Between Legal Requirements and Local Traditions in School Improvement Reform: School Leaders Walk a Tightrope

• In Event: 66.086 - MTCC Roundtable Session 29
  In Roundtable Session: 66.086-10 - Meeting School-Based and Local Needs and Requirements for School Improvement

Abstract

This paper deals with how school leaders conceptualize their role in the context of local policy enactment of a centrally based reform, concretely the implementation of a new school type in Austria. Drawing on different theoretical strands (neo-institutionalism, school culture theory) the role of school leaders is conceptualized as gap management at the organizational level (macro level) and the level of local school culture (micro level). The results of an interview study with 25 school leaders of Secondary Schools indicate that they see themselves as double agents: they face increasing demands for the organization to gain legitimacy from both outside the school and from colleagues inside the school.

Author

• Mariella Knapp, University of Vienna