Leadership development: A lever for system-wide educational change

Suraiya Rathankoomar Naicker ,Raj Mestry

doi:10.15700/saje.v36n4a1336

Suraiya Rathankoomar Naicker , Raj Mestry

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.15700/saje.v36n4a1336

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Abstract

The continuous poor performance of South Africa’s learners is detrimental to its developing economy. The need for education change prompted two universities to initiate a system-wide change strategy in a poorly performing school district. The leverage for change was leadership development, involving school principals and district officials. The global impetus for driving leadership development is based on the positive association between high-quality leadership and effective schools. The change strategy was a three year leadership development intervention programme. An evaluative case study was used to investigate the experiences of the participants during the implementation of the programme. Research methods included individual interviews, observation, and a survey by means of a questionnaire. Using systems theory as a theoretical framework, various disconnections were identified in the school district. These disconnections concern the interrelationships between the educational leaders which hinder organisational learning. Changing the culture of the school district through system-wide collaboration could be the key to systemic improvements. Strategies such as collective capacity building, joint problem-solving, networking and system leadership, might provide the essential ‘glue’ for strengthening the interconnections within the school district. Keywords: collective capacity building; district officials; education change; educational leadership; leadership development; principals; school district; system leadership; system-wide change

Highlights

South Africa is a developing economy that is in a transitional period to a fully-fledged democracy since the demise of apartheid in 1994
These results present a bleak future for the South African economy and society, since a nation’s education system influences the strength of its economy and society (Levin, 2012)
The key research question is: what can be learnt about the implementation of a leadership development intervention programme based on system-wide change strategy? The sub-questions are: what are the experiences of the participants; what were the strengths and challenges of the programme; and, what can be learnt about the system-wide change process in a school district? The aim of our research was to explore and evaluate the implementation of a leadership development intervention programme based on a system-wide change strategy

Summary

Introduction

South Africa is a developing economy that is in a transitional period to a fully-fledged democracy since the demise of apartheid in 1994. The extent of South Africa’s education woes is explicated by Spaull (2013:3), who states that does the country have the “worst education system of all middle-income countries that participate in cross national assessments”, but that the country performs “worse than many low-income African countries”. As a result of having no further education post-secondary schooling, learners in the 18 to 24 year age category, are at an economic disadvantage and face a high likelihood of unemployment (Spaull, 2013). This is a dark period in South Africa’s history, which challenges the agency of school leaders to bring about change in the academic performance of learners

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