Leading the Unexpected Required Practice: The Effective Principals’ Instructional Leadership in Secondary Schools in Taiwan

• In Event: School Leadership in Chinese Society: Impact of Academic Research on School Improvement

Abstract

In Taiwan, although principal instructional leadership is required by related regulations, many ideas and excuses have become obstacles for secondary principals to provide quality service to increase the effectiveness of teaching and learning in classrooms (Lee, 1999; Lin, 2010; Yang, 2002). Becoming an effective instructional leader for the principal in school is the ultimate expectation of teachers, but it is difficult for the principal to be good at all subjects. Principals are not considered as subject experts. For secondary principals, instructional leadership is a required but unexpected task.

In this challenging situation, how instructional leadership is actually practiced in secondary schools becomes critically essential to be investigated in order to bridge the gap between academic research and school practice. It is unreasonable to expect principals to follow all the behavior dimensions founded in the academic research papers (Blase & Blase, 1998; Lee, 1999; Murphy & Hallinger, 1985). Principals in secondary schools in Taiwan have to figure out the practical ways they can take on instructional leadership effectively. This paper has two major objectives. First, what is the practice of the pragmatic and effective principals’ instructional leadership in secondary schools in Taiwan? Second, what are the indicators that principals utilized to judge the effectiveness of their instructional leadership practice?

This paper collected data from six surveys of school principals in different counties in Taiwan from 2012 through 2013. There were two open-ended questions to the survey questionnaire, including “what do you do to enhance the quality of teaching and learning in you school that you see as effective?’ and “What are the indicators that you use to judge the effectiveness of your instructional leadership practice?” This paper collected more than 200 secondary school principals’ responses which consisted of about 1/3 of the secondary schools principals in Taiwan. The valid samples in terms of the size and location of the schools and the gender of the principals are representative to the population.

All the findings are compared with the research findings in the studies of Murphy and Hallinger (1985), Blase and Blase (1998) and Lee (1999) in terms of the similarities and differences. The author also argues that the re-clarification of the objectives of secondary schools and applying the practical research finding in order to bridge the gap between academic research and school instructional leadership practice are crucially significant.

This paper found that the indicators used by secondary school principals in Taiwan to judge the effectiveness of their behavior were closely relevant to students’ learning processes and outcomes and teachers’ commitment and professional performance. Secondary school principals participating in this study indicated that they performed various instructional leadership practices to enhance the quality of teaching and learning in their schools.

In the end, the author provided suggestions to secondary principals in terms of enhancing the quality of their instructional leadership. First, secondary principals should communicate the authentic objectives of secondary education with their teachers frequently. Second, they need to balance both administrative and instructional leadership in schools.

Author

• Ming-Dih Lin, National Chung Cheng University