Connecting the Dots: Director Qualifications, Instructional Leadership Practices, and Learning Environments in Early Childhood Programs

It has long been assumed that directors are a linchpin to high-quality early care and education programs. However, research investigating the influence of director qualifications on instructional leadership practices and the quality of classroom learning environments is sparse. The research that has been conducted, however, supports conventional wisdom that better educated directors provide teachers with supervision that enables more effective classroom teaching.1 The purpose of the current study was to explore different aspects of directors’ qualifications to determine how they relate to the quality of instructional leadership practices and the quality of the learning environment in center-based early childhood programs