---

Within the educational system, the role of assistant principal is vital. This book comprehensively examines two areas which are core to educational leadership theory and practice: assistant principals and the passage from teaching to administration.

---

This book makes a much needed contribution to what we know about the role and work of the assistant principal. It offers terri c insights into the different challenges one faces after being appointed assistant principal, and it provides readers with a rich array of data regarding the mental, emotional, social, and physical adjustments accompanying one´s transition to this new role. The author refreshingly moves beyond mere description of what assistant prin- pals do as they make their transition to that role, and actually helps us gain a sense of the lived experience of becoming and being an assistant principal. The book gives a realistic picture of the cognitive, social, and emotional con icts and confusions, the daily ups and downs, the fears, frustrations, and highs that are experienced by the men and women undertaking the passage from teaching to administration. This book is distinctive for a number of reasons. It is an empirical study of the role of the assistant principal. There are comparatively few helpful studies, and P- fessor Armstrong´s research adds a solid and much needed addition to that body of work. It focuses on the transition from being a teacher to being an assistant prin- pal, and it reveals much about how the assistant principal´s role transition differs markedly from that of the school principal.

---

Background.- Perspectives on Change, Transitions, and Passages.- Narrating the Administrative Passage.- The Individual Narratives.- Charting the Administrative Passage.- Entry-Exit: Crossing the Administrative Threshold.- Immersion-Emmersion: Ascending the Administrative Hierarchy.- Disintegration-Reintegration: Shifting Perspectives - Letting Go, Holding On, and Reframing.- Transformation-Restabilization: Becoming and Being an Assistant Principal.- The Way Forward: Connecting Theory and Practice.- Reconceptualizing Assistant Principals´ Leadership Transitions.

---

From the reviews:
"Denise Armstrong has done an excellent job in bringing together theory and practice in this book. ... Armstrong gives a compelling picture of the transitions that have to be made as teachers move into more formal leadership positions. ... I would recommend it because ... the way that it draws together work on transition and suggests new ways of looking at the way transitions happen. ... It is certainly a book that I would recommend both to postgraduate students and teachers in schools." (Megan Crawford, Educational Review, November, 2011)

---