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Given the significant influence of managerial reforms in education fields, how to promote teacher professionalism appears to be a priority task for school leaders. This study examined the mediation role of teacher recognition on the association between transformative leadership and teacher professionalism. From a sample of 1196 primary and secondary school teachers nested in 98 schools from mainland China, this study used the multilevel structuration equation model to explore the associations among the study variables on both the teacher level and school level simultaneously. On the teacher level, the results showed that transformative leadership was positively related to teacher professionalism and verified the mediation role of teacher recognition for social esteem. On the school level, transformative leadership was associated with teacher professionalism through the mediation role of recognition for care. This study suggests that transformative leadership may influence teacher professionalism via teacher recognition on both individual and school levels, while the influence mechanism could be different. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The purpose of this paper is to identify teacher-level latent profiles of open innovation mindset and explore how these profiles moderate the effects of leader-member exchange on their exploitation and exploration activities. We also aim to investigate the indirect effects of principal transformational leadership on exploration activities via leader-member exchange. Research Design: Using a sample of 3,075 teachers working in 261 schools from 12 provinces across Türkiye, this study, first, employed a moderation analysis with latent profiles variables and, second, conduct a two-level structural equation model. Findings: Latent profile analysis produced three types of teacher mindset profiles: growth, average, and fixed. Findings indicate the quality of the dyadic exchange with the school principal did not influence engagement in exploitation activities of teachers with a growth mindset, whereas it contributed to the exploration activities of those teachers. Our results showed that when teachers perceived that their principal exhibited a higher level of transformational leadership behavior, they were more likely to have a higher leader-member exchange, which in turn increased the teachers’ exploration behavior. Implications: This study highlights both exploitative and explorative activities are facilitated by high-quality work-related social processes within the school, and we need to recognize affective and relational contexts in the schools, as they are primarily social institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: While integrated leadership has received significant scholarly attention in the past decade, most existing research in this vein has focused on its impact on student achievement and often dismissed how it might be related to instructional practices, which are at the center of many school reforms. In this research, we examined the relationship between integrated leadership and teacher professional learning and teacher practices in Turkey, where educational policy makers have recently introduced several school reform initiatives. More specifically, we aimed to examine the moderating function of transformational leadership in the relationship between instructional leadership and teacher practices, with an emphasis on the mediating role of teacher professional learning. Research Design: We conducted this study with a cross-sectional design and moderated mediation model. Data collected from 616 teachers working in a mix of primary and secondary schools in Turkey were analyzed using structural equation modeling and bootstrapping tests. Findings: We found evidence that transformational leadership acted as a moderator of the indirect effect of principal instructional leadership on teachers' instructional practices through teacher professional learning. Implications: This study adds to the accumulated body of knowledge on the effects of school leadership by concluding that the effect of instructional leadership on teacher learning and practice is contingent upon the extent to which principals enact transformational leadership. School principals who adopt a more comprehensive leadership approach that combines instructional leadership and transformational leadership practices can maximize their effects on student achievement through teacher learning, and better address the ever-growing demands of educational reforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Instructional leadership has been identified as a key responsibility of principals who achieve promising results for school improvement. This study investigated how the national context has influenced the adoption of instructional leadership as a defining role responsibility for Israeli principals. Research Methods: Participants in this qualitative study consisted of a diverse sample of 46 Israeli principals, broadly representative of the larger body of school principals in Israel. Data were collected through both interviews and focus groups. Data analysis proceeded in a four-stage process that involved condensing, coding, categorizing, and theorizing from the interview data. Findings: Findings identified three sociocultural norms that shaped principal adoption of instructional leadership in their role set: low power distance, clan culture, and incomplete identification of principals (and teachers) with their schools' academic missions. These contextual cohering forces led principals to resist new, formally defined policy expectations of their role as instructional leaders. Implications: This study's findings reinforce arguments that propose national context as an underserved theoretical lens for