Educational leadership
Key
to success for a school/academic institution
By
Anil Kumar Gupta
M.Com. M.A. (Economics).
M. Lib & I Sc. DCA. M.A.
(English Literature)
Regional Incentive Awardee 2014
Librarian
KVS
Significance of Educational Leadership:-
There is great
interest in educational leadership in the early part of the 21st century
because of the widespread belief that the quality of leadership makes a
significant difference to school and student outcomes. There is also increasing
recognition that schools require effective leaders and managers if they are to
provide the best possible education f or their learners. Schools need trained
and committed teachers but they, in turn, need the leadership of highly
effective principals and support from other senior and middle managers. While
the need for effective leaders is widely acknowledged, there is much less
certainty about which leadership behaviors are most likely to produce
favourable outcomes. I examine the theoretical underpinning s for the field of
educational leadership and management, assess different leadership mode ls, and
discuss the evidence of their relative effectiveness in developing successful
schools.
Educational
Leadership requires a lot capabilities. This enables the success of an academic
institution. The primary purpose of
educational leadership is to ensure academic success through process, material
and training improvements. This
is mainly accomplished through collaboration with different individuals, such
as educators, parents, students, policy makers and the people of the locality. From
a business perspective, educational leadership is a form of academic management
and quality control. A successful leader
should be contemporary in all respect. He/she should be sincere, dedicated,
courageous, and passionate for work, hardworking, knowledgeable, and resilient
and should be capable about learning theories and child psychology and
development. He/she should be able to work in a team with all kinds of people.
He/she must be positive in all respect, credible, caring, charismatic,
compassionate and inspirational. He/she should be soft spoken and respecting
every individual.
He/she
must be capable to know other’s caliber and efficiencies. He/she must be known
to delegate the work for smooth functioning of the institution. Educational
leadership is centered on certain key principles. First, educational leadership
creates a vision of academic success for all students. This is important
because there has always been a historical gap between students on different
socio-economical levels and high and low achieving students. Second,
educational leadership strives to maintain a safe and receptive learning
environment. That is, a healthy school environment is key to providing
comfortable, orderly and structured classrooms. Third, educational leadership
delegates responsibility to others. This means that teachers, parents and even
students are empowered to take responsibility and accept accountability.
Fourth, instructional methods and curriculum content must be continually updated
and improved as per the needs of the contemporary educational scenario. Fifth,
the field of education must borrow and adapt modern management tools, processes
and techniques to meet modern approaches.
What Successful
school leaders do?
@ They provide clear aims and goal to reach.
@ They put in place
sound approaches that enables teachers and students to observe learning process
and the steps required to meet learning aims.
@ They communicate
the vision of the institution clearly to students, parents and teaching faculty
with other staff members.
@ They create
positive environment for all.
@ They foster and
promote a culture of trust and sharing of ideas and thoughts for the betterment
of the institution.
@ They recognize that
teaching and learning is their main objective and main objective of the
institution.
@ They are well
informed in their actions by principles of doing what is right.
@ They foster
standards of teaching and learning that are high and attainable.
@ They spent time in
the classroom to interact with students and observing teachers.
These were some of
the features of a successful school leader. If these are considered success is
sure.
Educational
leadership needs the followings:-
·
For school leadership community of
learners must be created. This will create a better scenario of learning among
students, teachers and colleagues. Positive relationship may be built among the
learners.
·
For a successful institution this is
very important that they have to take care of their celebrations, traditions,
culture and programmes. These must be maintained in all respect. These
traditions help the next authority who joins the institution later.
·
To achieve high expectations from staff
and students one thing must be taken care of that the traditions they follow
must be obeyed in all respect. This requires high level of motivation for both
staff and students.
·
It should be noticed by the authority
that the faculty is enough capable to hold teaching learning process in a
fruitful manner so that students may be benefited. They must be provided with
all sorts of requirements. They must be well equipped and less interfere of the
authorities to their work. Proper infrastructure may be provided to inculcate better
educational leadership.
·
To maintain educational leadership this
is very important that work or responsibilities or power must be delegated, so
that less stress may be there on individual’s shoulder. School Principal may play a very vital role in
this regard. One event manager must be there in every school, so that teaching
learning process may go on smoothly.
·
To create active participation
school/institution leader may announce on monthly basis incentives as “sincere
employee of the month”. Process of selection of such candidate may be
transparent in all respect.
·
Role of leader of the institution/school
is very important in respect to visibility and accessibility of the staff for
active participation in teaching learning process. He/she should be socially
and morally attached with all the staff members. He/she should not rely on one
or two of the staff members specifically. Less time may be consumed by the
teaching faculty to perform their duties, it should be sincerely taken care of.
·
Workshops may be organized on various
contents time to time to enrich skills of the teaching staff to meet modern
approach of teaching and learning. Contemporary approach of teaching learning
process may be maintained an all respect.
·
To resolve every minute problem of every
child, teaching staff may be trained to deal with such matters sympathetically
and with positive approach.
·
To meet the objectives of the
institution, team spirit may be inculcated among all the members. This will create
positive and healthy environment.
·
A leader identify methods to energize your staff towards the
creation of efficient and effective organizations.
.
A leader must develop a personal leadership philosophy and plan.
·
A leader should analyze the leadership
practices and philosophies of current
and former organizational leaders.
Educational
leadership and management are two different things. Managerial skill is totally
different from the skills of educational leadership. Managerial part is
observed by the educational leader in a school or in an academic institution.
Educational leadership require better skills for smooth
functioning of the school. A leader should be energetic, punctual, resourceful, positive,
skillful, working with team work, enthusiastic, socially, ethically and morally
sound. Educational leader should be capable to hold the standards, the
challenges and complexities of principalship, school reforms and require
exceptional coping skills.
On the basis of above mentioned information we can conclude that
educational leadership plays a very vital role in today’s school education.
Reference: -
1. Educational
leadership and management: theory, policy, and practice BY Tony Bush tony.bush@ntlworld.com.
South African Journal of Education Copyright © 2007 EASA Vol 27(3)391–406.
2. Educational
leadership by Hiren S Parikh in The progressive teacher magazine. Vol.No.02 Issue
No.05 of November/December 2015. page.8.
3. Other articles from
Internet and other sources
4. Discussion with
colleagues
