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Heads of secondary school mathematics department were surveyed to assess their perceptions of how they influence and impact students' performance in mathematics. Survey results showed both agreement and discrepancy between what department heads perceived as actual and optimal activities to enhance instructional improvement, influence student achievement, and implement initiatives for change. The report concludes with a description of the pre‐service and in‐service programs.

This chapter examines one of the most contested issues in Public Administration, namely political–administrative relationships. The first part of the chapter begins with a brief overview of the features of an ideal-type bureaucracy. Next is a literature review of political–administrative relationships. This is followed by an analysis of typologies of political–administrative relationships, with particular reference to developing countries. The second part of the chapter analyses the evolution of political–administrative relationships since the dawn of South African democracy in 1994. It examines the growing politicisation of the public service, the weakening of the powers of public officials vis-a-vis Ministers and the emasculation of the PSC. Data indicate that the government is unable to fill posts at the Senior Management Service (SMS) level and that there are a high number of acting HoDs, an indicator of instability. Finally, it uses Dasandi and Esteve’s typology of political–administrative relationships in developing countries to interpret the South African case.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of the secondary Head of Department (HoD) in leading teams producing exceptional education outcomes in Years 7‐10 in New South Wales (NSW, Australia) government schools.

Sites where exceptional educational outcomes were believed to be occurring were selected using a variety of data including performance in standardised tests, public examinations, various value added measures and nominations from various stakeholders. Sites were of two types: subject departments responsible for teaching certain subjects and teams responsible for cross‐school programmes in Years 7‐10. Sites were selected to be broadly representative. Some schools had more than one site, e.g. Mathematics and Student Welfare. A total of 50 sites across NSW from 38 secondary schools were studied.

With both subject departments and teams responsible for cross‐school programmes, leadership was found to be a key factor in the achievement of exceptional educational outcomes. Analysis of data revealed certain qualities, attributes and practices of the HoD of these schools, which are explored, central to which is a focus on students and their learning.

HoDs were those of secondary schools from one state educational system.

Despite the pressures of the secondary HoD role, the HoDs studied had been able to lead and facilitate teams that were thriving when others struggle to perform. Whilst innate, personal qualities are important, much of what these HoDs possessed and demonstrated had been learned from others.

Detailed case studies have provided an examination of HoD leadership effectiveness in a wide range of contexts, with much commonality revealed. Thus, the study can inform future professional learning for secondary HoDs and possibly other middle managers in education. It may also have value for HoD selection.

The aim of quality assessment is to support the development of learners’ competencies as required in 21st century economies. This paper aims to analyse the role and understanding of heads of department (HoDs) regarding quality assessment and the moderation of school-based assessment (SBA) tasks in tourism, which is a subject in the secondary school curriculum.

To elicit valid findings in this interpretative study, focus group discussions were conducted with 16 participants. The HoDs who participated in this study were purposively sampled based on their role as managers of tourism in their respective schools.

Informed by the context, input, process and output theoretical model, this study identified various elements that impacted the enactment of HoDs’ role in the moderation of SBA tasks, with particular reference to tourism. Despite these HoDs’ understanding of the importance of moderation as a key aspect in assuring quality assessment practices, it was found that the moderation of tourism SBA tasks was generally not conducted meticulously and appropriately.

The qualitative case study on which this paper is based used a limited sample within a restricted timeframe and the results may thus not be generalised. However, the methodology produced trustworthy results and may thus be replicated and extended to other subjects with a practical component for enhanced insights into SBA practices.

This paper highlights the necessity for schools to rely on knowledgeable and principled curriculum leaders, particularly HoDs, for the effective management of assessment and moderation strategies to ensure quality outcomes. The qualitative case study on which this paper is based used a limited sample within a restricted timeframe, and the results may thus not be generalised. However, the methodology produced trustworthy results and may thus be replicated and extended to other subjects with a practical component for enhanced insights into SBA practices.

This paper contributes to the discourse on quality assurance and SBA, with particular focus on how quality assessment can be enhanced in the moderation process of tourism. The insights that this paper share may contribute to improved policy decisions regarding the SBA process in tourism.

Universities globally have faced the introduction of research performance assessment systems that provide monetary and ranking rewards based on publication outputs. This study aims to seek an understanding of the implementation of performance-based research funding (PBRF) and its impact on the heads of departments (HoDs) and accounting academics in New Zealand (NZ) tertiary institutions. The study explores NZ accounting academics’ experiences and their workload; the relationship between teaching and research in the accounting discipline and any issues and concerns affecting new and emerging accounting researchers because of PBRF.

Applying an institutional theoretical lens, this paper explores accounting HoDs’ perceptions concerning the PBRF system’s impact on their academic staff. The research used semi-structured interviews to collect data from NZ’s eight universities.

