Session Information
26 SES 05 A, Leadership Development and Preparation
Paper Session
Contribution
School leadership is generally acknowledged as a crucial component of school improvement, yet there are no clearly identified systems for developing school leaders (Hallinger, 2003; Leithwood, Harris, & Hopkins, 2008; Leithwood, & Riehl, 2003). This presentation reports on a paper that examines the leadership development system in England, put in place from 2000 to 2015. Over the past 15 years, England has introduced substantial reforms to the ways educational leadership is designed and carried out in schools. First, it has developed a set of formal educational leadership positions in schools that go beyond the principal and one or two others. The clarity of the roles and responsibilities of three levels of school leadership—school principals, senior leaders, and middle leaders— are particularly striking The overall school leadership structure in England adds depth to the professional support that teachers get and moves responsibility for instructional improvement closer to the classroom. The tripartite structure has also created pathways for teachers to become school leaders, and for leaders to develop and refine their skills across their professional careers.
To support school leaders, England’s government charged a quasi-governmental organization, the National College of School Leadership, to define the knowledge and skills necessary to lead at each of the three levels and to develop a high quality curriculum to build the capacity of leaders to competently perform at each level. The National College curriculum brought together a rich set of blended learning experiences that culminate in an assessment for a nationally accredited certification for each leadership level. Tens of thousands of school leaders have received the national certification. More recently, the government has shifted to a more decentralized emphasis by facilitating school networks to enable lateral school exchanges, led by high performing schools. Because these networks are closer to particular problems of practice, they are more grounded and responsive to the specific challenges and needs of participating schools. I call this combination of vertical leadership development and lateral school network support the lattice for school leadership. Finally, and crucially, school leadership and effective teaching are central elements of the national school inspection process, which is the cornerstone of the nation’s school accountability system. By incorporating school leadership and instructional practice into school performance judgments, the essential role of these elements is reinforced and the signals for what schools should focus on are broadened beyond test performance.
The investigation was motivated by three central research questions. First, what were the key components of the leadership development system in England? Second, how were they developed and implemented? And third, how are they embedded into and integrated with the larger components of the educational system?
The investigation was conducted using a talent development framework adopted from the business literature. The framework is commonly used in the business world to guide the human resource processes that are designed to attract, develop, motivate, and retain productive employees (Berger & Berger, 2011; Cappelli, 2008). The educational leadership talent management framework focuses on a five-stage process (1) identifying and recruiting potential leaders; (2) developing potential leaders before they take on specific leadership responsibilities (pre-service); (3) licensing leaders as a mechanism of quality assurance; (4) providing ongoing professional development (PD) of leaders; and (5) planning for the succession of leaders.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Berger, L. A., & Berger, D. R. (2011). The talent management handbook: Creating a sustainable competitive advantage by selecting, developing, and promoting the best people. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill. Cappelli, P. (2008). Talent on demand. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing. Hallinger, P. (2003). School leadership development. In International handbook of educational research in the Asia-Pacific region (pp. 1001-1013). Springer Netherlands. Huberman, A. M., & Miles, M. B. (2002). The qualitative researcher’s companion. Thousand Oaks. Leithwood, K., Harris, A., & Hopkins, D. (2008). Seven strong claims about successful school leadership. School leadership and management, 28(1), 27-42. Leithwood, K. A., & Riehl, C. (2003). What we know about successful school leadership. Nottingham: National College for School Leadership.
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