Professional Development of Secondary School Leadership: Experiences and Expectations

This study is an attempt to explore the formal and informal professional training experiences of principals. The study also explored the barriers faced by them in the pursuit of professional development programs/training. This qualitative research study was based on interpretive paradigm. The data was collected through in-depth interviews. A thematic analysis approach was used to analyze data. The results revealed that the principals come across many negative and positive situations every day. Some of them were never given the opportunity for professional training. Others stated some professional and personal problems which generally create hurdles in the pursuit of professional development programs. They also emphasize the importance of teamwork. It was suggested that here should be a conduct of separate administrative trainings specifically designed for school principals/ heads and trainers/ resource persons should be highly qualified in the field of educational administration.

The Power Sources and Influences of Secondary School Principals in Eastern Ethiopia

This study aimed to critically examine the power sources and influences of school principals in secondary schools of Eastern Ethiopia. A descriptive survey research design was employed to carry out the study. The participants of the study were 145 teachers, 78 principals, and 41 supervisors who were selected by using stratified and random sampling techniques. The researcher adopted descriptive and inferential statistics to make sound interpretations of data. The results revealed that school principals were mostly used expert, legitimate, and reward sources of power. Likewise, school principals have predominantly exercised a positional basis of power rather than personal power. There was a significant statistical difference in power sources of school principals regarding positions, gender, and service years. The findings also showed that school principals dominantly practiced proactive influencing tactics. Moreover, findings indicated that subordinates carried out school principals' compliance to obtain a prize or avoid punishment by applied reactive influence tactics. The study further discovered that subordinates were inclined to resist school principals' influence. This study suggests secondary principals should rethink how power is managed and deployed to make sound influence over subordinates to assure quality education. Hence, the results of the study may serve as a springboard to improve secondary school leadership and equip novice teachers to bring them a principalship position. Plus, this study may provide a clear picture for policymakers, scholars, and government officials to support and retain principals for long-term school improvement, and it may also a theoretical benefit for future research on the area of study.

Integrating Leadership Development Into Cross-Age Mentoring Programs

In British Columbia (BC), the use of cross-age mentoring programs, commonly referred to as buddy programs, is not systemically evaluated and there are no clear program goals. Although the use of buddy programs is widespread across school districts in BC, research remains scarce regarding both the origins of buddy programs and their purpose. Accordingly, integrating leadership development training for children into existing buddy programs could provide clarity for the use of buddy programs while providing elementary-aged children positive benefits, better equipping them for their professional lives after secondary school. Leadership development training is widely accepted as valuable to the elementary-aged child due to its positive impact on self-esteem, self-efficacy, school connectedness, citizenship, civic efficacy, and sense of social justice.

A systematic review and thematic synthesis of research on school leadership in the Republic of Ireland

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to review and generate themes evident in research on primary and post-primary (secondary) school leadership in the Republic of Ireland (Ireland) from 2008 to 2018. Design/methodology/approach This paper follows the steps of a systematic review and thematic synthesis. Findings Following the review, six themes are identified and described, summarising the most current school leadership research in Ireland. Practical implications Potential future directions of research are identified. Originality/value No review of research on school leadership in Ireland is currently available and this is timely given the policy context’s recent focus on school leadership. The steps taken to conduct the review are clearly outlined.

Broken bridges: a social network perspective on urban high school leadership

Purpose Secondary school leadership provides multiple challenges in terms of the diversity of tasks, multiple demands on time, balancing communities and attending to instructional programming. An emerging scholarship suggests the importance of a distributed instructional leadership approach to high school leadership. However, what has been less thoroughly explored is how secondary school leadership is distributed leaders across a school district. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the social structure and positions urban high school principals occupy in the district system. Design/methodology/approach This study was conducted in one urban fringe public school district in southern California serving diverse students populations. The data were collected at three time points starting in Fall 2012 and ending in Fall 2014 from a district-wide leadership team including all central office and site leaders. All leaders were asked to assess their social relations and perception of innovative climate. The data were analyzed through a series of social network indices to examine the structure and positions of high school principals. Findings Results indicate that over time high school principals have decreasing access to social capital and are typically occupying peripheral positions in the social network. The high school principals’ perception of innovative climate across the district decreases over time. Originality/value This longitudinal study, one of the first to examine high school principals from a network perspective, sheds new light on the social infrastructure of urban high school principals and what this might mean for efforts at improvement.

Secondary school leadership preparation and development

In England, school leadership preparation has shifted from the National College and local authorities to teaching schools, their alliances and multi-academy trusts. Against this changing educational landscape, we investigate opportunities presented to men and women in secondary school leadership teams (SLTs). Drawing on interview data from a British Educational Leadership, Management and Administration Society funded investigation, we report on leadership preparation and development opportunities, aspiration to headship, headteachers’ support of ‘in house’, regional and national preparation programmes, coaching and mentoring involvement as well as access to formal and informal networks. Our analysis of SLTs as sites of potential for headship demonstrated some variability in women’s and men’s reported experiences. Accredited courses, higher degrees and workplace-based preparation provided access to leadership preparation and development opportunities; access was not transferrable from school to school. We identified a fragmented system and suggest policy and cultural changes to allow SLTs to offer inclusive and sustainable opportunities for succession planning.