The Developing Role of the Headteacher in English Schools:

Abstract

This article argues that, at a time of extensive educational reform in England and Wales, some headteachers are developing pragmatic response strategies to mandated change, and drawing eclectically on a range of management and leadership traditions to maintain institutional equilibrium and preserve valued educational philosophy and practice. Of particular interest is evidence that heads’ efforts to incorporate imposed educational policies into their schools’ practices do not necessarily involve the abandonment of strongly held ideological positions, even when these appear to be threatened by such policy. The ideological and managerial positionings of headteachers are, it is argued, more complex and less ‘determined’ than is sometimes suggested in the literature.