Title - An Interpretive Case Study of Distributed Leadership in a Welsh Primary School Background - This paper explores the model of distributed leadership operating within a Welsh primary school from the perspective of a selection of staff working in the school. The school was chosen because the head teacher had stated that the school operated a model of distributed leadership, a model which is advocated in the Welsh School Effectiveness Framework (NAW, 2008). In order to investigate "How is leadership distributed at Fox Primary School", the research design of this dissertation explores the distribution of leadership throughout the environment and people of the organisation. To address the overarching research question two specific research sub-questions are addressed in this dissertation. These are: 1. Who performs leadership roles at Fox Primary School? 2. How is leadership coordinated and aligned at Fox Primary School? Methods - Data collection took place in three phases. Phase one consisted of the collection of internal documents, including school improvement plans and staffing structures, and external reports by Investors in People and Estyn in order to gather a environmental context in which the staff who work in the school operate. Phase two consisted of individual semi-structured interviews with the head teacher, deputy head teacher, school business manager and a teaching assistant. Phase three consisted of a focus group interview with three class teachers, the school business manager and a teaching assistant. The interview and focus group data, which were gathered to explore the perceptions of leadership operation in the school, were analysed using Nvivo 9 software. Conclusions - The research concluded that, based on the perceptions of a sample of staff from within Fox Primary School, the practice of distributed leadership is less than expected, given the head teacher's initial statement that the school operated a model of distributed leadership, and that its implementation is constrained by the requirement that the school meet externally imposed aims relating to pupil outcomes in literacy and numeracy. This conclusion is based on key findings which indicate that the focus of leadership activity is influenced by Government; that the role of the head teacher remains significant even through leadership is distributed; that opportunities for enactment of distributed leadership between governors and staff is limited; and that staff vary in their perceptions of the value and opportunity for informal leadership by parents. However, it was found that the alignment and coordination of leadership is supported through a combination of traditional hierarchical structures and novel flattened structures for curriculum development. The curriculum development structures and the school's school improvement planning processes support the distribution of leadership throughout the school community, although the foci of the school improvement plan are significantly influenced by Government.

This thesis investigates workplace learning for new and established leaders in an English primary school. The study uses an ethnographic linguistic approach to explore the workplace learning environment and develops a conceptual framework that examines boundary construction, performance spaces and genres of organizational talk. This framework draws on Hernes (2003) to assess organizational boundaries, sociological and psychological concepts which take account of space and a Bakhtinian theory of language to understand genres. Using this framework the study investigates the way that the five formal leaders of a 350 pupil semi-rural primary school are able to learn to lead as part of their working lives. The methods used included interviews, participant observation, concept mapping,group discussions and attendance at the INSET training days and management team meetings taking place within the school. The study took place over one school year (September to July). The study illuminates the ways in which learning to lead was dominated by the local environment. Planned learning within the school was related to the organizational concerns of the headteacher and her perceptions of vulnerability and risk associated with opening the boundaries around and within the school. The school was assessed as having a restrictive learning environment, using Fuller and Unwin’s (2003) expansive – restrictive continuum, but this planned strategy by the headteacher aimed to ensure that fast, immersive learning could take place. Use of a limited range of genres of organizational talk also shaped the way in which learning took place, privileging process knowledge (Eraut 2004). The thesis proposes that boundaries, spaces and genres need to be considered together when considering the workplace as a learning environment.

The aim of this thesis is to cast light on the neglected ‘walking phenomenon’ (Morton, 2002) of women’s uneven participation in Cyprus primary school management and to investigate the reasons causing it. More specifically, the research offers insights into women’s experiences of progressing to and experiencing primary school principalship in Cyprus from 1961 to 2010; examines whether and to what extent these experiences have changed over the last five decades; and maps the reasons women leaders provide for their disproportionate representation in principalship over this period. Underpinned by the principle of ‘fitness for purpose’ (Cohen et al., 2007), the interpretive paradigm, a qualitative approach (narrative inquiry), snowball sampling, semi-structured in-depth narrative interviewing of 23 retired and in-service women principals as well as thematic analysis are adopted. With regard to women’s experiences of progressing to principalship, the findings suggest that women educators in primary education between 1961 and 2010 had generally been non-leadership oriented; had followed fairly unplanned occupational trajectories; and thus had needed external encouragement to enhance their confidence and set themselves on the pathway to principalship. Participants had been fairly unaware of discriminatory dynamics during the interview for promotion. In terms of women’s experiences of principalship, the outcomes indicate that, despite a growing positive ethos, stereotypical preconceptions identified in the school, community and family contexts regarding women in leadership posts – particularly of younger age – persist. The comparison of women’s experiences of progressing to and experiencing primary school principalship in Cyprus between 1961 and 2010 reveals comparable conducive and/or impeding impacts on women’s advancement as well as on their leadership role as such, throughout the period under consideration. A range of reasons for women’s disproportionate representation in primary school principalship are proposed by narrators that fall in three intersected levels coined in this thesis: a) the Macro level: Socio-cultural barriers, b) the Meso level: Institutional barriers and c) the Micro level: Personal/Psychological barriers. Some implications for theory, policy and practice are provided and recommendations for future research are proposed.

