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The purpose of this study is to describe the variability of principals' classroom observations across schools and to relate classroom observations to the schools' instructional climate. This helps identify the conditions under which classroom observations effectively improve instruction in some schools and not in other schools.

Data for the study are from surveys from principals (n=319) and teachers (n=15,818) matched to administrative data on principals and schools. Data are analyzed using factor analysis, latent class analysis, and regression.

There is no evidence that the frequency, duration, or instructional focus of classroom observations varies across schools with different student demographic characteristics or student performance levels. There is also no evidence that the frequency or duration of conducting classroom observations relates to the instructional climate of the school. However, there is evidence that conducting observations with a focus on instructional improvement relates to the instructional climate of the school after controlling for school and principal characteristics. These findings suggest variability in the implementation of classroom observations.

The paper provides useful information to guide the preparation and support of principals in order to use classroom observations most effectively for improving instructional opportunities.

This paper seeks to explore how principals use their time when the requirement exceeds the activities are desirable. In the scholarly debate it has been pointed out the heads think that too much time is devoted for the financial and administrative issues, or to solve acute problems. This means that there is not enough time to work with educational issues. The purpose of this paper is to clarify how principals use the time they have devoted for the educational area and what activities they prioritize. It will also increase the knowledge of reasons behind their prioritizing and reflect on some of the consequences. Results relate to the question if introduction of performance measures has increased a short-term perspective on student performance or if it works as a suitable tool for the principals to achieve the schools goals and to create more effective schools in the long run. The question if stakeholders can get required insight by the performance measures as they are designed today and if the principals got the right incentives is raised.

A quantitative approach is used and a mail questionnaire was distributed to the principals in all upper secondary schools in Sweden and a comparative cross-sectional study was conducted.

Principals’ perceptions suggest that, their prioritization when working with educational issues is influenced by a more short-term perspective and that they prioritize teaching, which have a much faster impact on student outcome, over long-term school development which facilitate the conditions for the former. These findings increase the insight into the need, for as well stakeholders as principals, to develop performance measures to stimulate change when needed.

These findings have implications on the direction of the development of performance measures. The result points out the lack of transparence for stakeholders and uncovers the need to know when change and long-term development is ongoing or not. The study show how principals need incentives for prioritizing these activities and that this can be done by the stakeholder by designing required measurements for as well teaching as long-term school development when change is needed or to maintain a successful process.

This paper fulfills an identified need to study how the performance measures of today can be complemented with measures for stakeholders for increased insight in ongoing activities with development and required change for long-term school success.

The purpose of this paper is to call for a rhetorical turn in the study of school leadership and discusses how principals use language to enact school improvement. The key purpose is to explore how talk is action in leading and managing school reform.

This paper presents a rhetorical framework and methodology for interpreting principal practice through language. As a model, the language use of one urban school principal is examined through a rhetorical analysis of 650 instances of principal talk in 14 administrative meetings. The paper reports on the form and content of principal rhetoric, including analysis of logos, pathos, and ethos, and comparative analysis across meeting contexts.

The paper demonstrates the importance of rhetorical form and content and highlights the role of audience in principal talk. In the present example, each of three rhetorical forms was used to transform school practice. Logos was used most frequently; emotional and ethical arguments were also integral to principal talk. Comparative analysis showed that the principal's rhetoric varied by audience. The principal's use of language did not just explain practice, but also defined and shaped ongoing practices.

The author proposes future cross-case research to develop an understanding of how leadership language varies across individuals and contexts, as well as interaction analyses of the co-performance of discourse and rhetoric in schools.

The author argues that principal preparation would benefit from the incorporation of the linguistic concepts and forms of rhetoric, particularly in the context of school improvement.

While many have turned to principal practice as an area of research, few have focussed on the underlying linguistic structures. This paper emphasizes the importance of language in principal practice and offers a specific methodology with which to study it.

The purpose of this paper is to describe how elementary school principals adjust their leadership practice in response to Washington’s new teacher evaluation policy.

The authors conducted a modified content analysis of open-ended survey responses collected from elementary school principals in Washington State. In all, the survey included responses from 354 elementary school principals representing 25.0 percent of the state’s elementary school principal population. ATLAS.ti supported data analysis and assisted in the derivation of three key findings.

Elementary school principals changed their instructional leadership practice in response to the new teacher evaluation policy in three significant ways. First, principals adjusted their approach to classroom observation to complete more intentional, in-depth observational activities. Second, principals redistributed non-instructional responsibilities to clerical staff members to allow themselves and other administrators more time for classroom observation. Third, principals adopted a learning stance to the new policy and thus sought external support, especially coaching, to assist them with the implementation of new evaluation practices.

The study faced three limitations. First, the sample of respondents included in this study cannot be generalized to the state as participants were not randomly selected. Second, the survey did not utilize a longitudinal design, and thus its findings only relate to the first year of the policy’s implementation. Third, the study does not include school-based evidence to triangulate principals’ survey responses.

