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Importance of educational leadership
The leadership literature considers two styles of leadership: transactional and transformational (Keskes, 2014)
Effective leadership in education
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According to noted American writer and scholar Peter Drucker “management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things” (Flagello 2009, p.127). There in lies the difference, management is about implementation and leadership is about deciding which course of action to take. Leadership is about the ability to influence, motivate, and stimulate those you lead while considering their input and the objective (Bass 1985). However, just as it is with management, leadership is affected by both the situation and resources presented. The ability to lead is the culmination of a set of skills and abilities, which are acquired and developed over time through experience as long as there is sufficient motivation and desire (Kouzes and Posner, 2008). Two other critical factors are necessary in leadership; they are role models and coaching. Through these two factors, it is clear that a student of leadership can be melded by their observational and practical experiences of other leaders who serve as their mentors. Management is seen as a set of skills and abilities that are learnt, while leadership is seen as a set of innate personal characteristics (Kouzes and Posner, 2008). These personal characteristics of leadership are a reflection of the situations the leader finds themselves in and forms the basis of their own self-awareness and effort to become leaders (Kouzes and Posner, 2008). The leader must be willing to be adaptable to the situations and willing to undertake the responsibility to lead.
As a leader it is necessary to have a multitude of skills, none are exclusive but in particular the ability to communicate and collaborate are two of the key requirements for effective educational administration ( Harris 2009, p.8). It ...
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...ndom House, New York.
Leithwood & Jantzi 2005, p. 183
A Review of Transformational School
Leadership Research 1996–2005
AK eRnenveitehw L oeift hTwraonosdfo armnda tDioonrails LJeanadtzeirship KENNETH LEITHWOOD and DORIS JANTZI
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto
Leithwood, Kenneth and Jantzi, Doris(2005) 'A Review of Transformational School Leadership
Research 1996-2005', Leadership and Policy in Schools, 4: 3, 177 — 199
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15700760500244769
Kouzes, J & Posner, B 2008, The leadership challenge, 4th edn, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco.
Silins, H 1994, ‘The relationship between transformational and transactional leadership and school improvement outcomes’, School Effectiveness and School Improvement, vol. 5, no. 3, viewed 17 April 2011, .
Gorton, R. A., & Alston, J. A. (2012). School leadership & administration: Important concepts, case studies, & simulations. (9th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill. [Kindle Version] (pp. 1-323).
I had the pleasure of being able to shadow Superintendent Shirley Hall of the Maplewood School District. Ms. Hall took the reins of the district over in 2012 from a very popular superintendent who was credited with making great strides within the district. Although Ms. Hall had very large shoes to fill, she seems to be doing it with grace and enthusiasm. She credits the previous superintendent with making systemic changes and establishing the overall forward momentum of the district, but recognizes that she cannot rest on past success. Her goal is to take the district to the next level of educational excellence by focusing her and her administrative team's efforts on the P.E.L.P. coherence model from Harvard University. This model focuses the leadership's attention on the interdependence of the various aspects of their school district and how they reinforce one another to support the implementation of an improvement strategy. One of Ms. Hall's mantras was change, but not just for change sake, deep change for sustained improvement. Therefore, although Ms. Hall's predecessor was able to put the district on the right path, Ms. Hall has taken the baton and run with it; establishing her own style and path to excellence.
Leading organizations of school administrators offer educators various opportunities to encourage educators to become leaders. No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) has mandated that leaders be better prepared for the task of providing quality education to all. NCLB “… is forcing all educational stakeholders to face the weakness of contemporary school leadership and is making it impossible to ignore the need for higher quality principals” (Hale & Moorman, 2003, p.1). It is believed that all educators can be and are leaders in their own right. A leader is a visionary and has the ability to inspire others to aspire to greatness. Of the numerous opportunities that are offered, those that are most beneficial include but are not limited to leadership training programs, professional development, and creating shared leadership opportunities for teachers to become leaders. The systems “…that produce our nation’s principals are complex and interrelated – and governed by the states. Each state establishes licensing, certification and re-certification” (Hale & Moorman, 2003, p.1). States use the ISLLC standards “…as the framework for preparation programs and in service professional development of school superintendents, principals, and other leaders” (Hale & Moorman, 2003, p.3).
Leadership at times can be a complex topic to delve into and may appear to be a simple and graspable concept for a certain few. Leadership skills are not simply acquired through position, seniority, pay scale, or the amount of titles an individual holds but is a characteristic acquired or is an innate trait for the fortunate few who possess it. Leadership can be misconstrued with management; a manager “manages” the daily operations of a company’s work while a leader envisions, influences, and empowers the individuals around them.
