Helping School Leaders Embrace a Peer Coaching Plan

When I started as an assistant principal, I inherited the office of a respected administrator who left behind meticulously organized binders and file folders. So meticulous, in fact, that I was unsure of where to even begin. I was overwhelmed and wondered what I had gotten myself into.

I thought back to my prior leadership training, when veteran administrators, district leaders, and superintendents shared their journeys and offered advice to aspiring leaders. Reflecting on those sessions, I came to a powerful realization: For professional learning to become embedded in my own work, I needed support from another administrator who understood the challenges I was facing. I was looking for a peer—someone nonevaluative who I could confide in while I grew into the role at my own pace.

Though they are arguably the most influential people on campus, we rarely ask administrators how their own leadership is cultivated. And while a growing body of research has explored the impact of instructional coaches on teachers and students, we know comparatively less about the development of school administrators.

What we do know is encouraging. A 2018 study by the National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP) found that while only 66 percent of principals reported receiving coaching, the 70 percent of those who did found it valuable. The same study showed that coaching leads to a greater transfer of knowledge and skills put into practice, compared with traditional professional development. 

In the years since I started as an assistant principal, I’ve served in a number of teaching and administrative positions. Now, working as a district senior administrator in leadership development, I’ve come to truly embrace the power of administrative peer coaching. Unlike top-down training or isolated mentoring, peer coaching creates space for school leaders to reflect together, exchange strategies, and support one another in real time, all of which builds professional confidence and positively impacts every student.

How to Create a Peer Coaching Plan

Nonevaluative peer coaching partnerships are set up by individuals at the district level: district instructional leaders, leadership development coordinators, or even a member of a superintendent’s cabinet. Needs assessments and ongoing data analyses are conducted to identify areas for growth. Then, district leaders match up administrators in similar roles—principal to principal, assistant principal to assistant principal, etc.—from different campuses, fostering districtwide collaboration and reducing intraschool isolation. 

Successful peer coaching comes in a four-phase model: preparation, observation, analysis, and support. During each phase, pairs engage in classroom walk-throughs, leadership practice observations, and reflective conversations, constructing a mutual understanding of priorities. From there come agreements and action plans, which invoke a sense of ownership and commitment. To stay focused and ensure that peer goals are achievable, action plans should be limited to one or two steps, be rooted in shared ideas, and also clearly articulate assigned responsibilities with set timelines and definitions for success. This transparency prevents misunderstandings, while regular check-ins maintain alignment and allow for adjustments as circumstances change.

Peer Coaching in Practice

Peer leadership collaboration unearths all kinds of growth opportunities within a school. Through conversation, peer leaders might realize that some teachers aren’t getting the most out of their instructional coaches, or that a ninth-grade algebra team isn’t working together as effectively as it could be.

Side-by-side coaching is a powerful next step when reflective conversations and advice don’t spark change. This approach involves bringing a peer into the classroom to observe and offer real-time feedback about larger, schoolwide issues—not individual teacher performance.

The full, nonevaluative peer coaching cycle is typically completed in two to three hours. It starts with a school update shared by the administrator. Peer coaches visit three classrooms to observe instructional trends—like whether or not students are engaged, or if teachers are having a hard time keeping track of how everyone’s doing—followed by a debrief to analyze root causes and next steps.

Throughout the process, direct interaction with teachers is avoided; the focus remains solely on supporting the administrator’s leadership development. Teachers are informed in advance that the visit is nonevaluative and not intended to assess their instruction. Thank-you notes are left in classrooms, but no feedback is provided to teachers, in order to maintain the integrity of the coaching process.

One such example from my district: A peer coach partnered with an assistant principal after walk-throughs revealed gaps in how teachers were checking for student understanding. Together, they developed a targeted action plan and committed to weekly meetings over the course of a month. Student progress data was used to guide their conversations and pinpoint where additional support was needed. In moving from the abstract to the concrete, the focus shifted from discussing what should be to identifying what is—and what may be missing, too.

As part of this work, the peer coach also helped the assistant principal lead more effective conversations with teachers about small group instruction. They shared resources, strategies, and tools for giving meaningful feedback. Over time, the assistant principal gained confidence and clarity in their leadership practice.

Effective peer coaching additionally relies on a thoughtful balance of structured and unstructured dynamics. While formal, scheduled check-ins are essential for maintaining focus and accountability, it’s equally important to leave space for informal, organic moments that can make for the most meaningful growth. These “in-between” moments—like quick texts and spontaneous debriefs—often lead to real-time problem-solving, knowledge sharing, and stronger relationships, reinforcing a culture of continuous support and collaboration. It’s in these less structured moments that I’ve witnessed the greatest growth and transformation, when leaders feel comfortable enough to be vulnerable and express their true challenges.

The Wider Impact of Peer-to-Peer Plans

Peer coaching encourages a more empathetic and responsive leadership style, and serves as a powerful antidote to the perception that the further leaders move away from the classroom, the more disconnected they become.

In fact, these one-to-one peer coaching relationships can have districtwide impacts. When a pair of peer coaches in my district sought support in specific areas, the district responded by offering tailored professional learning sessions on building efficient systems, managing resistance, facilitating effective professional learning community conversations, and delivering impactful teacher feedback.

This is the value of administrative peer coaching: It creates space for school leaders to collaborate within the context of their daily work. By investing in the development of our leaders, we’re increasing the odds of success for every student and teacher they serve, building leadership capacity across the system for the benefit of all.