Bringing context and educational leadership together: fostering the professional development of school principals

ABSTRACT

Policy makers increasingly acknowledge that problems and challenges arising at the school level should be resolved on site. At the same time, the political expectation to delegate more responsibility to the individual school is rather heavily contrasted with the weak knowledge about how this new public management approach can be translated into successful leadership practices. Thus, considering that there is a close relationship between context and leadership, principal preparation programmes should be guided by a deeper examination of contextual factors. Against this background, we aim to critically examine existing views of practitioners and researchers on the challenge of establishing more context-sensitive school leadership preparation programmes in an era of New Public Management in Education. In doing so, we introduce the Swedish Model of principal preparation as an example for a more context-sensitive leadership preparation program. To that end, we argue that a differentiated perspective about contextual conditions and their role as facilitators or obstacles to effective leadership must be further explored. Moreover, school leaders should be encouraged to consider the relevance of such approaches to their own needs.

KEYWORDS:

• Professional development
• school leaders
• autonomy
• context
• Sweden
• new public management
• effectiveness
• leadership preparation

1. Introduction

In recent years, a shift of perspectives can be observed internationally, about the way schools are being affected by problems which are increasingly global, and the realisation that the solutions are mainly local. Drifts in values, new technology as well as other societal changes have enhanced expectations, at the same time as policy makers acknowledge that problems and challenges which arise at the school level should be resolved on site, thus relying to a greater extent on an efficient as well as effective site-based management (Pont et al. 2008, Gurr and Drysdale 2016, Sebastian et al. 2018). This change is expected to generate or enhance strategic leadership actions, thus allowing for the design of more and better contextually-bound solutions for the respective schools. In particular, new instruments of governance are needed, which are characterised by a greater degree of autonomy and accountability. These instruments are intended to support policy-makers and school principals in terms of targeting specific aspects of school development in order to operate as quality assurance mechanisms.

At the same time, we do know that the success of leadership relies on the choice and combination of different leadership styles, as well as the specific situation and context underlying those particular combinations (Brauckmann and Pashiardis 2011, Nir and Hameiri 2014, Brezicha et al. 2015). Therefore, considering that contexts and leadership actions are intricately intertwined, leadership preparation programmes should adopt those governance principles guided by the concept of New Public Management and a stronger consideration of contextual factors such as the national and local area close to school (ACTS), which is deemed to be more promising to secure success (Schwarz and Brauckmann 2015). Moreover, the political expectation to delegate more responsibility to the individual school is rather heavily contrasted with the weak knowledge about how this new public management approach can be translated into successful leadership practices. In fact, little is known about what kind of governance mix (the interplay of autonomy and accountability), and under which conditions, leads to what kind of ‘leadership challenges’ and ‘leadership consequences’. The question of context-relevant professionalisation of school principals can be attributed to the broader context of research into effective leadership knowledge application on site. Findings from this line of research also indicate that the process of using evidence from the effective leadership paradigm is often more complex than policy makers might assume (Mowat and McMahon 2019, Hallinger 2018, Leithwood et al. 2008).

Against this background our article is based on the assumption that, in order to have comprehensive leadership preparation programmes, we need to be context-sensitive; however, this alone is not enough. Instead, leadership training and practices should be related to expected results, the process variables leading to student learning as well as the context which enables better academic results. As a consequence, a familiar problem occurs in a new context, i.e. if, and how, theoretical knowledge about effective leadership can be transformed into leadership practices which is relevant for the local school context. For quite some time now, a significant divide was observed between the acquisition of research-based leadership knowledge and its actual use on site by school principals (McCarthy 2015). Obviously there is no straightforward transfer which leads from the research-based knowledge body on effective leadership to context relevant leadership practices. These findings are supported by research on evaluation utilisation in the Anglo-American area, which is nowadays a well-established field of research with a thematically broad scope (Pannell et al. 2015, Grissom et al. 2019).

