Strong school leadership plays a vital role in shaping equitable learning environments, fostering whole child development, and supporting socially just educational practices. The Principal Leadership Institute (PLI), a master’s degree program designed to train working school-level educators to become school leaders, exemplifies this approach through its unique partnership with AileyCamp, a summer program that uses the arts to empower historically disadvantaged middle school students. This collaboration, highlighted in Developing Expert Principals: Professional Learning that Matters by Linda Darling-Hammond and colleagues, is a prime example of how leadership preparation programs can leverage the arts to equip future principals with the skills to create socially just and inclusive schools.
Arts and Leadership: A Powerful Partnership
In Developing Expert Principals, the partnership between PLI and AileyCamp is recognized as a model of whole child education and equity-focused leadership development. By immersing aspiring principals in a program centered around art and personal growth, PLI provides its students with invaluable lessons about the power of a comprehensive curriculum. At AileyCamp, students not only engage in rigorous dance instruction but also develop crucial social emotional learning (SEL) skills. These experiences give PLI students a deep understanding of how arts education can foster empowerment, discipline, and emotional resilience in young students.
Creating Art in Response to Hate
One of the most powerful lessons PLI students take from AileyCamp is how art can be used to respond to hate and injustice. Through their research with AileyCamp, PLI students learn how to harness the arts to empower students, foster healing, and create a sense of belonging and expression.
This approach, as highlighted in Developing Expert Principals, equips future school leaders with the tools they need to support students not only academically but also emotionally and socially—creating the foundation for more profound learning experiences and long-term success.
Empowering Future Leaders Through Deeper Learning
As part of their immersive experience at AileyCamp, PLI students develop a keen understanding of the critical role that a full curriculum plays in student development. By witnessing the transformative impact of arts-based education, PLI participants see how deeper learning experiences—those that go beyond academics to include SEL and personal growth—empower students to thrive.
A Vision for Socially Just Leadership
The PLI and AileyCamp partnership, as featured in Developing Expert Principals, offers a powerful model for interdisciplinary collaboration and leadership development. By immersing aspiring principals in a culturally responsive and arts-centered education program, the partnership prepares them to become equity-conscious leaders equipped to address their students' social-emotional needs and create equitable schools.
Through this innovative partnership, PLI students gain the tools and mindset needed to lead schools that serve all students—especially those from historically marginalized communities—with the care, equity, and depth that every student deserves.