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Descriptors:
Foreign Countries; Developing Nations; Profiles; Human Resources; Capacity Building; Principals; Elementary Schools; Secondary Schools; Educational Change; Instructional Leadership; Educational Legislation; School Administration; Program Implementation; Program Effectiveness; Rating Scales

Abstract:
In 1999 Thailand passed an ambitious national educational law that paved the way for major reforms in teaching, learning and school management. Despite the ambitious vision of reform embedded in this law, recent studies suggest that implementation progress has been slow, uneven, and lacking deep penetration onto classrooms. Carried out ten years after the launch of the reform law, the current research sought to expand on these earlier studies by examining the capacity of Thailand's principals to lead reforms in teaching and learning. The study developed a national profile of principal instructional leadership using a Thai Form of the "Principal Instructional Management Rating Scale" (Hallinger, 1994). The overall profile of 1195 primary and secondary school principals suggested a moderate level of engagement in two dimensions ("Creating a School Mission and Developing a Positive School Learning Climate") and a lower level of activity on the dimension, "Managing the Instructional Program". The results provide preliminary evidence which suggests that a more systematic human resource strategy is needed in order to ensure that Thailand's key school leaders have the knowledge, skills and motivation needed to support changes in teaching and learning envisioned in the nation's education reforms. (Contains 3 tables and 2 figures.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Instructional Leadership; Cutting Scores; Decision Making; Standard Setting (Scoring); Influences; Principals; Administrator Evaluation; Competence; Rating Scales; Administrator Effectiveness

Abstract:
Purpose: Performance evaluation informs professional development and helps school personnel improve student learning. Although psychometric literature indicates that a rational, sound, and coherent standard-setting process adds to the credibility of an assessment, few studies have empirically examined the decision-making process. This article sheds light on the inner workings of setting cut scores for leadership proficiency from the deliberative perspectives of expert-panel participants, including principals, teachers, district supervisors, and researchers. Research Design: Qualitative methods are used to observe and document a standards-setting process as it takes place and to analyze the results. Findings: The findings indicate that setting cut scores for principal leadership proficiency is a cognitively demanding but achievable process for effective implementation of carefully designed procedures. The study also provides insight regarding the influence of external factors, such as backgrounds of panelists, consideration of school contexts, and concerns about consequence during the standard-setting deliberation. (Contains 3 tables and 4 notes.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Principals; Educational Change; Urban Schools; Elementary Schools; Instructional Leadership; Participative Decision Making; Elementary School Teachers; Hispanic Americans; Parents; Low Income Groups; Social Capital; Empowerment; Capacity Building; Leadership Role; Role Conflict; Coping; Community Organizations; Parent School Relationship; Educational Cooperation; Interviews; Observation

Abstract:
Purpose: Educational leadership is key to addressing the persistent inequities in low-income urban schools, but most principals struggle to work with parents and communities around those schools to create socially just learning environments. This article describes the conditions and experiences that enabled principals to share leadership with teachers and low-income Latino parents to improve student learning. Methods: This study used interviews, observations, and documents to examine the perceptions and experiences of the principals of three small autonomous schools initiated by a community organizing group in California. Data analysis was conducted in iterative phases using shared leadership, social capital, and role theories as lenses to identify themes, triangulate across data sources, and examine alternative hypotheses. Findings: Findings illuminate how a design team process initiated principals into a model of shared leadership with teachers and empowered parents that focused on deep relationships and capacity building. Principals enacted this model of the "principal as organizer" in the newly-opened schools, but they struggled to navigate conflicting leadership role expectations from district administration. Implications: Organizing approaches to education reform can cultivate shared leadership in principals and the capacity to partner with empowered, low-income Latino parents. District expectations and principals' broader social networks may be critical in navigating and sustaining such leadership. Further research on districts that collaborate with community organizing groups may provide promising insights into the development of a new generation of educational leaders. (Contains 1 table and 9 notes.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Cultural Awareness; Cultural Pluralism; Study Abroad; Instructional Leadership; Practicums; Internship Programs; Graduate Students; Outcomes of Education; Administrator Education; Educational Administration; Attitude Change; Student Attitudes; Mixed Methods Research; Foreign Countries

Abstract:
Developing globally minded citizens has become a national push and a stated priority for many higher education institutions in the United States. This article focuses on one university's efforts to develop globally minded school leaders who are accepting of and comfortable with diversity. The University of North Carolina Wilmington has created an international practicum for master's and doctoral-level students in the Educational Leadership Department. This study focuses on the outcomes of this international practicum. Data from this mixed methods study are presented on participants' shifts in attitudes about cultural diversity as measured by the Miville-Guzman Universality Diversity Scale survey and interviews. The article also provides suggestions about processes and experiences necessary to support and facilitate participants' shifts to embrace diversity and global perspectives. (Contains 2 tables and 3 figures.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Educational Environment; Educational Change; Instructional Leadership; Federal Legislation; Performance Factors; Institutional Mission; Organizational Climate; Educational Objectives; Decision Making; Administrative Organization; Administrative Change; Change Strategies; Organizational Change; Focus Groups; Educational Policy; Administrator Attitudes; Superintendents; Principals; Formative Evaluation

