The trend of low-birth rate is a crisis for schools to run. Especially for the schools, the doomed disadvantaged ones, in off-shore islands in Penghu County, an archipelagic county in Taiwan, to be closed or merged could be a huge barrier for the education-development. Therefore, to think out the development model of characteristic schools, and make use of the advantages of the small-scale in schools and classes to combine the special natural environment and cultural historical resources, and then construct a special and innovation regional program in order to increase the value of education and operate marginal profits. The purpose of this study is to explore the strategies of characteristic schools¡¦ innovative management and the critical successful factors on the transforming of primary schools in Penghu County. Finally, conclusions and suggestions will be made to find other ways rather than ¡§keep¡¨ or ¡§abolish¡¨ the schools. The study uses the qualitative research with depth interviews as an applied method. We adopt the purposive sampling method, to sample from the principals, teachers (including the mainland and the off-shore islands of Penghu, and the representative areas of townships and cities), superintendents who deal with correlative affairs in educational administration organizations, the specialists and scholars. Our findings can be classified into two parts¡G 1. The critical factors of primary schools transforming into characteristic schools. i. The administration management should stress on the planning and improvement of software and hardware. The leaders must possess the right opinions, and use strategies to cohere common consensus, to make use of teachers¡¦ specialty elastically and give rewards and punishments properly. ii. Special programs and teaching design should be planned by a professional group in an innovative way. The network information platform must be constructed and integrated with teaching. The contents of program should focus on the local characters. iii. Knowledge sharing is important. They must build a learning organization and improve their mental models. The website is the way to be used as the knowledge management platform and the professional capability could be improved by knowledge sharing and invigoration. iv. The integration of strategic alliance¡GSchools are divided by townships to form a characteristic group. The educational circles and industrial circles could become fellowship in a mutual beneficial condition. 2. The strategies of developing characteristic schools and innovation management of primary schools in Penghu County. i. The short-term target¡GThe improvement of the professional skill of teachers, the integration of human resource. ii. The mid-term target¡GTo develop a strategic alliance and construct a learning platform by network. iii. The long-term target¡GTo combine the environmental education and local cultural education and invent a special travel study model. The study also advances that the educational administration organization should subsidize to establish a group to promote the characteristic schools. The schools should become a learning organization and strengthen the strategic alliance between schools. The principal should have a innovative management opinion and to teach by personal example.

Thesis (EdD.)--Open University.

Vision and mission statements are developed by schools to give purpose and direction to all those who work in these institutions. They also articulate the values that the organisation endeavours to promote. This case study demonstrates how an independent school fosters values in the vision and mission statement through curriculum implementation. The school offers a values education programme in conjunction with the National Curriculum Statement. This is done through the example of the English curriculum in a primary school. The challenge for the National Curriculum Statement is how to promote the goals and values of social justice, equity and democracy, by integrating them across the curriculum. The Department of Education views values development as being crucial for the personal development of the students and to ensure that a South African identity is built on values different from the apartheid era (Department of Education, 2002). The school therefore has an important role to play not only in the development of knowledge and skills of their students, but also the development of values. This study adopts a qualitative approach which is located in the interpretative paradigm. A case study approach using multiple methods of data production was used. Document analysis, observations and semi-structured interviews were used to gather rich data. The vision and mission statement of the school was analysed to determine what values are articulated in it. Six comprehension lessons of three teacher participants were observed and a semi-structured interview was conducted with each teacher to determine what values are fostered through the teaching of English. The findings revealed that the values articulated in the school’s mission statement played a pivotal role in teaching. There was a strong relationship between the values in the mission statement and teaching of English. Teachers were successful in eliciting values during their teaching by using a variety of strategies, creating a positive classroom atmosphere and being acutely aware of the importance of being good role models. The training and support received by the teachers enhanced the fostering of values. In spite of the fact that the teachers were not involved in developing the school’s vision and mission statement which was the ideology of the organisation that started and manages the school, their belief in the values programme motivated its successful implementation. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Edgewood, 2011.

The study explores communication links existing in the management of primary schools in Lesotho. The frequency of the links as well as the content and channels used in the transmission of messages between the principals, advisory school committees and management committees were investigated. The Lesotho primary education management system involves the principals, advisory school committees and management committees. Management committees in Lesotho manage all primary schools under their jurisdiction. Principals manage schools on daily basis on behalf of the management committees. Advisory school committees advise the management committees on all matters relating to education. Questionnaires, interviews and school record books were the research tools used in this study. The responses revealed that links exist between the above bodies even though the links are inadequate in most instances. The way through which messages are sent vary from link to link but most of the links are in the form of meetings. These meetings are often below the stipulated number in the country's Education Act. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of Natal, 2002.

