Cross-Cultural Context of School Leadership

Roles of school heads are changing with time, and consequently requiring a wide range of new responsibilities and the use of effective leadership practices. There are also increased aspects of global diasporic activities and rapid flow of ideas. The school context through which leadership practices are exercised is at the same time influenced by national (country) or societal culture. As a result, styles of leadership practices that researchers have found to generate effective results are being adopted across cultures. This book is a research work that explores the need for situational responsiveness as a means toward effective school leadership for outstanding educational outcomes across cultures, as well as in schools with diverse cultures. The research work particularly questions whether practices of effective school leadership are dependent on local, socio-cultural contexts. To seek evidence to these questions and informed by the literature review, a cross-cultural contextual approach of school leadership is adopted. The study compares the perceptions of effective practices of leadership from leaders of secondary schools across two societal cultures, England and Tanzania.