Search Results (11)

This study examines how primary school principals navigate and influence curriculum reform through instructional leadership. Using a qualitative approach, data were gathered from semi-structured interviews and structured observations with three purposefully selected principals, guided by the Principal Instructional Management model. Interview questions focused on three core areas—developing the school mission, managing the instructional program, and fostering a positive school climate—allowing principals to share insights on their leadership strategies, challenges, and engagement in curriculum reform. Observations captured real-time practices, such as classroom visits, teacher interactions, and feedback sessions, to provide a comprehensive view of their instructional leadership roles. Thematic analysis revealed that principals actively shape school missions by integrating personal beliefs, educational agendas, and curriculum policy knowledge. They engage in reflective practices such as meetings and retreats to reinforce the school’s vision among teachers, manage instructional programs through routine and random checks, motivate teachers with positive feedback, and promote a positive climate by supporting social cohesion and addressing teachers’ personal needs. These findings underscore the multifaceted nature of instructional leadership, where principals balance personal convictions with policy-driven mandates. Recommendations include targeted professional development and formal policy recognition of instructional leadership to empower principals in leading reform efforts. Full article

This manuscript presents a comprehensive analysis of NC State University’s redesigned principal preparation program, emphasizing its alignment with state and national leadership standards, innovative curriculum, and commitment to practical application. The program’s redesign addresses long-standing criticisms of traditional university-based leadership preparation, such as the disconnect between theory and practice, by incorporating data-driven instructional leadership, equity-focused training, and collaborative community engagement. Additionally, this article explores the role of specialized internships, full-time residencies, and the integration of technology in training future principals. The program’s success is demonstrated by improved principal placement, school outcomes, and teacher retention—particularly in high-need schools. Finally, the manuscript discusses the future of leadership preparation, highlighting the potential of artificial intelligence to further enhance decision-making, personalized professional development, and administrative efficiency, while addressing ethical considerations such as data privacy and equity. Full article

Following the educational reforms of 2010 and the revision of the curriculum in 2018, Swedish preschool principals have a special responsibility for ensuring that preschool teachers have the necessary conditions to assume their responsibility for the teaching and to lead the work team. This indicates that integrating leadership with management is essential for a sustainable and successful preschool education. This study explores this assumption. Building on the concepts of management and leadership, with a qualitative research design, this study analyses data from seven interviews with preschool principals. The results showed a lack of a combination of management and leadership among the principals in relation to their special responsibility of ensuring that preschool teachers are given conditions necessary to be responsible for teaching in the preschool. The principals either lacked both management and leadership or focused on management only with a lack of leadership. Our findings suggest the necessity for principals to combine management and leadership and move from a previous flat organisational structure towards a focus on increasing preschool teachers’ responsibilities and leadership within the work team. Support for principals is needed to be able to perform a combination of management and leadership when their mission is complex and time-consuming. Full article

This study aims to explore the challenges faced by principals in rural schools in Taiwan and the professional support they require to improve leadership and school management. Utilizing focus group interviews, data was collected from 16 participants (7 women and 9 men), focusing on issues such as limited cultural capital, student retention, teacher shortages, poor student performance, and insufficient school funding. This research highlights the specific challenges of teacher retention, student mobility, and administrative burdens. The key professional support identified includes targeted professional development, curriculum inspection, parental engagement, and collaboration with colleagues and experienced principals. This study suggests that creating professional development communities, fostering collaborative networks, and increasing administrative support can significantly enhance rural school leadership and improve education quality. The findings offer practical insights for policymakers to tailor support systems to meet the unique needs of rural school principals in Taiwan, drawing on successful strategies from both local and international contexts to ensure sustainable educational leadership and development. Full article

National school leadership standards are now de facto curriculum for preparation programs. Data use is embedded throughout standards to guide school improvement and classroom instruction. Yet, across a number of areas, pre-service principals do not appear ready to lead once in the field. Principals are responsible for using various data to guide internal policies, school cultures, and capacity building, largely supporting teachers by establishing norms, expectations, and clear visions for data use in instructional decisions. In this study, we examined leadership preparation programs in one U.S. state to understand how data use is addressed in leader preparation. Our analysis of course description, syllabi, and program director interview data resulted in the following findings: (1) programs and courses seldom explicitly acknowledged data use as a topic; (2) when data use was acknowledged as a topic, it was infrequently tied to standards; (3) connections between data use and instructional change were limited; and (4) most programs relied on internships for leadership preparation programs to learn data use practices. There are opportunities for programs to make connections between standards, data use, and instructional improvement more explicit, as well as to clarify expectations for and increase oversight of field-based mentors. Full article

Throughout the globe, there is growing attention being paid to issues of equity and efforts to produce more equitable student learning outcomes in schools, and much of the scholarship internationally has begun to center school leaders as key drivers of more equitable conditions. Indeed, in the United States, persistent inequities in education have highlighted the need for K-12 principals who can effectively support diverse students. Effective leader preparation and development, particularly with a focus on equity, is crucial, as it equips school leaders with the knowledge and skills to create inclusive and equitable learning environments. U.S.-based research highlights that high-quality, equity-centered preparation programs can significantly impact student outcomes, emphasizing the importance of integrating equity-focused training in leadership development. However, we know less about the design of high-quality preparation programs oriented around equity, and scholars have noted that current programs are often ill-equipped to prepare equity-centered leaders. Therefore, this study provides an integrative review of the U.S.-based equity-centered principal preparation literature to extract learnings from several types of publications, including descriptive and empirical studies, literature reviews, and conceptual essays. This study provides insights into four key elements of equity-centered principal preparation and development: program vision, curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment. This review consolidates insights from the existing literature into a single, accessible article, offering valuable learnings for program faculty, others who prepare school principals, and researchers focused on equity-centered preparation. Additionally, while centered on the U.S. context, this review is likely to be of value to leadership preparation and development programs in other national contexts, particularly those that have more recently begun to form. Full article

