Basics of qualitative research: Grounded theory procedures and techniques

Doing qualitative research: a practical handbook, by David Silverman, Los Angeles, Sage, 2010, 456 pp., AU$65.00, ISBN 978-1-84860-033-1, ISBN 978-1-94960-034-8. Available in Australia and New Zeal...

Doing qualitative research: a practical handbook

International evidence suggests that educational reform’s progress
depends on teachers’ individual and collective capacity and its link with schoolwide
capacity for promoting pupils’ learning. Building capacity is therefore
critical. Capacity is a complex blend of motivation, skill, positive learning,
organisational conditions and culture, and infrastructure of support. Put together,
it gives individuals, groups, whole school communities and school systems the
power to get involved in and sustain learning over time. Developing professional
learning communities appears to hold considerable promise for capacity building
for sustainable improvement. As such, it has become a ‘hot topic’ in many
countries.

Professional Learning Communities: A Review of the Literature

This article argues for a reconceptualization of leadership. Possible substitutes for leadership are reviewed along with a number of existing dualisms. These are rejected in favour of the claim that the leadership of organizations is most appropriately understood as a distributed, rather thanas a focused, phenomenon. Various attributes, dimensions and applications of distribution are then considered, and a revised approach to action and influence in organizations centred on conjointly performed activities is thenproposed. For this new formulation a summary is provided of the core concepts of, and recent developments in, activity theory. It is shown that two particular advantages of this approach include the helpful model it provides for contextual analysis—an aspect sorely neglected by the field of leadership—and its focus on the evolving division of labour in organizations, the prime mover for tracking emerging patterns of distributed leadership.

Distributed Properties A New Architecture for Leadership

This article considers the relationship between distributed leadership and school improvement. Drawing upon empirical evidence from two contemporary studies of successful school leadership and recent studies of school improvement, it explores the extent to which distributed forms of leadership can contribute to school improvement. The article argues that the distributed perspective offers a new and important theoretical lens through which leadership practice in school can be reconfigured and reconceptualized. It concludes by suggesting that, while evidence would suggest that distributed forms of leadership can assist capacity building within schools which contributes to school improvement, further research is needed to confirm a relationship between distributed forms of leadership and improved student learning outcomes.

Distributed Leadership and School Improvement: Leading or Misleading?.

There is an emerging literature on the relationship between school leadership and student outcomes (Leithwood et al., 2006; Robinson 2007). These sources conclude that leadership has a significant impact and that schools with a clear improvement trajectory invariably have highly effective principals. In parallel with such studies, there has been an increasing focus on shared, or distributed, leadership (Gronn, 2010; Harris, 2010). Leithwood et al.’s (2006) study makes seven ‘strong claims’ about successful school leadership. Two of these are especially pertinent for this editorial:

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1741143210379069

Editorial: Leadership, Collaboration and Learning Outcomes

Editorial: Educational Leadership and Management: Whose Vision?

The political, economic and social challenges in Zimbabwe are well documented. Public schools have been damaged by a shortage of resources, and by a brain drain of teachers. This has led many paren...

/pdf/leading-and-sustaining-zimbabwe-s-private-schools-matching-3a839xmf0l.pdf

Leading and sustaining Zimbabwe’s private schools: Matching vision with economic reality:

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1741143206068210

Editorial Educational Leadership and Management: South African and Global Perspectives

System leadership is a relatively new (21st century) expression used to describe and explain the operation of schools in England. Susan Cousin defines it as ‘a headteacher working in a leadership p...

Tony Bush

Papers

Editorial: Leadership, Collaboration and Learning Outcomes

Editorial: Educational Leadership and Management: Whose Vision?

Leading and sustaining Zimbabwe’s private schools: Matching vision with economic reality:

Editorial Educational Leadership and Management: South African and Global Perspectives

System leadership: policy and practice in the English schools system: by Susan Cousin, London, Bloomsbury, 2019, ISBN 978-1-3500-8105-5