School Leadership
Educational leadership is a challenging field. School leadership brings efficiency in all forms of school activities. School leaders are the administrative and academic chief of schools. The development and progress of school relies on the qualities and initiatives taken by the school leaders. School leaders are expected to develop learning communities, build the professional capacity of teachers, deal with parents, take collaborative and consultative decision making, resolve conflicts, supervise teaching and learning in schools etc.
Leadership has to interact both the external and internal world. Leadership itself means change in society. It is concerned with purpose, values, culture, history, mission, etc. These include re-engineering mechanism, a focus on quality management, strategic planning, financial accounting and technology transfer.
School education institutions are one of the oldest institutions in the world and responsible in the socio-economic development of the society. Leadership approach is a product of history and culture that is clearly seen in Chandragupta Maurya’s regime.
School leaders have to do multiple roles. They have to play the role of an academic, personnel and financial manager. Most of the head teachers in Indian school also teach in the classrooms.
In a fast changing scenario, school educations are compared in financial support, quality and efficiency of institution. In fact, it is to test managerial ability thereby realized the school education. For institutional management and leadership, entirely dependency on the government is not necessary.
In the age of urbanization and globalization, principals are in the real driver seat to improve the teaching system and atmosphere in the schools. He has to play the role of educational visionaries, curriculum leaders, assessment experts, public relations experts, budget analysts, special programme administrators etc. He should have the ability of negotiating conflicting interests of parents, teachers and students.
The role that leadership can play in shaping institutional change is emerging as a central concern for institutional managers as well as policy makers. In other words, transformative leadership is about devising strategies that will facilitate effective institutional leadership and management in the context of a professional culture is the urgent need for harnessing the potentialities of the new generation.