This thesis aims to privilege the voices of principals and teachers by interrogating their experiences and perceptions of the new phenomenon of school inspection (SI) in primary schools in St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG). The study also investigates how SI helps in understanding teaching and learning and leadership and management. Additionally, it looks at the implementation of the inspection recommendations and the challenges surrounding their implementation. I did this study out of an intrinsic interest in SI. It was a qualitative case study within the constructivist/interpretive paradigm. It utilised one-on-one interviews, documents, and observations to gather data. I used a postcolonial framework, a review of literature on SI, teaching and learning, leadership and management, and Ehren and Visscher’s theory of SI, as the main means, to analyse the findings. The study finds that accountability and school improvement are among the main experiences and perceptions of SI. There is unanimous agreement with its implementation, although there was some dissatisfaction with the top-down manner in which policymakers implemented it. SI has the potential to lead to school improvement, however, there are instances in which it results in negative unintended consequences on school staff. SI reveals leadership and management in primary schools is ineffective for the most part. However, there is some degree of evidence that leadership and management can make a difference in primary schools operating in challenging circumstances. Traditional teacher-centred methods dominate the teaching and learning process. The study also reveals that the implementation of inspection recommendations is limited to those that are easy to implement. Challenges, mainly from within the schools, exist to implementing those recommendations that are likely to have the greatest impact on change. There are ways in which SI may be enacted to fit the context of primary schools in SVG.

This thesis seeks to increase understanding as to how primary school principals in Israel perceive the impact of school-based management on their leadership practices. The argument underpinning the thesis is that school principals represent the interface between policy makers and policy implementation and as such are the key players in educational reform. This is an interpretive qualitative study, using the collective case study approach. Fifteen in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with twelve primary school principals, leading schools which had undergone a transition to school-based management in a large urban location in Israel. Data were analysed using both a categorical and a contextual approach in order to reach an understanding of the individual principals' perceptions as well as viewing them as a group. The findings reveal that principals are in a transitional stage in educational leadership and are facing new challenges. These are presented through six core themes: autonomy trust the corrupting nature of power unclear lines of responsibility work overload and stress and leadership beyond school boundaries. A conceptual framework is developed which underscores principals' differential responses to these challenges. This study validates findings of previous studies and offers two new insights into principals' perceptions of their leadership roles. The first is a perception of an erosion of trust across all levels of the education system. The second is a dilemma between autonomy, power and corruption. The typology developed in this thesis to represent principals' differential responses to school-based management provides a broad conceptual framework to underpin further research into principals' perceptions of their leadership roles.

The status of special measures has been an outcome of school inspection for more than a decade. This study contributes to understanding the leading of primary schools through and beyond that outcome. Through self-perception, headteachers examine the relationship and interplay between their leadership and their schools' cultures. The study focuses on the agency of leadership through a process of change, so generating propositional ideas that extend the current theoretical framework. Two cultural typologies are identified that are specifically associated with this status. One is encountered at the outset of the journey of special measures and represents the root of the predicament. The other represents the cultural territory of schools that have moved beyond special measures. The study finds special measures to be an episodic journey of change. So doing it identifies three distinctive phases (the last divided into sub-phases representing an increasing complexity). In each the theme of culture and leadership is explored through the application of a conceptual model. These are configured to demonstrate the necessary dynamic for the formulation and transformation of schools' cultures. The differing and adaptive manifestations of phase-specific leadership are respectively described as: leading through cultural dissonance, leading counter-culturally, and leading through cultural congruence. The literature review identifies three conceptual orientations of leadership, each accordingly being related to special measures. These are technical-rational, transformational and critical forms of leadership. Each is seen as making a contribution at some point and to some degree through the course of the journey. The study, moreover, presents a conceptualisation of headship based on school context and circumstance - style, approach and theoretical positioning. This formulation emphasises the appropriateness of the leadership practice offered at given moments. However, the overall success of moving beyond special measures lies in each school's capacity for journeying through the phases to a position of cultural congruence.