As a consequence, within this article, we aim to systemise and critically examine existing views on the challenge of establishing more context-sensitive school leadership preparation programmes in an era of new public management in Education. Their particular conceptual and procedural challenge consists, on the one hand, in being oriented towards the findings of school leadership effectiveness research and, on the other hand, address the immediate inner and outer school context, as they are perceived and experienced by the respective school principals. In an international context, little is known as to the extent of how far the content of leadership programs is being used for school context-related leadership actions (Pannell et al. 2015, Grissom et al. 2019). For instance, a way forward could be to strengthen principals’ own ability for interpretation and analyses through preparation programmes. At this point, it would be useful to explain how we use the term ‘preparation programme’ in this paper and why we tried to avoid ‘principal training’. We consider preparation to be a more inclusive term, which includes both theory and practice and it can happen either before you take the job or while on the job (as is the case in Sweden). Thus, we think of the Swedish program as a preparatory programme for principals already on the job. Training on the other hand, is a narrower term which mainly focuses on practice. As far as we know the Swedish principalship program, is more geared towards practice, however, there is quite a strong theoretical component, and this is why we prefer to use preparation instead of training. Thus, we will introduce the Swedish Model as an example for a more context sensitive leadership preparation program and will further discuss preliminary research findings from the international literature on the perception of a more context-sensitive approach. Throughout the paper, the following aspects will be addressed in particular:

1. New Public management (with a particular emphasis on the interplay between autonomy and accountability) and its impact on the understanding of leadership oriented towards (or reduced to) effectiveness and efficiency.

2. The dilemma of transferring research-based findings focusing more on output-oriented school leadership styles into a school principal`s practical leadership arsenal.

3. The way current leadership preparation programmes could be responding in a productive as well as a pragmatic way to the dilemma of being output-driven oriented and context aware; in this regard, we will focus and reflect upon experiences from the national Swedish school leadership preparation program.

2. More autonomy and responsibility as a challenge for school leaders

The demand for more school autonomy as an enabling factor in the quality development of schools and their teaching and learning received additional impulses and accentuations especially in the 1990s through modern approaches to organisational and management theory (Gobby et al. 2018). In this context, the school’s self-administration or self-regulation seems to be of great importance. Closely related to this was (and still is) the discussion about the competences and qualifications of school principals, especially as schools are increasingly asked to take on more responsibility for the learning outcomes achieved. The fact that the structure of tasks and responsibilities (sometimes inheritably) deviates from the traditional role of school management, means that (correspondingly) accentuated qualification and support measures for members of school management come more into the focus of empirical school management research (Heffernan 2018).

Bearing in mind that the state is responsible, one way or the other, for monitoring schools, the enhancement of school autonomy creates tensions in the relationships within individual schools, which are particularly experienced by school principals themselves (Langfred and Rockmann 2016). They are positioned at an interface between external and internal school environments and, according to school legislation of a particular country/jurisdiction, the school principal holds overall responsibility for the school. Moreover, it cannot be assumed that school staff and, especially, principals are always ready and willing to undertake reforms inspired by the leading ideas of New Public Management. Besides, other contextual conditions to which school leaders’ actions are subjected to are constantly changing. For instance, changing contextual conditions at the level of the individual school are characterised by the heterogeneity of the student body, a partly growing influence of parents on inner-school decision-making processes, demographic developments and associated school mergers as well as the implementation of new pedagogical concepts such as inclusion. These factors apparently require even greater sensitivity on the part of school leaders towards both the outside- as well as the in-school contexts.

Whatever the chosen model, be it through general education legislation, specific legislation or more flexible regulations, autonomy was imposed on schools in nearly all countries through legislative procedures (Schleicher 2012). Not all schools themselves did seek autonomy; the legislation included provisions for the transfer of new duties without the schools having any right to express their views on the matter (Hughes et al. 2013). In fact, oftentimes schools acquired new responsibilities against their own wishes. In addition, many management-related decisions, especially financing and staffing issues, are intricate, complex and have not taken into consideration the context of the individual school. Therefore, the expectations, alongside with the strengthening of more autonomy, changed the current professionalisation settings of school leadership in a way that the question of systematically gathered information on professionalisation and training of school leaders gains more significance. This has led to a high demand for qualification programmes and support strategies for the leaders of educational institutions which have traditionally a long history in education systems such as those of England and the USA (Ni et al. 2017, Cliffe et al. 2018).