Although a principal’s leadership of the curriculum can have a substantial influence on student outcomes and school performance, limited research exists about the impact of a principal curriculum leadership on the development of students’ thoughts, attitudes, values, and behavioral patterns, so that they can participate effectively in modern society. Based on the theory of human development ecology, this study aimed to explore the impact mechanisms of principal curriculum leadership on students’ modernity, examine the chain mediating effects of teacher leadership and class management effectiveness, and examine the moderating effects of class collective effectiveness. The results reveal that principal curriculum leadership was unable to significantly predict students’ modernity; teacher leadership played an independent mediating role, whereas teacher leadership and class management effectiveness played a chain mediating role; and class collective effectiveness significantly positively moderated the effect of teacher leadership on class management effectiveness and the effect of class management effectiveness on students’ modernity. In order to improve principal curriculum leadership and enhance students’ modernity, the former needs to consider students’ sustainable development, and further attention should be paid to the value of “significant others”, such as principals and teachers, in the development of students, as well to the mechanisms by which the school ecosystem influences the sustainable development of students. Full article

A scoping review was carried out on the literature relating to the evaluation of the implementation of quality physical education (QPE) programmes and related outcomes on final-stage primary-level pupils’ attitudes towards physical education (ATPE), physical activity behaviour (PAB), mental wellbeing (MWB) and academic achievement (AA). The scoping review included studies published between 2000 and 2020 in the PubMed, Elsevier, SCOPUS and CINAHL databases and was completed in accordance with the PRISMA extension for scoping reviews’ guidelines. Based on the inclusion criteria, 15 out of 2869 studies were included in the review. A thematic analysis was used to inductively and deductively analyse the studies for common themes of features of QPE programmes in primary schools, arising from nine different countries, considering the four outcome dimensions (ATPE, PAB, MWB and AA). The common themes identified as features of QPE across all four dimensions were as follows: (1) government leadership; (2) PE curriculum; (3) school principal and leaders; (4) organisational management from leadership in school; (5) teachers; (6) parental involvement; and (7) community partnerships. Based on these findings, recommendations were made for an evaluation framework on QPE in primary education. Full article

Nature-based play and learning is of increasing interest to primary schools and research suggests that it has many potential benefits for children’s health and development. However, little is known about educators’ perspectives and experiences of nature-based play and learning, particularly the barriers, benefits and enablers, despite their direct relevance to the uptake of nature-based play and learning in schools. A qualitative descriptive methodology was employed to uncover these. Individual, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 principals and educators from South Australian public primary schools, recruited via a participant contact list from a previous study. The participants were two principals, eight educators and two individuals with dual principal and educator positions. Metropolitan and rural schools were equally represented. Interviews were audio-taped, transcribed verbatim and analysed using thematic analysis. Analysis identified four overarching themes: the practice, perceived benefits, barriers and enablers of nature-based play and learning. Children’s learning, enjoyment, creativity, and a relaxed and flexible environment were clear benefits. Meanwhile educator knowledge and confidence and the crowded curriculum were barriers. Enablers were nature-based play and learning champions and support from school leadership. The findings suggest that schools can help engage students with nature-based play and learning activities by mitigating these barriers and promoting these enablers. Full article

A parallel system of inclusive and special education persists in Ireland despite attempts to move towards integrated provision for students with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) along a flexible continuum of support. Even in mainstream schools, duality exists and discrete delivery of special education continues to create ‘siloed’ approaches to education for some students. This paper outlines a research and knowledge exchange initiative involving a higher education institution and a management body for post-primary schools in Ireland attempting to develop integrated, school-wide, systematic and collaborative approaches to inclusive and special education. Theoretically underpinned by Hornby’s model of Inclusive Special Education (2015) and a conceptualisation of the SENCO role in the Irish context, a pilot process was implemented to support the development of an integrated response to a continuum of need. A year after initial implementation a review was undertaken. Focus group and individual interviews with SENCOs, Curriculum Leaders and Principals in six schools indicate that the initiative, while still in its infancy, raised awareness about inclusive special education amongst staff and provided data-informed approaches to education. The centrality of leadership in promoting school-wide approaches to inclusive special education also emerged. Finally, the importance of situated community of practice approaches to professional learning were identified as critical to leading change in schools. Full article

There are intersections that can occur between the respective peak Australian school education policy agendas. These policies include the use of technologies in classrooms to improve teaching and learning as promoted through the Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians and the Australian Curriculum; and the implementation of professional standards as outlined in the Australian Professional Standard for Principals and the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers. These policies create expectations of school leaders to bring about change in classrooms and across their schools, often described as bringing about ‘quality teaching’ and ‘school improvement’. These policies indicate that Australian children should develop ‘democratic values’, and that school principals should exercise ‘democratic values’ in their schools. The national approaches to the implementation of these policies however, is largely silent on promoting learning that fosters democracy through education, or about making connections between teaching and learning with technologies, school leadership and living in a democracy. Yet the policies promote these connections and alignments. Furthermore, understanding democratic values, knowing what is a democracy, and being able to use technologies in democratic ways, has to be learned and practiced. Through the lens of the use of technologies to build digital citizenship and to achieve democratic processes and outcomes in schools, these policy complexities are examined in order to consider some of the implications for school leadership. Full article