The Nature of School Administrators’ Work in Rural Settings

• In Event: Roundtable Session 21
  In Roundtable Session: Leadership in Rural Schools

Abstract

There is a dearth of literature exploring the nature of school administrator`s work in rural Canadian contexts. This paper explores the nature of principals’ work in rural settings. It seeks to document how principals spend their time, explore the motives and external factors influencing their choices, and describe any challenges and possibilities their work presents to them. These perceptions of 18 rural principals interviewed are compared and contrasted with those of 52 principals from urban and suburban population centres who also participated in this study. This study also looks at the ways in which rural principals’ understanding of their work falls within the revised Ontario Leadership Framework (OLF), which was used to partially frame the nature of school administrator’s work

Authors

• David Cameron Hauseman, University of Toronto - OISE

• Katina E. Pollock, University of Western Ontario

• Asma Ahmed, University of Western Ontario

• Patricia L. Briscoe, University of Western Ontario

• Donna Hazel-Swapp, University of Western Ontario

• Michael Mindzak, Western University