3. School leadership preparation within different contexts – what do we know?

Not least owing to an increase in the empirical evidence base of school leadership actions as a central component of school quality assurance and development (see Robinson et al. 2008, Brauckmann and Pashiardis 2011, Ärlestig et al. 2016), many educational policy makers in Europe and beyond have developed strategies for the recruitment, selection, preparation, further qualification and support of school leaders. This was deemed necessary in order for them to professionally fulfil this new and central role of quality development and quality assurance agent (for an overview, see Lumby et al. 2008). Such strategies expect school leaders to learn leadership concepts in professional development courses, leading to modified leadership activities. Furthermore, these new leadership activities are assumed to have a positive impact on teacher professionalisation thus improving the teaching and learning that takes place in schools, at least for the interim period (Lee et al. 2012, Tran et al. 2018).

In particular, initial and further qualification measures targeting the formal professionalisation of school leadership actions concern increased demands for entering the profession (Young and Grogan 2008) and mostly the establishment of leadership academies (Hean and Tin 2008). Moreover, in some countries, agreement on nationwide quality standards for school leadership actions (see Ingvarson et al. 2006), as well as the conceptualisation of competence-based qualification frameworks (CCSSO 2000) is being sought. Such frameworks relate to the respective career stages of particular school leaders (Oplatka 2011), to enable adequate initial and further training of skills required for relevant tasks and activities, including the required professional skills (Hean and Tin 2008).

From a scientific perspective, criticism from school leadership researchers is constantly being raised claiming that school leaders with ‘uniform design’ are thus created (Southworth 2002), who are unable to appropriately react to specificities of their individual school contexts (Salazar 2007, Brezicha et al. 2015). An example in this regard, is the professional development programme offered to Cypriot principals, once they are promoted to the level of school principal. The very basic training offered in this program lacks any relevance to the context in which these principals will operate. Instead, a ‘one-size fits all approach’ is implemented, regardless of the needs expressed by school leaders themselves. However, data analysis of the participants’ views in this programme in Cyprus, revealed that they prefer specific preparation and training, especially designed for their needs and according to their specific leadership post (Michaelidou and Pashiardis 2009).

Occasionally, awareness for problem-based learning can be observed in formal professionalisation processes as opposed to the traditional focus on thematically centred learning. In some cases, a growing awareness is observable for increasing the correspondence between the knowledge a school leadership candidate already possesses and the qualification measure (McCarthy 2015, Pashiardis & Brauckmann 2019). Thus, the idea is that most of the principal preparation programmes have a generic content which does not acknowledge the specificities of localities and the variations and influence of cultural contexts.

Altogether, the majority of the formal opportunities offered for professionalisation target context-independent generic skills, whilst professionalisation at an informal level is more strongly characterised by its reference to context and problems (Crow 2001, Walker 2015, Ärlestig et al. 2016). During the last two decades, researchers have indicated that, in terms of improving the effectiveness of school leadership actions, these two strands of qualification should functionally be better aligned:

“School leaders today require greater leadership skills for strategic resource management and for guiding teaching and learning. The skills needed for such a role, which can be distributed, cannot be developed solely in one programme, but rather in a combination of learning, coaching and practising that develops formally and informally. What is required is the knowledge of how best to combine these approaches to provide a holistic learning experience to meet the needs of leaders at different career stages” (Pont et al. 2008, p. 211).

In the above quotation, we would add, ‘and not only to meet the needs of leaders at different career stages, but to also bear in mind the different phases of development in the various educational contexts in which these leaders operate’. Comparative studies on school leadership so far provide little information on the systemic contexts underlying school principals’ actions (Brezicha et al. 2015). For instance, systemic framing of school leadership includes the underlying legal framework (setting) and the structure of its regulations as well as state-organised support systems (e.g. qualification and training programmes) aiming to empower school leaders to do what they are supposed to do, in a particular country/jurisdiction. Against this background there is a growing understanding in recent years for the fact that school leaders’ (principals’) actions are subject to many conditions (Hallinger and Truong 2014). For instance, awareness for the impact of the school’s history or legislative framework on the leaders’ actions developed only hesitantly. At the same time, the assumption that generic leadership styles exist, which have a positive effect on the school’s output, needed to be revised, corrected or modified given evidence from international school leadership and school effectiveness research. Traditional ideas concerning the existence of generally effective leadership styles have been increasingly challenged, not least because of findings from school effectiveness research (Grissom et al. 2015).