Abstract:
This article documents perceptions of superintendents and principals when working under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2004-06. It uses data collected through the Voices 3 Project to consider three factors associated with instructional leadership as applied under NCLB, defining the school's mission, managing the instructional program, and promoting a positive school learning climate. Findings include that the narrowness of the curriculum objectives, the top-down hierarchical nature of decision making in the system, and the pervasively negative and punitive environment impact on the work of instructional leaders. The article argues that new approaches and leadership models are needed. Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Evidence; Resistance to Change; Instructional Leadership; Foreign Countries; Principals; Educational Change; Vocational High Schools; School Restructuring; Correlation; Educational Policy; Teacher Attitudes; Administrator Attitudes; Teacher Characteristics; Administrator Characteristics; Secondary School Teachers

Abstract:
Many countries design and implement school change with a focus on the fundamental reconfiguration in the structures of schooling. In this article, we examined the relationship between principal leadership and teacher resistance to school reforms driven by external interveners. For an empirical analysis, we took advantage of extensive data derived from 967 teachers and 32 principals in Korean vocational high schools that are now experiencing school reforms launched by the government. Our results revealed the importance of human aspects of school changes and reforms, in particular, driven by the external intervener. We first showed that a principal's initiative leadership is significantly related to the reduction of teacher resistance to change, in particular on the emotional and behavioural dimensions. Not surprisingly, teachers showed a higher level of resistance when their schools participate in the government-driven reform. Finally, teacher resistance depended upon characteristics of teachers as well as principals. These findings provide some useful policy implications for facilitating successful school reform efforts. Foremost, school reformers are advised to rethink the school change model design in a way of fully capturing human aspects in the reform process. (Contains 5 tables and 10 notes.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Foreign Countries; Cognitive Mapping; Urban Environment; Interviews; Student Attitudes; Instructional Leadership; Teacher Attitudes; Mixed Methods Research; Statistical Analysis; Educational Research; Instruction; Learning; Pattern Recognition

Abstract:
The aim of the article is to show how substantial qualitative material consisting of graphic cognitive maps can be analysed by using digital CmapTools, Excel and SPSS. Evidence is provided of how qualitative and quantitative methods can be combined in educational research by transforming qualitative data into quantitative data to facilitate discoveries of patterns in the data. Examples are drawn from research on conceptions of both different teaching methods and on school leadership related to school development. The rationale for using cognitive map interviews as a method for data collection is presented. Cognitive, theoretical and methodological issues are discussed. Tools that might be used to facilitate detection of patterns in a substantial number of maps are reviewed. It is demonstrated how unique expressions on individual cognitive maps visualizing different understandings can be transformed into a common system of concepts which make it possible to use quantitative methods to find patterns in comprehensive qualitative data. (Contains 3 tables and 1 figure.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Sanctions; Principals; Instructional Leadership; Administrator Role; Leadership Role; Barriers; Time Management; Capacity Building; Educational History; Expertise; Goal Orientation; Intention

Abstract:
In recent years, policy changes in American education have refocused a spotlight on principal instructional leadership. Although in previous eras the professional literature exhorted principals to "be instructional leaders," there were few sanctions if they failed to do so. In the current policy context, however, instructional leadership has assumed a central rather than peripheral place in the hierarchy of roles played by principals. Today principals who fail to engage this role proactively and skillfully do so at their own risk. Yet history suggests that neither policy mandates nor good intentions will penetrate the "force field" that stands between the principal and the tasks involved in leading learning. A more strategic and coherent approach is needed by principals who wish to enact this role in practice. This article reviews the evolution of instructional leadership as a model for principal practice, examines barriers to its successful enactment, and proposes strategies that school leaders can employ to reduce the gap between intentions and reality. (Contains 1 figure.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Leadership; Leadership Effectiveness; Leadership Qualities; Models; Leadership Role; Instructional Leadership; Novices; Evaluation; Institutional Mission

Abstract:
Although inextricable, the act of leading, the leader, and outcome of leadership are unique entities. Lack of such differentiation may ensnare novice leaders in broad suppositions. This conceptual article introduces a tool for analyzing leadership. Leaders can leverage the model to evaluate the act of leading, in route, via a measurable trajectory toward an outcome of leadership. Mechanisms to detect error, surmount barriers, build leadership capacity, sustain optimum performance, and identify artifacts of leadership are included. (Contains 1 table and 2 figures.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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Descriptors:
Educational Quality; Foreign Countries; Instructional Leadership; Urban Schools; Data Analysis; Rural Schools; Educational Resources; Parent Participation; Parent School Relationship; Elementary Schools; Questionnaires; Teacher Attitudes; Hierarchical Linear Modeling; Educational Environment; Rural Urban Differences

Abstract:
Shortcomings of educational quality in rural schools remain a key focus in the literature related to developing countries. This paper studies whether rural primary schools in Malaysia, an upper middle-income developing country, are still experiencing lower levels of educational resources, school climate, school leadership, and parental involvement than their urban counterparts. A survey questionnaire, containing items related to these 4 factors, was distributed to teachers in the 2 school locations. In the study, 1183 teachers from 63 rural schools and 1367 teachers from 60 urban schools were involved. Due to the hierarchical nature of the data, multilevel modelling analysis was used for data analysis. Open-ended questions were analyzed using text analysis. Findings showed that generally no differences between urban and rural schools in educational quality as perceived by teachers were found, which contradicts previous studies. Nevertheless, results did show that rural teachers perceived lower levels of school climate. (Contains 6 tables and 1 figure.) Note:The following two links are not-applicable for text-based browsers or screen-reading software. Show Hide Full Abstract

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