M.Ed. Instructional Leadership

Program Goal

The Instructional Leadership Program (ILP) focuses on developing candidates with the appropriate knowledge, abilities and dispositions to eliminate the achievement gap and prepare educators to serve effectively in instructional support positions. Candidates are expected to develop expertise in using data to drive improvement efforts, assessments, and to create schools committed to student learning and achievement.

Program Requirements

The Master of Education degree program in Instructional Leadership includes 30-33 credit hours.  Candidates will complete 15 credit hours of core courses, including technology, nine credit hours of Internship, and nine credit hours of Foundations of Education and other supporting courses. The 24 credit hours of core and internship courses are as follows

Core courses:

ILP 510      Foundations of Instructional Leadership

ILP 520      Instructional Leadership and Supervision

ILP 570      Ethics and Legal Basis of American Education

ILP 572      Fiscal and Human Resource Management

ILP 574      Instructional Technology for School Leaders

ILP 595      Internship In Instructional Leadership I

ILP 596      Internship In Instructional Leadership II

ILP 597      Internship In Instructional Leadership III

Additional courses:

SED 500 The Exceptional Student

SED 590   Communication, Collaboration, and Diversity

Advisor Approved Elective


Reduced Hour Option

Special Option (Effective July 1, 2014)  A person who holds a Class A Professional Educator Certificate and meets the program admission requirements in Rule 290-3-3-.48(1)(a) and (b) may be able to complete a reduced-hour program to be recommended for a Class A Instructional Leadership Certificate. Although the number of semester hours of required credit for instructional leadership courses may vary by EPP, depending on the courses needed to document compliance with program approval standards, at least 18 semester hours of credit for instructional leadership courses are required for this option. EPPs may choose to require additional courses or set a higher GPA requirement. Alabama State University’s requirement entails 24 semester hours. Every instructional leadership course required for the reduced-hour option must include either field or clinical experiences.