4. Increasing the effectiveness of school leadership preparation – what should we know?

International research on school leadership has so far mainly focused on the categorisation of training contents; conceptualisation and conduct, the mandatory or non-mandatory character of training programmes and the determination of professional fields of action (Huber 2004). Research still knows relatively little about the use and effects (see Davis et al. 2005, Darling-Hammond et al. 2007, Dempster et al. 2011) and equally little about structural conditions underlying ‘successful’ professionalisation programmes. In particular, this would concern the fit of personal needs (e.g. motivation) with structural conditions (support given in choice for a measure). Even more so, this would also concern the relationship between professionalisation initiated (and oftentimes demanded) by external sources, and that which is initiated by school leaders themselves. Still, there is a general assumption that professionalisation has a positive effect on the knowledge, skills and behaviour of participants (Grissom et al. 2019). Hence, there is an implicit assumption that the professionalisation of school leaders will lead to improved leadership practice even though the empirical evidence for drawing such a conclusion is, at best, scant and very limited (Pannell et al. 2015, Grissom et al. 2019). At present, it remains open how training of technical skills by formal or informal professionalisation processes works. In total, it should be noted that knowledge is yet insufficient regarding training pathways that are most apt for the qualification of school leaders and their increasingly more complex fields of action, respectively how school leaders can best take professionalisation on themselves (Macpherson 2009). This implies identification but also the replication of effective preparatory programmes and appropriate structures.

If certain competencies characterise the professionalism of school leadership members and if these were to be acquired in so-called competence-based qualification and professionalisation measures, it remains to be seen in how far the acquisition can be visible regarding real-life situations (Tucker et al. 2012). Furthermore, it is yet unclear in how far target-prioritised competencies can be defined, given that school leaders need to take on different approaches, sometimes simultaneously, dependent on the context of their individual school (i.e. administrator, creator, educator, and teacher), thus creating their own ‘leadership cocktail mix’ (Brauckmann and Pashiardis 2011). At present, it remains unclear how technical skills and practices can be acquired, notwithstanding furnishing participants in professionalisation courses with fundamental knowledge about the underlying pedagogical gains being associated with more school autonomy. Only by raising awareness for a systemic grounding and functional determination of the changed role of school leadership, will it be possible to increase school leaders’ readiness to professionalise (Yoder et al. 2014). The educational leaders of tomorrow have to be aware of their new roles and responsibilities, understand and accept them and finally make sense out of them. In this phase they are serving primarily as a flexible anchor and a reliable compass in an environment which changes drastically and constantly and might (therefore) lead to many inconsistencies and uncertainties among other staff members. Hence, a new context-oriented perspective has become increasingly relevant in school leadership research which has so far, at best, been considered occasionally. The concept has been taken on by very few recent research activities and fleshed out (Clarke and O’Donoghue 2017, Hallinger 2018).

Against that background, we would like to describe an existing program which combines (to a great extent) theoretical perspectives and local context examples for principals’ professionalisation, which is being offered in Swedish national principal program.¹ The program combines both context-independent generic skills, whilst creating opportunities for real life application and experimentation of new ideas at the schools where principals are employed. Thus, participants are able to apply generic leadership knowledge and competences into applied situations which are customised according to the specific context in which their school resides. The preparation and training takes place both in traditional classes and on-site when the principals are working, which provides opportunity for reflection and coaching in real problem situations (Johansson 2001a, 2001b, Murakami et al. 2014, Norberg 2019). A short description of the Swedish principal preparation program follows in the next section.

5. Paving the way for context-sensitive leadership preparation programmes – insights from Sweden

To transfer from teacher to a competent principal requires both knowledge and experience. As was previously mentioned, demands on what to accomplish comes from several levels of governance and actors; the national/political level, national agencies, school owners such as municipalities and independent schoolboards as well as teachers, students, parents and the general public. Often, individual principals have higher expectations on themselves in relation to what is expected from other actors.

