Drawing on a new survey of seasoned principal mentors and other data, this report by the Southern Regional Education Board concludes that the weak quality of many mentoring programs for aspiring principals “is retarding state efforts to ensure that every student attends a school where strong leadership results in high academic performance.” Among the common failings: haphazard selection of mentors, poor training for those mentors, and mentoring that often consists of busy work rather than meaningful experiences in leadership. The report calls on districts and universities who provide training for aspiring principals to assume more shared responsibility for mentoring, clarify expectations, and make the process and its participants much more accountable for achieving agreed-upon standards, so that new principals arrive assume their positions much better prepared to lead needed changes.