Over the last eight years, the University of Virginia Partnership for Leaders in Education (UVA/PLE) has worked with over 50 districts and state education agencies across the country to embark on high-level change at the state, district, and school levels through the use of leader competencies.

This guide, from the Center on School Turnaround, highlights practice-based experience, expertise, and insight used to pro­vide both technical assistance and leadership support to districts and systems involved in school turnaround. The guide provides a ratio­nale for using behavioral event interviews and competencies to explore candidates’ suitability for turnaround leadership, and takes an in-depth look at how these tools might be used in practice. It also explores how sev­eral districts and states use these research-based processes to improve selection as well as other human resource functions, such as school assignment and professional development.