Dilemmas and solutions regarding principal evaluation

School reform embraced the American psyche in the 1980s, and waves of initiatives emerged to revitalize and improve a system perceived as not meeting the country's needs (Murphy, 1990; Plank & Ginsberg, 1990). Today, ideas such as school choice, for-profit schools, site-based management, participatory decision-making, teacher empowerment, school restructuring, and an array of other reforms fill the educational lexicon as reformers seek alternative means for better educating the nation's youth. Indeed, even the President of the United States has set six national goals for education, while a private corporation, the New American Schools Development Corporation, embarked on a several hundred million dollar effort to come up with break-the-mold designs for schools.