The school improvement came into question that schools meet the educational needs has been made to make it more effective, changing in parallel globalization. The purpose of school improvement is to rise levels of student achievement and school environment to increase participation. In this context, the basic aim of this study was to determine the ideas of the principals about school improvement and what strategies they use in order to improve their schools. The research was conducted with the principals of the primary schools in Karabaglar, a town in the province of metropolitan area of Izmir. This study is a descriptive research that used qualitative data. The data were collected through semi-structured questions from 37 principals and analyzed qualitatively. Some of the results obtained in this study were as follows: According to the principals, on the top of the list of the things to do to improve schools were "improving co-operation and communication". In the second place, there were "teacher development" and "meet the need for personnel". In third place there were "improving the physical conditions" and "provision of educational technologies and increasing their use". The first thing the principals do to improve their schools was "increasing the number of the technological devices and the use of technology". On the top of the list of what the principals want to do but cannot do were "lack of financial allocations" and "lack of financial sources".