In an increasingly complex environment, the amount of knowledge about topics that relate to schooling, curriculum, organisation, management, school improvement and societal changes grows immensely. Moreover, the core in a principal’s knowledge becomes more and more context dependent (Clarke and O’Donoghue 2017, Hallinger 2018). When a professional principal role has a common value and knowledge base, principals are better able to meet additional demands over and above the mission of schooling and are better equipped to handle conflicting requirements.

To view principals’ leadership and role as something that can be learned needs a structured view on how to build principal preparation and training. It is impossible to fit in all aspects and knowledge into a single programme, as previously stressed; this means that preparation programmes or introduction to the work as a principal are important as a base for building a deeper knowledge in a national preparation program. Even after the completion of a national preparation program, it is necessary to have in-service training or university courses in order to meet individual challenges, societal and organisational changes and courses with the intention to develop experienced principals. What kind of preparation and training is necessary also depends on whose perspective is adopted. It is not always the same content that is required from the national level, the districts, the teachers or the individual principal, as these contexts vary to a great extent.

In Sweden there is a long tradition of offering the national principal program (Johansson 2001a, 2001b). The program is currently hosted by 6 universities at the request of The Swedish National Education Agency.² This makes it possible to meet expectations from several levels and create a common knowledge framework that all principals in Sweden should take a part in. According to recent evaluations, 97%³ of the participants have indicated that the program is very good or good. At the same time, the program emphasis that to be successful there needs to be a combination of theory and practice. At this point, again, we would like to remind readers how we use the term ‘preparation programme’ in this paper. We consider preparation to be a more inclusive term, which includes both theory and practice and it can happen either before you take the job or while on the job (as is the case in Sweden).

Thus, Sweden´s principal preparation and training differs (in relation to many other countries) since the Swedish National Principal Training Program is offered for the first time when the participant has a position as a principal or deputy principal. Principals are required to finish the three-year program within four years in their first principal position. Some of them have a recruitment course and some have experience as teacher leaders, deputy principals or substitute principals, while others don´t have any leadership training or experience. The participants are expected to use 20% of their working time on the program.

The program has three main courses: Legislation on schools and the role of exercising the functions of an authority; Management by goals and objectives; and School leadership. In the national regulation for the program three main aims are stated, so that all participants get the knowledge in order to be able to:

1. Be responsible so that students and children get an equal and legally accurate education

2. Create prerequisites to goal fulfilment on an individual as well as on an organisational level and

3. Be responsible that all aspects of the school activities improve (Förordning 2011, p. 183⁴).

The Swedish Agency for Education dictates the objectives that the program needs to meet, according to national legislation. Based on the objectives, the universities can then formulate and contextualise the program. This means that the program differs slightly but it is still based on the same intentions and national expectations. The responsible directors for the university programmes meet regularly with representatives from the Swedish Agency for Education in order to evaluate and improve on the program. Moreover, trainers that work in the program meet nationally to get updates and discuss current issues twice a year. Each 6th year new national objectives are presented and the universities apply to get the programmes by sending in a declaration of how they will interpret the content and organise the teaching and learning.

Within the content of the program it is important to combine practice, policy, theory and earlier research (Törnsén and Ärlestig 2018). Since all principals have their own schools it is easier to connect the literature and new insights with the participants’ own experience and local challenges. The program is structured with three-day meetings twice each semester in conference hotels so that an environment is created where the participants can concentrate on their learning, away from their daily stressful duties. Before the meetings the participants read literature and conduct different tasks in relation to the meetings’ themes. During the meetings the participants get input from principal trainers, have seminars to deepen what they have read and practiced as well as being mentored in relation to real-life dilemmas. After the meetings they can take their new knowledge back to their school in order to deepen the understanding and then start to work on the tasks for the next meeting.

