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Journal of Educational Change

, Volume 15, Issue 4, pp 357–376 | Cite as

School leadership and educational change: Tools and practices in shared school leadership development

  • Trond Eiliv Hauge
  • Svein Olav Norenes
  • Gunn Vedøy
Article
First Online:

Abstract

This study examines the features of school leadership as it evolved in an upper secondary school attempting to enhance school improvement through a dedicated team of developmental leaders. We study the team leadership’s tools and design over one school year and report on the evolution of a collective approach to leadership for school improvement. Researchers in a formative intervention research project supported the change process. Cultural-historical activity theory and a set of new technologies inspired the intervention design. The study describes how conceptions and practices of leadership gradually emerged as a collective and distributed approach to leading educational change and school improvement. In particular, new tools and designs for school team leadership were explored and implemented. The study addresses the need to develop shared and collaborative conceptions of leadership in schools. The study concludes that careful planning and skilful orchestration of human, cultural and technological resources are needed in order to make sustainable improvements in schools.

Keywords

Shared school leadership Distributed leadership Educational change Developmental work research Cultural-historical activity theory 
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Notes

Acknowledgments

The University of Oslo, through the research initiative Competence and Media Convergence (CMC), 2003–2008, and the EU project Knowledge Practices Laboratory (KP-Lab), IST -27490 (IP) supported this research. We would like to thank the school principal, the P-team leaders and several teachers at Hillside School who so willingly participated in the research project. We would also like to thank the reviewers for valuable comments in revising the manuscript.

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014

Authors and Affiliations

  • Trond Eiliv Hauge
    • 1
  • Svein Olav Norenes
    • 2
  • Gunn Vedøy
    • 3
  1. 1.Department of Teacher Education and School ResearchUniversity of OsloOsloNorway
  2. 2.Department of EducationHordaland CountyBergenNorway
  3. 3.International Research Institute of Stavanger ASStavangerNorway

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