understanding differences in principals' practices across different societies. The findings suggest that despite increasing global acceptance of instructional leadership, its implementation in practice is inevitably shaped by the institutional policies and cultural values of different societies. Even when a "generic" model of instructional or transformational leadership is adopted by policy makers, there will be a process of mutual adaptation during implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Despite occasional claims for the coexistence of transformational leadership and instructional leadership in schools, the literature is dominated by views supporting an "either/or" orientation. This is especially true in the wake of recent findings that instructional leadership has a greater impact on student learning. This study, going beyond simply evaluating whether these two modes of leadership complement or contradict each other, explores how they may intersect in complex and nuanced ways. Specifically, I examine the moderating effect of transformational leadership on the impact of instructional leadership on student outcomes. Research Design : A questionnaire, composed of items to measure instructional and transformational leadership, student outcomes, school background factors, and informant's demographic variables, was sent to the vice-principals in Hong Kong schools. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to factor out the effect of informants' personal and school factors on leadership perception and student outcomes in the testing of the moderating effect. Findings : With evidence drawn from 177 aided schools, this study confirms the moderating effect of transformational leadership through the identification of a disparity in the effect of instructional leadership on student outcomes corresponding to disparate levels of transformational leadership enactment in schools. Implications : The effect of instructional behaviors on student outcomes is considered to be situationally contingent on the extent of transformational behavior enactment. Despite its lack of a direct impact on student outcomes, transformational leadership serves as a necessary, although insufficient, condition for the effective implementation of instructional monitoring measures. Limitations of the study are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This review study aims to bridge neuroscience and educational leadership by exploring the neural mechanisms of the constructs relevant to educational leadership. Research Methods: The reviewed literature includes 69 neuroscience studies and 4 books on neuroscience. The brain activities and neurotransmitters associated with the constructs pertinent to educational leadership were coded to bridge the knowledge base of neuroscience and educational leadership. Findings: The neural mechanisms of the constructs related to educational leadership (e.g., vision, charisma, trust, and organizational justice) were organized by four different leadership approaches: charismatic, transformational, destructive, and culturally responsive school leadership. Emotions are the common thread weaving through all four leadership approaches. Implications: This study has salient theoretical, methodological, and practical implications for educational leadership. Theoretically, the findings not only accentuate the role of emotions in educational leadership, but also reveal the trade-off between emotions and analytical calculation in leaders' decision making. Methodologically, the neuroscience methods (e.g., functional magnetic resonance imaging, quantitative electroencephalography, and hormonal analysis) add to the methodological repertoire of educational leadership research. Practically, the findings warrant the emotion training and present the potential of using neurological measurements in school leadership preparation and professional development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This article explores the effects of sensemaking interventions on a group of educators’ race-conscious problem analysis of racial discipline disparities. Research Method: I conducted this research in a predominantly White diversifying suburban high school that served roughly1,600 students. To understand how sensemaking interventions shaped teachers’ racial ways of knowing, I conducted an ethnographic content analysis of 14 transcribed teacher focus group and data retreat exchanges to identify conversational patterns related to their problem framings. Findings: I found that providing diverse data types reflecting a range of racial perspectives offered cues that enabled organizational members to notice and (partially) disrupt the personal and organizational racism and race-evasive tendencies that drive the reproduction of racial inequities in school discipline. Implications for Research and Practice: Offering teachers sensemaking opportunities that prompt collective racial awareness and critical self-reflection can instigate shifts in racial ways of knowing that are critical to understanding and addressing discipline culture and climate problems in racially diversifying schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This article illustrates how successful leaders combine the too often dichotomized practices of transformational and instructional leadership in different ways across different phases of their schools’ development in order to progressively shape and “layer” the improvement culture in improving students’ outcomes. Research Methods: Empirical data were drawn from a 3-year mixed-methods national study (“Impact Study”) that investigated associations between the work of principals in effective and improving primary and secondary schools in England and student outcomes as defined (but not confined) by their national examination and assessment results over 3 