UVA Welcomes 16 School Districts to Leadership Development Program

The University of Virginia Partnership for Leaders in Education (UVA-PLE), a national leader in education leadership development, today announced its 23rd cohort of school and district partners.

A joint initiative of UVA’s Darden School of Business and the School of Education and Human Development, UVA-PLE is a multi-year engagement with superintendents, principals and other education leaders. The Core Partnership is the only remaining research-proven effort in the country combining world-class executive education, evidence-based leadership development and sustained thought partnership to help school systems build the capacity needed to improve outcomes for students.

Cohort 23 includes system and school leaders from 82 schools, in 16 districts across 13 states.

• Albermarle County Public Schools, Virginia

• Berkeley County School District, South Carolina

• Boulder Valley School District, Colorado

• Cleveland Metropolitan School District, Ohio

• Danville Public Schools, Virginia

• Eastpointe Community Schools, Michigan

• Everett Public Schools, Washington

• Gaston County Schools, North Carolina

• Mapleton Public Schools, Colorado

• Memphis Shelby County Schools, Tennessee

• Prince George’s County Public Schools, Maryland

• School District of the City of York, Pennsylvania

• Scranton City School District, Pennsylvania

• Tempe Elementary School District, Arizona

• The Kindezi Schools, Georgia

• Visalia Unified School District, California

Through the Core Partnership, UVA-PLE works alongside district and school leadership teams to identify and address the challenges most critical to their systems. Through tailored in-district support, onsite engagement and hands-on professional learning in Charlottesville, partners identify and pursue the changes most needed to improve outcomes for students across their school systems. Together, they develop and advance data-informed action plans, engage stakeholders and strengthen accountability for shared goals.

“Education leaders are the critical lever for lasting improvement in schools and communities, which is why investing in their leadership matters so deeply,” said UVA-PLE Executive Director Beth Narvaez. “Our new cohort represents an exciting opportunity to partner with a new group of courageous, committed leaders as they strengthen the conditions in which educators and students can thrive. We are honored to learn alongside these leaders and support their important work.”

Each partner will work with UVA-PLE to strengthen leadership capacity and address locally defined priorities, such as improving instructional leadership, reducing chronic absenteeism, bolstering Tier 1 instruction, improving principal supervision and expanding postsecondary opportunities.

“Our partnership with UVA-PLE has strengthened the way we approach leadership, improvement and the work of supporting our schools,” said Dr. Anthony S. Dixon, superintendent of South Carolina’s Berkeley County School District. “We are seeing that work translate into meaningful progress for students, including significant growth in mathematics. As we continue this work, we are focused on practical and innovative ways to better support our teachers and students, including approaches that may look different from what has traditionally been done in schools. We want to build on what is working while continuing to find new ways to meet the needs of our students and sustain that progress across our district.”

Over more than two decades, UVA-PLE has partnered with over 1,000 schools in 200 school systems across 36 states. More than 50% of recent partners achieved double-digit gains in mathematics or language arts within three years, often surpassing pre-pandemic performance and national trends. That includes recent results in Berkeley County, which is now a top 3 mathematics growth district in the state of South Carolina, with 7.2% more students on grade level in math.

“Partnering with the UVA Partnership for Leaders in Education gives our leadership team the strategic framework and executive tools needed to accelerate student achievement,” ssaid Dr. Shawn Joseph, superintendent of Prince George’s County Public Schools in Maryland. “By focusing on strengthening instructional leadership and empowering our school leaders, we are ensuring that every classroom across our district provides the high-quality learning environment our students deserve.”