In this article we address several tensions and dilemmas that are impacting on Australian principals and other school leaders. The first section explores areas associated with improving teaching and learning and includes discussion of education trends, the construction of new learning environments and the implication of these for more…

The quality of leadership and the effectiveness of schools to deliver an appropriate education through quality teaching have been "hot" topics within education and more widely for several decades. This article provides a brief historical overview of developments in research and changing paradigms of Australian school leadership, followed by a…

Schools in Hong Kong have been operating in a fast changing external environment in the last two decades; not only have they had to follow the international trend of implementing various educational reform initiatives but they also have had to adjust to the social changes brought about by the transfer of political governance. These changes have…

There is no shared understanding of what school leaders are expected to do. Schools have many external as well as internal stakeholders and each of them has different expectations as to leadership practice. Thus school leadership is a "fluid signifier". This article first outlines external expectations that school leaders are faced with and have…

While there are significant differences between England and Scotland in the politics, the policy environment and the management of schools, leadership development both north and south of the border is charged with addressing what has been termed a recruitment and retention "crisis". An emerging phenomenon in both jurisdictions is that of "career…

This article identifies the major themes that emerge from the five selected articles in this special issue. Collectively, they demonstrate some trends occurring in the area of school leadership, but also show that individual countries are looking at these trends in different ways. It is an example of what might be called thinking globally but…

There are essentially two overlapping approaches to describe the state of the art of school leadership training and development in the US. The first approach is what I call recorded history. It is a factual documentation of milestone events, governance changes as well as the passage of landmark laws and policies. The second approach, hidden…

This article documents the leadership practices within one secondary school in Queensland, Australia that uses equity as a central philosophy. Drawing on specific elements of productive leadership as defined by Hayes et al., the article draws attention to how the school's common equity agenda, its supportive social relations, and its dispersed…

Leadership development has been an area of much research, particularly in the last two decades. This has been mirrored by increased policy activity to build leadership capacity in schools through preparation programmes and continuing professional development. This article examines continuing professional development provision for head teachers in…

Strategy is a much debated concept in the field of educational leadership. This article draws on a variety of data from a larger research programme focused on reconceptualising strategy in the specific context of school leadership. Rather than offering a definitive voice, this article lays the foundations for further inquiry on the topic through a…

In this article, we examine the utility and value of multiple measures of school performance for school leaders and managers. The research was conducted within the context of the state of California through an investigation of how operators, managers and authorisers of autonomous "charter" (publicly financed but privately operated) schools use…

Teaching assistants (TAs) comprise a quarter of the school workforce in England and Wales. There has been controversy over TAs' deployment and appropriate role regarding supporting learning and these debates have been transformed by findings from the largest study of school support staff (the DISS project), which show that TA support has a…

The roles and workloads of teachers have been widely noted as changing considerably over recent decades. In this 2009 replication of a 1992 study, 379 New Zealand primary school educators are surveyed regarding their workloads, how these changed and their perceived sustainability. It investigates how respondents believe that educational reforms…

School leadership literature suggests that school effectiveness and ongoing improvement rely on school leaders and principals. Despite significant contributions made by principals towards teaching and learning in schools, there have been few studies that explore principals' perceptions of the factors underpinning their successes and achievements.…

The paper investigates the association between individual characteristics and teacher job satisfaction in secondary education in Cyprus. It focuses on two individual characteristics commonly linked to job satisfaction in the literature, namely, gender and years of experience. A short version of a questionnaire previously employed by Dinham and…