years. The research began with a critical survey of the extant literature, followed by a national survey that explored principals’ and key staff’s perceptions of school improvement strategies and actions that they believed had helped foster better student attainment. This was complemented by multiperspective in-depth case studies of a subsample of 20 schools. Findings: The research provides new empirical evidence of how successful principals directly and indirectly achieve and sustain improvement over time through combining both transformational and instructional leadership strategies. The findings show that schools’ abilities to improve and sustain effectiveness over the long term are not primarily the result of the principals’ leadership style but of their understanding and diagnosis of the school’s needs and their application of clearly articulated, organizationally shared educational values through multiple combinations and accumulations of time and context-sensitive strategies that are “layered” and progressively embedded in the school’s work, culture, and achievements. Implications: Mixed-methods research designs are likely to provide finer grained, more nuanced evidence-based understandings of the leadership roles and behaviors of principals who achieve and sustain educational outcomes in schools than single lens quantitative analyses, meta-analyses, or purely qualitative approaches. The findings themselves provide support for more differentiated, context sensitive training and development for aspiring and serving principals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study that evaluates the different types of school principals in U.S. based on their perception on leadership. The study is undertaken through the use of a latent class analysis to identify the different types of school principals in the U.S. and the administration of a Staffing Survey. The results of the study show that the difference in the types of principals were defined by educational leadership.

Background: Using meta-analytic review techniques, this study synthesized the results of 79 unpublished studies about the nature of transformational school leadership (TSL) and its impact on the school organization, teachers, and students. This corpus of research associates TSL with 11 specific leadership practices. These practices, as a whole, have moderate positive effects on a wide range of consequential school conditions. They also have moderately strong and positive effects on individual teachers’ internal states, followed by their influence on teacher behaviors and collective teachers’ internal states. TSL has small but significant positive effects on student achievement. Research Design: This synthesis of unpublished research results is accomplished by a systematic series of meta-correlations and is compared with the results of earlier systematic reviews of published TSL research. Findings: Among the conclusions arising from the study is that several of the most widely advocated models of effective educational leadership actually include many of the same practices. Conclusions: More attention by researchers, practitioners, and researchers needs to be devoted to the impact of specific leadership practices and less to leadership models. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Throughout the world, educational policy makers, practitioners, and scholars have acknowledged the importance of principal leadership in the generation and implementation of innovations. In many studies, transformational leadership has emerged as a promising approach in response to increasing demands to develop and implement innovations in schools. Although research has suggested that having access to leaders with expertise can significantly stimulate innovation, the link between transformational leadership and principals’ social network position has not yet been extensively studied. The goal of this study was to investigate the relationship between principals’ positions in their schools’ social networks in combination with transformational leadership and schools’ innovative climate. It was conducted among 702 teachers and 51 principals in 51 elementary schools in a large educational system in the Netherlands. Using social network analysis and multilevel analysis, the authors analyzed a quantitative questionnaire with social network questions on work-related and personal advice and Likert-type scales for transformational leadership and innovative climate. Findings indicated that transformational leadership was positively associated with schools’ innovative climate. Principals’ social network position, in terms of centrality, was also related to schools’ innovative climate. The more principals were sought for professional and personal advice, and the more closely connected they were to their teachers, the more willing teachers were to invest in change and the creation of new knowledge and practices. Moreover, work-related closeness centrality was found to mediate the relationship between transformational leadership and innovative climate. Implications of the study are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Transformational approaches to leadership have increasingly been advocated for schools. Research evidence suggests that the effect of leadership on student learning outcomes is mediated by school conditions such as goals, structure, people, and school culture. Using the combined approach of multilevel analysis and structural modeling, this study investigated the relationships of leadership with school learning culture. Data were collected from a random sample of 373 teachers. The results suggested relationships between leadership and school learning culture did exist, and they highlight the importance of individual principal-teacher relationships in schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]