The purpose of this paper is to describe Auburn University's story of developing an innovative field-based master's level principal preparation program. Our goal was to align the program's curriculum and internship experiences with state and other accrediting agency standards, current leadership preparation research, and local educational agency (LEA) partner input and support. As a faculty, we decided to model best practices throughout the redesign and approached the curriculum development project using a variety of data collection processes. What emerged was a creative Instructional Leadership Program (ILP) curriculum, involving multiple partnerships, best practices research, and an understanding that it was a living, breathing document which would change as implementation occurred and data were collected to suggest needed changes. As the program is constantly evaluated and the university revisits with LEA partners, 2008 educational leadership cohort students, other stakeholders and researchers are beginning to see richer results than originally anticipated. Similar to Murphy's (2002) “New Blueprints” discussion of new educational leadership foundations, several important paradigms are emerging from the program: leadership based on school improvement and student achievement, and creating schools as socially just, democratic learning communities (Furman & Shields, 2005; Green, 1999; Smylie, Bennett, Konkol, & Fendt, 2005; Strike, 1999).
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