The program is very interactive and intends to provide principals with a research-based leadership training. The participants bring their own experience of what it means to be a principal and the training provides them with the opportunity to get various tools and discuss how they can be used, which gives them the skills to transform more generic knowledge into their own context. This could be done by classroom observations in relation to a specific area. After the observation the principal writes a summary of what s/he has seen. The protocol is discussed in class and thereafter the participants provide feedback to their teachers. At the next meeting the focus is on what happened when the teachers got their feedback. Another example is how principals work with systematic quality assurance. Each participant chooses an area in which they know the organisation is underperforming or an area where they have very limited data. During the course each participant gathers data, reads research, analyses findings in conceptual models and suggests strategies how to move forward. In the last meeting leaders from the districts are invited and the participants present their findings in round table discussions (Ärlestig 2012) The program prepares them to have a structured but also critical view in order to make them more independent and able to take well-informed decisions.

Furthermore, the way the program is structured, it is designed to meet the interests and use the knowledge from several levels. The state interests, which are expressed through the national agency, are to ensure that the principals know and follow national regulations and that principals work with school improvement processes in relation to national policy. The National Agency provides objectives and aims as well as resources to the university in order to run the program. The Agency also arranges meetings in order to assure that the education offered to the principals includes the right content and is more or less uniform across the country. Both national and local context are affecting the individual principals’ prerequisites and challenges (Ärlestig and Nordgren 2019). By using a combination of lectures and readings (theory and research findings), policy (reforms and current evaluations) together with the principals’ own experience and examples (practice), the program creates both generic knowledge and specific knowledge related to the individual participant and situation (Johansson 2002). Meta reflection, critical thinking and the ability to use earlier knowledge become part of the way to handle concrete issues and problems. One way to assure the quality of the programmes is that each participant answers a national survey before they start the program, in the middle of the program and when they have finished the program. In this way, the needs of the participants are taken into consideration, and by the end of the program, we can have an impression about how successfully the needs were covered.

The universities provide research-based education. In the Swedish Education Act it is stated that the work in schools should be based on scientific research and proven experience. The universities can contribute with knowledge based on both well-known and accepted research and the latest research within the selected areas. They also provide methods to work systematically and to become aware of different perspectives and methods’ strengths and limitations. Striving to be a modern education program, more and more of the tasks and content are offered in interactive learning methods. Input from professors are followed by tasks that include knowledge and dilemmas from their current practice. Their experience and new input constitute an important part to (together) understand and try out old as well as new perspectives. The participants’ various contexts and prior experiences help to understand that there are many ways to reach the same objectives. The program also provides group coaching. In groups of 5–6 together with a tutor, one participant provides a real dilemma from their practice. Through a strict communication method, they deconstruct the dilemma to create a wider understanding in order to find several alternative solutions. A process that creates both a deeper understanding but also a chance to discuss possible effect of different scenarios is thus utilised (Foshaug Vennebo and Aas 2019). This means that the program creates opportunities to apply new knowledge in real life situations as well as time for reflection and to create professional networks.

6. Context- related school leadership research and its (possible) impact on principal preparation programmes

Framework conditions change and they may cause tension which might result in new leeway for school leaders. The survival of individual educational institutions might not least depend on a school’s ability to forge an alliance between the institution and its surrounding environment, thus being a powerful, structurally anchored and flexible actor in the political arena of decision-makers. Studies on environmental conditions of school leadership actions present an area that still needs to be investigated (Hallinger 2018), e.g. whether and to what extent leadership actions are structurally or culturally determined. Preparation programmes such as the Swedish one, might offer some insightful orientation notes in this regard.

Another area that needs to be further studied concerns possibilities and processes of changes in the contexts that shape structural and cultural characteristics. Everyone shares responsibility in shaping an organisation (each individual is part of it) thus they take part in shaping it. Networking of different spheres of influence needs to be investigated. So far, too little attention has been paid to the genesis of environmental conditions (historical contexts; social, political, societal context, conditions of system structure, room to manoeuvre for actions and decisions) and whether these must be taken for granted (Hallinger 2018). Instead, one might critically reflect on decisions that were led by the seemingly unalterable, determining conditions. It would thus be possible to probe considerations of plausibility according to which the form of a decision (respectively of reaching a decision) also significantly shapes the precursor conditions. We cannot predict how far the enablement of stronger professional self-governance (as is intended by the ‘twins’-accountability and autonomy and the development of school concepts that are appropriate to the given situation), is framed by destabilisation.