The key findings posit that many institutional processes, some more coercive in nature, whereas others were normative and mimetic, have been put in place to ensure that academics are able to meet the PBRF requirements. HoDs suggest that their staff understand the importance of research, but that PBRF is a challenge to new and emerging researchers and pose threats to their recruitment. New academics must “hit the ground running” as they must demonstrate not only teaching abilities but also already have a track record of research publications; all in all, a daunting experience for new academics to overcome. There is also a teaching and research disconnect. Furthermore, many areas where improvements can be made in the design of this measurement tool remain.

The PBRF system has significantly impacted on accounting academics. Central university research systems were established that subsequently applied coercive institutional pressures onto line managers to ensure that their staff performed. This finding offers scope for future research to explore a better PBRF that measures and rewards research productivity but without the current system’s unintended negative consequences.

The purpose of this paper is to solve the problem of tuning of EKF parameters (process and measurement noise co-variance matrices) designed for attitude estimation using Global Positioning System (GPS) aided inertial sensors by employing a Human Opinion Dynamics (HOD)-based optimization technique and modifying the technique using maximum likelihood estimators and study its performance as compared to Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) and manual tuning.

A model for the determination of attitude of flight vehicles using inertial sensors and GPS measurement is designed and experiments are carried out to collect raw sensor and reference data. An HOD-based model is utilized to estimate the optimized process and measurement noise co-variance matrix. Added to it, few modifications are proposed in the HOD model by utilizing maximum likelihood estimator and finally the results obtained by the proposed schemes analysed.

Analysis of the results shows that utilization of evolutionary algorithms for tuning is a significant improvement over manual tuning and both HOD and PSO-based methods are able to achieve the same level of accuracy. However, the HOD methods show better convergence and is easier to implement in terms of tuning parameters. Also, utilization of maximum likelihood estimator shows better search during initial iterations which increases the robustness of the algorithm.

The paper is unique in its sense that it utilizes a HOD-based model to solve tuning problem of EKF for attitude estimation.

Recently, universities have been subject to many changes which have placed new demands on management at all levels. Reports a study, at a university in the north of England, the aims of which were to investigate by questionnaire if heads of departments (HODs) possessed any management qualifications, whether they had undertaken any management training, and to assess the usefulness of training in certain management skills. No one held a recognized qualification in management and 35 per cent had not undertaken any management training. The two areas of management training that HODs considered to be the most important were those of financial and personnel management. Findings also suggested that HODs now regard their management role as being of greater importance than in the past. However, an ambiguity is that management skills are often not considered for promotion to HOD and that research performance is still the major criterion.

This chapter provides a summary of the main findings, indicating that none of the public service reforms studied has worked particularly well. It then looks at ‘The Way Forward’ by analysing current proposals of the Ramaphosa government to reform the public sector. There are legislative proposals to give HoDs powers to appoint and dismiss staff, along with provisions devolving administrative powers to HoDs, while retaining strategic powers. There is a provision for the EA to intervene in the event of HoDs failing or refusing to fulfil a power or duty in terms of the proposed Act. This does provide a back door for Ministers to intervene in administration. Further, there is likely to be resistance against proposals to reduce politicians’ role in human resources, including members of the President’s own political party who are reluctant to lose delegation powers. Finally, it is suggested that the government should move away from centralised policies, particularly in respect of performance management, towards network governance-type approaches which promote a non-hierarchical approach to Public Administration.

This chapter examines performance management, which has arguably been the kernel of New Public Management inspired version of public sector reform. The first part is a literature review that looks at experiences of performance management in both developed and developing countries. It looks at the difficulty in transferring public sector reforms from developed to developing countries. This is followed by the evaluation of performance management in the post-1994 public service in South Africa. Both the individual and organisational performance systems are highlighted, followed by an analysis of performance management reforms. There is a well-developed performance management system but the empirical data and qualitative reports found that it has not worked particularly well. There are concerns around a number of issues, including the measurement of targets; the signing of performance targets; a focus on outputs rather than outcomes; a lack of harmonisation between individual and organisational performance; a lack of capacity of managers, which in some cases is due to unskilled patronage appointments; a focus on compliance rather than performance; and a lack of accountability.

The purpose of this paper is to study the attitudes of UK head teachers and of librarians to the view that secondary school librarians should have the status of a head of department (HOD).

Questionnaires sent to 77 secondary schools in Cheshire, UK had response rates of 58 per cent from the librarians and of 49 per cent from the head teachers, with follow‐up interviews being conducted with 15 of the librarians.

Most librarians were employed as support staff, although many of them were doing a HOD's job; even when a librarian had this title, they did not often receive the recognition appropriate to such a role. Librarians were more likely to have HOD status in the independent schools sector than in the state‐maintained sector, and there was some evidence that head teachers and librarians have different views as to what a librarian's responsibilities should be.

There has been no previous study of this topic in the UK.