There is debate over the differences of management and leadership. There are different viewpoints and definitions of leadership as well. How do we know what the difference is and what definitions of leadership work the best? James C. Hunter in The Servant differentiates management from leadership by doing and influence (1998). Management is what you do and leadership is the influence and impact you have upon the people you come in contact with (Hunter, 1998). There are many different styles of leadership which include authoritarian, benevolent dictatorship, and participatory to name a few (Page and Wong, 2000). The model everyone is trying to emulate and make a framework for is servant leadership. Servant leadership
Presently many of us have learned that managers are primarily administrators who have learned to write business plans, utilize their resources and keep track of progress. We must learn that we are not limited by job title, and that means we can utilize our management skills in any position that we are in. We must also know that we can use our leadership skills in the same situations. On the other hand we have also learned that leaders are people who have an impact on those that surround them. The main difference that separates these two roles is that management is a function that must be utilized in any type of business, and leadership is the relationship that the leader has with his followers, which in turn can motivate and energize the organization.
One regular factor in most of the effective schools research is an emphasis on strong, instructional leadership (Edmonds, 1979ab, 1982; Purkey & Smith, 1983; Weber, 1971; Brookover& Lezotte, 1979). Leadership theories, such as trait, behavior, contingency, and charismatic, provide a theoretical framework for viewing the total development of instructional leadership. Instructional leadership has many different definitions and models that intellectualize it starting from the early 1900’s. The current study synthesizes the many meanings and models of instructional leadership using theoretical and empirical contemplations. The instructional leadership construct is defined in terms of principal behaviors that lead a school to educate all students to higher student achievement.
Management and leadership are viewed as two different perspectives in the business environment. As described by Dr. Warren Bennis ‘Managers are people who do things right, while leaders are people who do the right thing’, this means that managers do things by the set rules and follow company policy, while leaders follow their own intuition, which may in turn be of more benefit to the company.
Newspaper articles and websites about those organizations and the people connected to them instructional leadership. Examples of organizations such as Michelle Reed, Teach for America, and The New Teacher Project are a few (Rigby, 2014). The focus was on three out of the eight Dimensions when writing the memo notes. Number one focused on the underline assumption that all leaders share a commitment to bring educational opportunities to all students. Number two, leaders focused on the practice of instructional leadership. The third Dimension is the role of the teachers. Teacher’s characteristics have the biggest or largest impact on student learning inside of schools. The research shows that school leaders influence teachers such as with their type of their instructional leadership style they should develop trust and professional community. Majority of principal’s instructional leadership action is focused on the teachers through direct interaction such as observations and feedback (Rigby, 2014). The three largest instructional leadership research found that there was an assumption that the primary role of the principle is that of instructional leader how it is conceptualized and what it looks
With the passage of NCLB, many school reform efforts have been initiated using top-down model in which each school leaders have been charged with initiating bold administrative changes to address the legislation. With the number of leadership theories and models, researchers have become interested in studying those to determine which might bring forth the most significant results for leading such change. Due to the lack of highly qualified administrators and the increasing demands for administrators, Bush, O’Brien & Spangler (2005) studied a program, the Southern Tier Leadership Academy, a collaborative of the New York Education Department. The study included three separate cohorts who completed an eight month program. Whereas, Somech (2005) chose to investigate directive and participative leadership approaches, and which would more significantly impact school effectiveness. Perhaps Somech’s reflect Scherer’s (2009, p.7) understandings as described in Educational Leadership, ‘broom-wielding leadership can indeed be beneficial’ as is putting advocates into positions of power and influence and building teams, both of which are seemingly contrasting opposites.
The mystery of what makes one an effective leader has fascinated people for thousands of years. There is a great difference between leadership and management. Leadership in my opinion differs from management and requires transformational approaches. Peter F. Drucker says, "Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things (Goodreads.com,2014). Management capabilities can be developed mostly through personal experiences while leadership skills are inherent and there are therefore no clear cut ways to develop it. The viability of a leader depends more on knowing yourself, pragmatic leadership and pleasing the masses rather than responding to circumstances.
What does leadership mean in the context of educational leadership? Many definitions of leadership in education co-exist, attesting to the complexity and multi-faceted phenomena of the concept (Elwell & Elikofer, 2013). Leadership is one of the most observed and least understood organizational and psychological areas of study. Despite volumes of research and numerous theories, no one theory of leadership emerged as the sole predictor of the success of educational leaders. The current body of knowledge about leadership consists of narrow definitions of leader effectiveness that are disconnected from their context (Latham, 2014). Educational leadership influences and affects every dimension of the educational process from the
The method of leadership is almost as similar as management, and a leader can be a manager. “Both management and leadership are seen as positions of responsibility or accountability in an organization” (Edwards, Schedlitzki, Turnbull, & Gill, 2015). Leadership and management can relate and overlap within the roles and functions and are similar within one another in meaning. Together leadership and management direct the actions of a group or individually.
Leadership and management are two words that are commonly mistaken; the relation and the differences between them are often unclear. Leadership can be defined as the ability to influence a group toward the achievement of a vision or a set of goals." Managers are there to plan, organize, lead and monitor employees' activities. Leaders also have to be able to guide an organization through change. As we will see later, vision is a crucial component in the success of this task.
Leadership and management are two fundamental concepts which are involved in the effective management of organizations. Leadership in my opinion is a complex concept, which includes association of human qualities and the result of their activities. To be a great leader means not only following own visions, but also work towards company’s goals.