UC Riverside

Two Principals in a Policy Environment:

Beliefs and Behaviors Concerning Their Role in Instruction

Instructional leadership is one of the most frequently discussed educational leadership doctrines, yet the definition of the concept remains imprecise. This comparative ethnography of two suburban elementary schools develops the precision of the term through consideration of the practice of two particular elementary school principals. The study explores principal beliefs and behaviors in regard to their role in instruction within the school organization.

This interpretive research concluded that these two principals constantly navigated between the institutionalized organizational influences of what it meant to be the principal of a US public elementary school and the local cultural and micropolitical demands placed on their roles as building administrators. These findings revealed that internal local sociocultural influences carried importance even though the two schools appeared to be similar to one another in demographic and socioeconomic factors.

This study found that not only were principals working with a set of formal organizational goals related to teaching and learning, but they were also forced to respond to a different set of instrumental organizational goals necessary to keep the school functioning. In answering to these competing demands, the principals responded in two ways - they used their organizational positioning of the principal within the school and they each drew on different constructs of authority with differing degrees of effectiveness. The positioning of the principal within the organization and the ways in which the principals operationalized their authority within the school produced real as well as formal authority, thus impacting their capacity to influence others. Authority constructs defined primarily by principals' competence (expertise and experience) more effectively influenced teachers and thus the attainment of formal and instrumental goals than constructs defined primarily by positional power (hierarchy within the organization) and authority of person (social/human relations with teachers). This study presented an initial inquiry into the convergence of authority structures and instructional leadership. Additional empirical research will support the efficacy of the use of authority structures by principals to influence teachers and cultivate attainment of formal goals and thus improvement in pedagogical practice.