more student-centered process are explored. More a detailed, comprehensive narrative than a minimalist guide, this work develops fully the conceptual rationale behind the program reforms it describes.

Barbara L. Nicholson, presently a professor of leadership studies in the Graduate School of Education and Professional Development at Marshall University in West Virginia, has devoted 26 years to public education from high school to the undergraduate and graduate levels. Her interest in assessment issues dates back to her employment in the administration of former West Virginia Governor Gaston Caperton, who now chairs the College Board. Nicholson is a former Fulbright fellow to Uppsala University in Sweden, and has been a visiting professor in the Czech Republic, Northern Ireland, Russia and Scotland. She is the author of numerous articles and presentations, both national and international, on issues related to alternative assessment and design of programs in pre-service educational administation.