How Tustin Unified Develops Principals as Lead Learners

The Center for Education Market Dynamics • April 22, 2026

A new wave of mathematics curriculum implementation is underway across districts, creating an opportunity to strengthen instructional alignment systemwide. At the same time, decades of research underscore the central role principals play in improving teaching and learning. When those two realities are disconnected, districts risk adopting strong materials without building the leadership capacity required to sustain them.

Tustin Unified School District is working to bridge that gap. We recently connected with their school and district leaders to explore how curriculum-based professional learning for principals is anchoring their math transition.

Developing Principals as “Lead Learners” During Curriculum Adoptions

Two decades of research synthesized by the Wallace Foundation underscores the central role of the principal in shaping teaching and learning. Effective principals serve as instructional leaders: they work collaboratively with teachers, guide data-driven decision-making, utilize observation and feedback to improve instruction, and manage resources in service of academic goals. When they do these things, student achievement rises.

But when there is a disconnect between principals and the curriculum adoption and implementation process, school leaders are left trying to support work they have not experienced the[e]mselves. Without a deep understanding of the materials and pedagogical shifts, principals aren’t able to fulfill their roles as instructional leaders.

Tustin Unified School District offers a compelling alternative. By engaging principals in sustained, mathematics-specific curriculum-based professional learning, the district is building the conditions so that its investment in a rigorous, problem-based curriculum translates into stronger teaching and learning.

Forming a Leadership Community Around Content

In partnership with the Orange County Department of Education, Tustin created a principal community of practice grounded in its new mathematics curriculum. As described in a recent Learning Forward article, this learning is content-specific, coherent, and aligned with professional learning for teachers and coaches.

In this community, principals experience learning that mirrors the mathematics their students will encounter. In monthly professional learning sessions, they unpack standards, analyze lesson launches, watch and discuss classroom video, and rehearse feedback conversations. In addition, they observe grade-level collaboration at demonstration sites and reflect together on how to strengthen professional learning communities (PLCs) in their own schools.

This design matters. It gives principals shared language and shared images of strong instruction. It clarifies what the curriculum is asking teachers to do. And it builds leaders’ confidence to engage in precise, content-grounded conversations. As one principal reflected, “My lens and look-fors are shifting and my conversations with teachers have more value.”

Reshaping the Role of Principal

Kristy Andre, a Tustin elementary principal, described how this work has reshaped her leadership. A former instructional coach, she missed the daily opportunities to study practice closely. Traditional evaluations did not allow for the depth of instructional dialogue she valued.

The district’s shift to math-focused PLCs created new space. Fridays now have protected time and space for grade-level collaboration. She attends PLCs all day alongside her math learning specialist and TOSA, listening across grade levels and identifying patterns in teacher experiences.

Over time, she developed a self-reflection tool aligned to a continuum of learning in problem-based mathematics. Teachers use it to locate themselves in their practice and identify next steps. She provides written feedback separate from evaluation, offering specific nudges tied to the curriculum and instructional goals.

The result is not surface-level implementation. It is growth in teaching craft.

“When we focused on good teaching and understanding the math curriculum,” Andre noted, “our math scores shot up. Our ELA scores shot up too.” The sustained attention to standards, task design, and student discourse in mathematics strengthened instruction across subjects.

Investing in Durable Instructional Improvements

Tustin’s approach highlights a critical truth. District-level investments in curriculum take hold when school leaders create the conditions for teachers to learn.

In Andre’s school, that has meant protecting time for weekly PLCs, aligning coaching support, and ensuring conversations stay anchored in standards and student thinking. It has meant deepening her own understanding of mathematics so that feedback is specific and connected to the content that shapes students’ classroom math experiences.

In PLCs, teachers begin by asking a foundational question: Do we understand the math? If not, students will not. Week after week, teams unpack learning goals, anticipate student strategies, and study how to launch tasks without lowering cognitive demand.

“They’re learning how to teach it in a systematic way,” Andre said. “It’s very masterful, seeing so much rigor in the lessons and so much access for all students.”

Because she has engaged in the same learning, she can differentiate her support. “My conversations with teachers are different now,” she explained. “I know where everyone is at.” She can recognize when a team needs more modeling, when a teacher is ready for a new push, and when additional coaching will help practice take root.

This is the often unseen work of implementation. It is the principal ensuring that curriculum materials are not simply distributed, but understood. That collaborative time is sacred. That teachers are not left alone to navigate complex pedagogical shifts.

Applying These Practices

Tustin’s experience offers clear lessons for others transitioning to new curriculum and instructional models.

1. Principal learning must be anchored in the same curriculum and instructional practices teachers are being asked to enact. Without that coherence, district messaging fragments and classroom practice stalls.
2. Leadership development should include deliberate practice. Rehearsing feedback conversations, analyzing curriculum materials, and observing PLCs sharpen principals’ instructional stance.
3. Systems must align around the instructional priority. Tustin streamlined principal evaluations to focus on mathematics leadership and designed coaching sessions for leaders that center on teaching and learning. This signals that curriculum implementation is core to their work as school leaders.

When principals learn the content, study the curriculum, and grow alongside their teachers, district investments in new approaches become opportunities to strengthen professional expertise and build durable conditions for student learning.

In Tustin, the payoff is visible. Teachers are refining their craft, students are engaging in rigorous, discourse-rich mathematics, and principals are leading from the center of curriculum shifts.