Reflections on school leadership

Schools are complex social organisations, an intricate web of interdependent parts. They were invented to maximise student learning and develop compassionate, wise, knowledgeable and confident citizens. Everything about a school needs to focus on students learning with dignity and development of each individual at its heart.While schools have much in common, every school is a unique community and leadership needs to be situational and come from within. Outstanding school leaders acknowledge this complexity and strive to improve the components and dynamics of the system. This includes concern for curriculum, assessment, the schools culture and values, role of parents and the community. Above all, school leadership should be focused on improving learning through developing better teaching, as teachers are the most powerful influence on student learning. Good leadership is a necessary condition for educational excellence and best schools understand the difference between leadership and management, viewing leadership as a process rather than a position of authority. Great leaders get the best out of the system by setting, implementing, monitoring, reviewing and refining goals, practices and policies so that student learning outcomes continuously improve. Lead-ership also involves, in the words of educationist-author Geoff Southworth, (Looking into Primary Headship) lib-eration of talent. Teachers and students, fully supported, are leadership resources of enor-mous power and potential. For this reason, leadership is best viewed as a collective respons-ibility and widely distributed. Accountability and standards are, of course, critical. School evaluation practices, teacher appraisal and prof-essional development systems need to reflect the complex nature of the educational process and involve teachers as reflective practitioners conscious of their role in improving both their own and institutional practice. Involvement breeds confidence, commitment, ownership and dignity and can result in raising a wide range of educational standards as well as creating a culture of excellence based on the needs of the school at that particular time. All leadership is situational; inexperienced teachers need more directed support from experienced colleagues, and progress needs to be benchmarked to meaningful targets with individuals held to account. While every school is unique and leadership should ideally come from within, there is particular value in sharing practice and experience with schools supporting each other as critical friends. One example of an initiative that focuses on developing networks and the capacity for school leadership is Leadership for Learning (LfL) at the University of Cambridge faculty of education. This is a vibrant network concerned with learning, leadership and their inter-relationship. LfL has developed a framework of ideas, principles and processes which have been successful in different contexts worldwide and which are currently being piloted by nine schools using educational programmes and qualifications designed by Cambridge International Examinations (CIE), with a view to wider participation in the future. LfL practice is based on the following beliefs: • Learning and leadership are a shared enterprise, as much as an individual one • Leadership should be ‘distributed and exercised at every level • Collaborative modes of working strengthen teams and individuals • An independent, critical perspective, informed by research…