This is a detailed study of the values embodied in and transmitted by state primary schools in New Zealand between 1890 and 1914. After describing the creation of a network of primary schools and the means by which regular attendance was secured it describes the schools' role in fostering the conventional virtues and certain widely held social attitudes through the "hidden curriculum", through school discipline, and through teachers' example. The social and moral content of schoolwork is then analysed with particular attention to what was said about New Zealand itself and about Maoris and racial differences. A detailed examination is made of a number of attempts to enlist the schools in particular social and moral causes: religious education, temperance, the inculcation of patriotism, sex education, military training, "correct" speech, and secular moral instruction. The closing chapters consider the differential impact of schooling and credentialling on children from different social classes and on boys and girls. This study draws on a wide variety of sources and makes extensive use of a large collection of school texts of the period~ The values schools transmitted reflected a middle class consensus, not seriously challenged by workers. The content of schooling was chiefly contested by middle class groups seeking to purify and improve the existing social order. Middle class groups were ambivalent towards the emergence of a distinctive national identity, but the schools fostered, often as unintended consequences, certain aspects of national identity.

Worldwide, education systems have undergone unprecedented change due to a variety of economic, social, and political forces (Limerick, Cunnington & Crowther, 2002). The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is no exception. Continuous educational reform at primary and secondary levels in Mainland China has created new challenges and accountabilities for school principals. The important role of principals in primary and secondary schools has been acknowledged in both policy documents and the broader literature (Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, 1985; F. Chen, 2005; Chu, 2003; W. Huang, 2005; T. Wang, 2003). Yet, most of the literature on primary and secondary school principals in Mainland China is prescriptive in nature, identifying from the perspectives of researchers and academics what principals should do and how they should enact leadership. Lacking in this research is an awareness of the daily practices and lived experiences of principals. Furthermore, within the small body of writing on primary and secondary school principals in Mainland China, gender is seldom given any attention. To date, only a small number of empirical studies have focused on female principals as a specific category of research (Zen, 2004; Zhong, 2004). This study aimed to explore the professional lives of two female exemplary school principals in urban primary schools in Mainland China. A qualitative exploratory case study was used. Semi-structured interviews with each individual female principal, with six teachers in each of the school sites and with the superintendent of each principal were conducted. Field observations and document analysis were also undertaken to obtain multiple insights about their leadership practices. The conceptual framework was based largely on the theory of Gronn (1999) and incorporated five core leadership practices (vision building, ethical considerations, teaching and learning, power utilisation, and dealing with risks and challenges) taken from the wider literature. The key findings of this study were twofold. Firstly, while the five leadership practices were evident in the leadership of the two principals, this study identified some subtle differences in the way they approached each of them. Secondly, contextual factors such as Chinese traditional culture, the contemporary societal context, and the school organisational context, in addition to the biographical experiences of each principal were significant factors in shaping the way in which they exercised their leadership practices in the schools.

Thesis (M. Ed.)--University of Hong Kong, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 112-115).

Thesis (M.Ed.)--University of Hong Kong, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-115). Also available in print.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Melbourne, School of Philosophy, Anthropology and Social Inquiry, 2010. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (p. 220-235)

This thesis was inspired by my over 20 years’ experience of inspecting schools, including as one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors from 1991 to 2000. The research’s main aims were to review the development of the criteria devised by Ofsted by which inspectors judge the quality of teaching in mainstream schools and to gain primary headteachers’ and teachers’ views on the criteria and their enactment. The thesis analyses the development of the criteria since the first Ofsted inspections in 1993, and considers possible influences of government policies and educational research. I interviewed three former and one current HMI to explore their perspectives about the development of the criteria, and ten primary headteachers and pairs of teachers from their schools to hear their views. I applied Bourdieu’s thinking tools of habitus and field to interpret the roles of the different actors involved in the preparation and enactment of the teaching criteria. The findings suggest a hierarchy in what I have called the ‘field of inspection’, with HMI wielding significant symbolic capital because of their role as authors of the criteria and overseers of quality. Since 2012, the combination of a new HMCI and government has thrown the quality of teaching into the limelight, raised the stakes of the Ofsted outcome for schools and resulted in much public criticism of Ofsted inspections. Ofsted has responded to criticism over the years resulting in frequent changes to the inspection guidance and criteria, but the language of the criteria remains imprecise and open to interpretation. The thesis concludes that the frequent changes reflect what Bourdieu called ‘misrecognition’ by Ofsted of the significance of the inspection outcome to schools and the lengths that headteachers and teachers are prepared to go to get a ‘good Ofsted outcome’.