The purpose of this study was to determine the professional development needs of business educators in Virginia. An instrument was developed to assess priorities for leaders in business education in Virginia and the Virginia Business Education Association. The priorities were analyzed according to geographic region represented, and demographic factors of the respondents were compared to the priority rankings. Business educators attending regional conferences throughout Virginia during October, 1990 participated in this study. Two hundred and fifty usable instruments were received. A descriptive statistical analysis was used to determine the rank order, mean and standard deviation of the priorities; the same analysis by break-variable was used to determine the mean rankings for each geographic region. Correlations were run to determine relationships between the demographic factors and the priority rankings. Conclusions resulting from data analyses performed and reported in this study are as follows: (1) business educators are concerned with keeping business education relevant to workforce needs, and they are aware of the importance of integrating business education into the academic curriculum; (2) business educators desire their professional organization to act as their advocate at the local and state levels, as well as provide them with regional professional development opportunities; (3) business educators from all geographic regions agreed on their priority rankings for business education leaders and the VBEA; and (4) business educators with advanced degrees and/or more years experience do not differ significantly in their priority rankings from those educators without advanced degrees and fewer years of service. / Master of Science