The Principal-Teacher Churn: Understanding the Relationship Between Leadership Turnover and Teacher Attrition

Purpose: Principals are critical to school improvement and play a vital role in creating inclusive and high-performing schools. Yet, approximately one in five principals leave their school each year, and turnover is higher in schools that serve low-income students of color. Relatedly, high rates of teacher turnover exacerbate challenges associated with unstable learning environments. Our study examines the extent to which principal turnover influences teacher turnover. We build on past work by exploring how the relationship between teacher and principal turnover differs in urban, high-poverty settings and by examining the effects of chronic principal turnover. Research Methods/Approach: We draw on a student- and employee-level statewide longitudinal dataset from Texas that includes all public K-12 schools from school years 1999–2000 to 2016–17. We estimate teacher-level models with school fixed effects, allowing us to compare teacher turnover in schools leading up to and immediately following a principal exit, to otherwise similar schools that do not experience principal turnover. Findings: Teacher turnover spikes in schools experiencing leadership turnover, and these effects are greater among high-poverty and urban schools, in schools with low average teacher experience, and in schools experiencing chronic principal turnover. Implications: Improving leadership stability, especially in urban schools experiencing chronic principal turnover may be an effective approach to reducing teacher turnover. Principal and teacher turnover and their relationship with each other requires further investigation. The field would benefit from qualitative research that can provide important insights into the individual decisions and organizational processes that contribute to principal turnover.

Regional Transformation of the Horn of Africa: Implications for BRI Implementation

The Horn of Africa (HoA) is on the threshold of a long-term transformation as the result of a confluence of political, economic, and social changes, namely, generational political leadership turnover as a reflection of the rise of a younger population; a palpable shift in governance approach from a “security-first” model to a “development-centered” one; and the return of geopolitics across the Red Sea, following global and regional political realignments. To steer the transformation in a sustainable and peaceful direction, the HoA has to enlist the assistance of external actors both as a source of trade and investment and as guarantors of regional peace and stability. This region-wide transformation presents challenges and opportunities for the implementation of the Chinese-proposed Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Beijing should better align the economic connectivity-focused BRI with the development-centered approach of regional states, build national and regional capacity for HoA security governance, and join local and external actors in a multilateral effort to ensure a peaceful, secure, and economically dynamic HoA.

Collegiate Sport Club Service Delivery: Moving Between Motivations and Constraints to Beneficial Outcomes

Overwhelming evidence supports that collegiate recreation, as a sport service, achieves a variety of both university and individual benefits. However, the intricacies of how individuals take up a sporting activity to actualize individual and collective outcomes is unclear. The purpose of this project was to develop a holistic understanding of the sport participant experience from motivations to join, constraints faced and negotiated, and outcomes attained through American collegiate recreational sport clubs. Interviews were conducted with 20 sport club athletes using a semi-structured interview guide developed from previous work on sport participation, motivations, constraints, and related outcomes. Data were coded and analyzed using a constructivist grounded theory approach. The findings revealed participants were attracted to a club as they sought out specific benefits, but university and club policies, along with leadership turnover, created constraints to their participation. Constraints evolved from individual challenges (e.g., intimidation, time conflicts, communication, lack of knowledge) to challenges associated with the clubs (e.g., skill development, leadership turnover). Through successfully negotiating these constraints using both individual and club resources students then acquired sought after benefits (e.g., socialization, physical activity), as well as benefits realized through the experience (e.g., professional skills, student development). By understanding participant experiences, managers can better design programs to recruit and retain athletes. In particular, by identifying the needs and challenges faced by participants, organizers can create opportunities to meet those needs and overcome challenges, including by providing social events or mentorship programs. Additionally, the benefits realized by participants can be used by club officers and campus recreation managers to justify continued investment in sport clubs. Overall, the study provides a holistic understanding of how motivations and constraints interact and ultimately lead to beneficial outcomes.

Petro-friends: Foreign ownership of oil and leadership survival

The resource curse literature shows that natural resources, particularly oil, help regime or leadership survival, but it also suggests that resource-rich countries are prone to civil wars or political instability. This article argues that the ownership structure of the oil sector matters and influences leadership survival. Specifically, foreign ownership of the oil sector raises leaders’ survival prospect and leads to more military interventions aimed to help the leader. Using data on oil ownership and leaders from 1962 to 2006 across 120 developing countries, this article finds that foreign involvement in the oil sector has a negative effect on leadership turnover. Countries with deeper foreign involvement in the oil sector are also more likely to experience military interventions on the side of the leaders. In other words, leaders of oil-producing countries do receive political support when they cooperate with and serve as ‘petro-friends’ to foreign powers.

Institutional inertia, local leadership turnover, and changes in the structure of fiscal expenditure

Taking the perspective of local party and government leadership change and using L-kurtosis to analyze provincial panel data in China from 1996 to 2018, this article identifies the structural change pattern of fiscal expenditures. We find that economic construction, science, education, culture, and health expenditures conform to the punctuated equilibrium pattern, while public security expenditures conform to the gradualism pattern. For expenditures under the punctuated equilibrium pattern, the longer the current local leader’s tenure is, the greater the friction with institutional inertia, and the larger the deviation from the average expenditure structure during the previous local leader’s tenure; however, for expenditures under the gradualism pattern, the local leader factor does not have a significant effect. This article also discusses the motivations of new local leaders for adjusting their expenditure structure. In terms of the proportion of economic development expenditures, in targeting expenditures, new leaders are more likely to “strive for the upper ends of the country,” while the expenditures for science, education, culture, and health are targeted to “converge to the national average.”

The Moderating Role Of Change Management And Leadership Turnover: A Study Of Performance Accountability In Local Goverment

The purpose of this study is to provide empirical evidence of the effect of the goverment internal control system and transparency on performance accountability by considering change management and leadership turnover as the moderating variable. This study was conducted on Local Goverment Organization (OPD) of Muara Enim Regency. The unit of analysis is 118 employees whose work are involved in the preparation of performance accountability. This study using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) statistical techniques with SmartPLS 3. This study finds that goverment internal control system and transparency has positive influence on performance accountability. Furthermore showed that change management doesn’t moderated the relationship between goverment internal control system and transparency on performance accountability. Leadership turnover successfully moderated the relationship between goverment internal control system and performance accountability. However leadership turnover doesn’t moderated the relationship between transparency and performance accountability. The results of this study can be used as evaluation material for the local government of Muara Enim Regency in the implementation of internal control system and transparency to achieve accountability of government performance. In addition, by looking at the factors of change management and change of leadership can provide benefits to local governments in carrying out tasks and obligations.

Same as the Old Boss? Domestic Politics and the Turnover Trap

Leadership turnover brings to office new leaders with private reputational incentives to bluff about their resolve, incentivizing both incumbents and their foreign rivals to take steps that increase the risk of war. Some leader changes, however, are more dangerous than others. The turnover trap arises when there is sufficient uncertainty about a new leader's resolve and expectations of future interactions, and whether those factors coincide depends on how new leaders come to power and the political system in which its turnover occurs. We expect that those instances of leader change most likely to generate turnover traps entail (1) democratic incumbents unconnected to their predecessor's support coalition and (2) autocratic incumbents that inherit their predecessors' coalitions. In a sample of strategic rivals from 1918-2007, we find that the probability of dispute escalation declines over leaders' tenure, but only for the two types of turnover we identify as most dangerous.