There is growing interest in the professional development and preparation of educational managers. Previous activities in the Caribbean like the 1982 Jamaica workshop and the 1978 Commonwealth Secretariat Workshop show that this interest is neither spontaneous nor particularly, new. Similarly in Canada, we have had graduate programmes in educational administration, summer workshops, and research projects on the topic for over 20 years. However, if I were to examine the "state of the art" of the preparation and professional development of administrators in Canada, I would not be impressed with our progress. Our graduate programmes are under fire from practising administrators for their lack of relevance. In Manitoba, we have estimated that less than 20 per cent of the school-level administrators have availed themselves of university courses in school administration. Summer workshops and divisional in-service sessions get a more positive reaction from practitioners but are presented in no organized fashion, the substance and delivery of such sessions depending upon one or two "committee" meetings to decide, "What will we do this year?" Finally, our researchers in professional development and preparation of. school administrators are drowning in a sea of needs analyses.