This thesis explores Assistant Principals' perceptions of their professional learning and learning experiences as Middle Leaders in Irish Post-primary schools. The purpose of the study is to gain insights into and an understanding of the key enablers and inhibitors of Assistant Principals' learning, an area hitherto ignored in the Irish education research context. The study aims to contribute to the qualitative knowledge base on Assistant Principals' learning and to inform Irish discourse and policy with regard to the continuing professional development of this group of educators in Irish post-primary schools. The literature called upon is found within the fields of teacher professionalism, adult learning, and continuing professional development. It serves the dual purpose of shaping the data generated in the study and of providing a theoretical lens through which data are interrogated. Using qualitative methodology, the empirical investigation is based on semi-structured interviews with 21 Assistant Principals, incorporating the range of Irish post-primary schools, both religious and state run, both genders and a range of experience in the role. With regard to this area of professional learning, the findings are significant in that they have disrupted a prevailing silence and have made overt issues hitherto neglected in the Irish education context. They pose a range of challenges to our understanding of the complexity of Assistant Principals' learning. They highlight that Assistant Principals' learning is haphazard, time-poor, emotionally charged and neglected both by themselves and the system. The roles of school culture, school leadership and emotions emerge as significant variables which impact on Assistant Principals' learning. The outcomes of the study are challenging for Assistant Principals as professional learners, for their school communities as enablers and supporters of their learning and for those charged locally and nationally with overseeing and developing a learning agenda for middle leadership in Irish post-primary schools.

This thesis explores, documents and analyses the actions of a leader, sustained by the belief that developments in Early Years practice are more successfully embedded when practitioners are part of a learning community within which they are able to critically explore, test and apply theories, concepts and strategies. It is based upon the pedagogical observation that those involved in leading the learning need to be active participants in the process, surfacing and collaboratively exploring their tacit knowledge through practice-based research as part of everyday practice. This qualitative, case-study research project examines a leadership approach within a multifunctional Children’s Centre with a multiprofessional team over six and a half years. Action-based research - defined by Reason & Bradbury (2001) as a process in which individuals work co-operatively in order to find solutions for issues pertinent to them - has been used to study the development of Systemic Leadership through engaging practitioners in practice-based research. ‘Practice-based research’ is used in this study to describe practitioners’ engagement as action researchers, engaging with theory and becoming involved in developing theory through actively researching their practice. Leadership is viewed as a continuous process of learning from action based research, and as such it: • explores a commitment to developing and sustaining a learning organisation in which staff are supported to reflect individually and cooperatively about their work with children, families and the community in order to be aware of themselves and their learning capacity as individuals and as part of a team • analyses and documents the experience and learning of a leader in a complex and value-driven organisation, seeking to develop a democratic, systemic leadership model of collaborative practice-based research • explores the complexities of the organisation and the implications of maximising practitioners’ capacities to be curious about their work and open to feedback, using practice-based research groups to explore their inner worlds and review their values and assumptions • analyses individual and organisational shifts in values, self-awareness and self-knowledge, including practitioners’ capacity to theorise and weave theory into practice • assesses the impact of co-operative practice-based research on professional development.

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This study investigates factors that help and hinder primary schools in their distribution of leadership in England. Distributed leadership is defined as collaborative leadership within a culture of shared action and interaction. The research extends beyond teacher leadership and delegated leadership, which are limitations of previous studies, whilst contributing to the developing knowledge of distributed leadership practice in the UK- about which little has been previously written. Ofsted reports and LA recommendations were used to select four primary schools within North East Lincolnshire. Schools selected were identified as good schools and believed to distribute leadership. Using a mixed methods approach, 53 questionnaires were analysed using SPSS, to screen two schools for further study. These schools were further investigated using a multiple case study design. Semi structured interviews were conducted with two primary headteachers, one deputy and one assistant head, two teachers and two teaching assistants, enabling the researcher to consider the interactions and analysis of leadership practice at group level, and the complexities of the situation. A narrow research focus on four primary schools, and subsequent interviews with eight stakeholders in two schools is a very small sample size, and indicative of further study. However, the study is apposite at a time of demographic crisis in teaching in England; with 40% headteachers in primary schools over fifty and likely to retire in the next decade, the increasing numbers of part time teachers, and the increased number and extended use of teaching assistants in primary education. The study provides a framework of thinking about distributed leadership in primary schools, which at a pragmatic level might help other schools in the development and sustainability of leadership. This framework includes: processes, school culture, structural organisation of schools, sources of leadership, and barriers to distributed leadership. Findings show that whilst all collaborative leadership is distributed, not all distributed leadership is collaborative. Distributed leadership was found to exist alongside other forms of leadership, and although it was frequently planned, it sometimes occurred by default or through desperation. It was particularly effective where schools invested in the leadership development of all stakeholders, and in a culture of trust, support and encouragement. The Senior Management Team was particularly influential within this. Barriers that inhibited distributed leadership included traditional structures and systems both within the schools and the local authority.