The study contributes to the instructional leadership literature. Specifically, the study offers further insights into the adjustments principals make in their leadership to accommodate expectations found in new teacher evaluation policy.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how US school leaders make sense of external mandates, and the way in which their understanding of state and district accountability policies affects their work. It is posited that school leaders’ responses to external accountability are likely to reflect a complex interaction between their perception of the accountability policies, the state and district contexts in which those policies are situated and their own leadership beliefs and practices.

The authors use both principal and teacher survey data to explore the question of how perceptions of external policy are associated with instructional leadership behaviors. Cases of seven principals are employed to flesh out the findings from the survey analysis.

It is concluded that external accountability policy may have a positive impact on instructional leadership – where they see those policies as aligned with their own values and preferences, and where they see their district leaders as supportive of school‐driven accountability initiatives. In these cases, school leaders internalize the external accountability policies and shape them to the particular needs that they see as priorities in their own school. Where one or the other of these factors is weak or missing, on the other hand, leaders demonstrate more negative attitudes to external accountability and weaker instructional leadership.

This analysis draws on a unique, large‐scale data base and uses a mixed methods approach to answer the question.

The purpose of this paper is to examine considerations employed in decision-making processes by Israeli high school leaders, when implementing the “Courage to Change” reform. The reform gave schools large supplementary resources in the form of “weekly instruction time” and they decided how to exploit these additional hours.

Qualitative analysis focused on data from interviews with staff from 19 high schools.

The research identified three types of consideration adopted by managerial staffs: “Hasty,” “Conservative” and “Path-breaking.” Findings contribute to theory concerning incremental decisions in schools concerning the allocation of resources, in line with the institutional approach, and also inform other schools coping with similar tasks.

The research is original both in its topic and context. Further conclusions and implications are discussed.

This chapter uses findings derived from interviews with 13 Ontario (Canada) secondary school principals to identify conditions that contribute to emotional labor, experienced in their work. Five workplace conditions that heighten participating principals' emotional labor emerged from the interviews, including advocating for students, work intensification, navigating their local policy context, managing workplace conflict and crises or tragedies in the school community. The findings suggest a need to clarify legislated expectations and responsibilities placed on principals to accurately reflect their work and counter the impact of work intensification. Principals could benefit from additional supports to deal with the impact(s) of work intensification, shepherding the school through crises or navigating shifting policy contexts and conflicts in the workplace. Rather than treating the symptoms that result from emotional labor, concrete efforts are needed to change the culture of the principalship in order to maximize the impact of leadership on student achievement.

As part of a broader qualitative study on well-being and social support, the study reported here explored the issue of principal well-being to provide further insight into the concerns of principals. Its aim was to identify aspects of the principal role that impact on well-being.

A phenomenological approach was used to study the experiences of the principals. Eight primary school principals in New South Wales, Australia participated in semi-structured interviews that examined this area and identified aspects of their leadership role that influence their well-being. Purposive sampling was used to ensure representation in terms of gender and school size.

Five themes emerged as the key concerns of the principals: the responsibility of the role; managing people; feelings of isolation; the stress caused by the role; and prioritising the well-being of staff. Comments from the principals highlight how each of these areas is experienced.

Identifying and exploring these concerns added to the extant research on principal well-being by providing detail on the specific experiences of principals. The study also offers a basis to consider how the current situation may be improved by addressing the well-being concerns that are common, as well as highlighting areas that warrant further research attention.

Decades of research on different leadership styles shows that effective school leadership is the degree of influence or synergy between teachers and principals around the core business of schools, instruction. While various styles, such as transformational, instructional, shared instructional, point to the similar measures of high organizational quality, the inconsistency in how these styles are defined and relate make it unclear how principals systematically improve schools. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This study used the 1999-2000 schools and staffing survey, n=8,524 of US principals, since it includes a nationally representative sample of administrators who responded to a comprehensive set of leadership measures around a time of school restructuring reforms. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to identify different styles, and to measure the extent of their relationship. These factors were used to test a theory about why principals practice each of these styles to a different degree based on levels of shared instructional leadership.

Based on the theoretical framework, principals should have a similar high influence over resources, safety and facilities regardless of degree of shared instructional leadership since these tasks address foundational school needs. However, principal and teacher influence over these resources differed across levels of shared instructional leadership more than principal-directed tasks of facilitating a mission, supervising instruction and building community.

Differences in the practice of styles by shared instructional leadership did not fit changing, higher ordered needs as theorized instead seemed to vary by a hierarchy of control, the way in which principals shared influence with teachers.

Principals are considered central in initiating and mobilizing changes in schools; however, their political behaviors in the course of school changes are underexplored. The present research investigated the influence tactics used by school principals to induce teachers to join a process of second-order (deep and wide) change in the school teaching and culture. In specific, the authors were interested to know which influence tactics, principals and staff members considered to be efficient during such a second-order change process.

The study was based on a case study method focusing on four Israeli Jewish state public religious schools participating in the “Routes” program aimed at strengthening religious values in schools. Data collection included semi-structured interviews with principals, teachers with program coordinators responsibilities and teachers in four schools.

The results indicate that school principals who are considered successful in leading changes display two key influence prototypes: a hybrid type that combines soft and hard influence tactics and a unitype that relies on soft influence tactics.

The research study contributed to the limited knowledge in educational administration on micropolitics and political behaviors in the course of school changes.