We do know however, that despite historical and political changes, schools display the survival of traditional lines. This, once more, reveals that macro-social and macro-political conditions do not pre-shape an education system nor an individual school in a determinist way (school and its actors are somewhat able to shape their environment). Rather, at the borders of systems and institutions, selection of information and decision-making processes are realised as an interpretation following their own logic, enabling room to manoeuvre in ‘relative autonomy’. Context-related school leadership research should pay particular attention to these interfaces; as a result, principal preparation programmes should take such research outcomes seriously as well.

Having those potential dilemmas in a school (regarded as an expert organisation) in mind, a differentiated perspective needs to be taken on about contextual conditions and their role as facilitators or obstacles to effective leadership conduct for shaping and making rich learning environments. We can assume to find different patterns impacting on school leadership actions, for example owing to the social environment or daily routine in a school organisation. Thus, the question of contextual conditions also implies the question of obstacles to certain leadership styles or management practices owing to certain (structurally or culturally-based) patterns of facilitating or obstructing certain leadership styles and management practices. As authors in their different concepts of organisational leadership and school development (Wayman et al. 2012), have consistently indicated, there is no alternative to a data-based analysis of a school’s situation as it currently is (see the Swedish example of principal preparation). This seems to be a conditio sine qua non when establishing a foundation to process organisational and school development. A more context-oriented leadership preparation/professionalisation approach will draw together (in the long run) the notion of strategic development and action planning as a means of improving educational and public sector provision. School leadership, at both the school and the district level, will be encouraged to consider the relevance of such approaches to their own needs and to that of their institution at a variety of levels. By drawing upon this, they might also be encouraged to consider what school as well as teaching related leadership lessons might be learnt which are relevant to their own context.

It still remains a big challenge to reconstruct the concrete actions taken by school principals following the delivery of scientifically grounded knowledge on effective school leadership. In fact, there might be a multitude of leadership activities not at all being related to the robust findings of leadership effectiveness research. School principals obviously enter an (also) context driven decision-making process about if, and how, they wish to use the acquired knowledge on effective leadership. Spillane et al. (2002) refer to this process as sensemaking or interpretation, also in juxtaposition to the context of their schools. We might assume that the process of decision-making about research findings and their relevance for a school principal´s own context is characterised by the ambiguity of how to relate the available universal evidence to the specific and unique contextual challenges (Donmoyer et al. 2012). Leadership knowledge becomes relevant and inspires leadership action once school principals can cope with the meaning and action-specific effects of this body of research-based evidence to their own contextual situation and school at hand (Honig and Coburn 2008). This should (in turn) be of great importance for all principalship training: A theoretical base that principals can interpret and reflect on, in relation to various contexts and situations. Oftentimes, a combination of different theories is necessary to make more sustainable and informed decisions, decisions that are context sensitive and evidence-based.

Moreover, school leaders could be encouraged to consider the relevance of such approaches to their own needs and to that of their institution at a variety of levels and, by drawing upon this, they might also be encouraged to consider what lessons might be learnt which are relevant to their own context. We are certain that some of these ideas will further enhance and improve the dialogue for the initial and further preparation and training of school leaders needed in the future. This dialogue becomes especially important in light of the fact that, school leadership preparation in England (which has a long history), has once more, been left on an ‘ad hoc basis’ (Cliffe et al. 2018).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. https://www.skolverket.se/skolutveckling/kurser-och-utbildningar/rektorsprogrammet—befattningsutbildning-for-skolledare retrieved 2020-02-23.

2. https://www.skolverket.se/skolutveckling/kompetensutveckling/rektorsprogrammet—befattningsutbildning-for-skolledare Retrieved 2019-04-21.

3. Internal report, Evaluation of the Swedish National Principal Training Program 2019, Swedish National School Agency.

4. https://www.riksdagen.se/sv/dokument-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/forordning-2011183-om-befattningsutbildning_sfs-2011-183 Retrieved 2019-04-24.