Abstract
Chile’s school leadership is in the midst of a difficult transition in which principals must face new demands and implement innovative practices even though they lack the legal powers and training to do so properly. The search for school leadership is part of a more far-reaching push for decentralization and greater accountability of schools that would grant principals a more central role. The purpose of this chapter is to describe the tensions of this developing movement in regard to the principals’ position, actual leadership practices, and existing opportunities for training. The text also offers suggestions for educational policy that could favor the proper channeling of this transformative force. The content of the chapter is based on available statistics and intensive use of the results of a national research project that its authors are directing. Given the singular importance of the private sector in education in Chile – enrollment in private and private subsidized schools is higher than that of public schools – special attention is paid to the implications of these institutional management conditions for the exercise of leadership.
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Notes
- 1.
International measurements have shown a positive evolution in learning results (for example, a jump in language skills results in Chile between the PISA 2000 and PISA 2006 tests), which do not match the lack of progress shown in national measurements. This has been the object of recent studies such as those of Alfaro and Gormaz (2009) and Donoso and Lima (2009).
- 2.
While since the 1980s the direct administration of schools has been handled by municipal and private subsidized school owners, in the 1990s national programs and educational improvement actions from the Ministry of Education developed. This direct and systematic action from the central to the local level, made the Ministry co-responsible for the results reached. However, the laws that have been passed over the last 5 years reverse this situation. In a sense, this shift involves completing administrative decentralization with real educational responsibility.
- 3.
The private subsidized subsector coexists with a traditional paid private one that serves the national elite- around 7% of all students- and is wholly funded by direct contributions from the families.
- 4.
The Teacher Statute promulgated in 1991 incorporated shared management standards for teachers and school managers such as selection processes, remuneration, and terminations that must be respected by municipal administrations. It also contains some general norms that must be respected by the private sector. The Statute has undergone various changes since 1991, but it has always been based on the principle of having specific regulation on teachers’ working conditions, which distinguishes them from other workers and sets limits on the role of the municipal school owner.
- 5.
There are around 3,000 very small rural schools that have one, two, or three teachers and no school administrators. In these cases, a teacher is also responsible for management duties.
- 6.
Principals’ salaries tend to be 20% higher than those of classroom teachers in municipal and subsidized private schools. The difference is only greater in paid private schools. In fact, the Teacher Statute sets a 25% base salary cap for a principal position, but salary increases based on teaching experience can be as high as 100%. It is important to note that principals tend to be hired for a full workday (44 h per week) while teachers tend to work part time (an average of 33 h per week).
- 7.
Our study shows that 82% of municipal school principals went through a formal selection process and/or public competition, while 80% of those in subsidized private schools arrived at the position as a result of a direct invitation by the school owner or because they were owners of the school. The rate of such appointments of principals in paid private schools is 68%.
- 8.
For the past 5 years, legislation has promoted various initiatives regarding principals that range from the formulation of a Framework for Good School Leadership (2005) to the identification of tasks that principals must carry out; among them, the formulation, monitoring and evaluation of the goals and objectives of the school; supervise classes and support to the technical-pedagogical work and professional development of teachers; ensure that parents are informed regularly of the schools’ operation and the progress made by their children.
- 9.
The General Education Law states that “members of the management teams in subsidized schools or those that receive government funds must engage in teacher supervision in the classroom in order to better meet these objectives.” (Our translation.)
- 10.
The law authorizes school owners to provide Councils with the power to make decisions regarding a set of issues. This more participatory option practically has not been explored.
- 11.
There is a paradox in that municipal sector classroom teachers are evaluated every 4 years using a sophisticated centralized system that includes the analysis of a classroom teaching video. There are consequences that range from economic incentives for those who perform well to mandatory training and possible termination for those who consistently earn poor evaluations.
- 12.
Pedagogical leaders have existed since the 1970s (Núñez et al. 2010) and are part of the normal operation of schools with the exception of very small ones. They tend to be classroom teachers with graduate training in the areas of curricular development or teaching.
- 13.
For further information on the conceptual framework created for this study, see Weinstein et al. (2009).
- 14.
The empirical studies that describe this model are based on the opinions of teachers regarding the various areas and practices mentioned. Each practice is measured using an agreement/disagreement scale. Our study followed this approach, adjusting the indicators to the situation of Chile and applying the questionnaire to a random sample of primary schools in urban areas. The questionnaire questioned five teachers in each school on the principal’s practices as well as those of the pedagogic leader. A set of 42 indicators were defined for principals and 13 indicators were set for pedagogic leaders that, in the case of the latter, correspond mainly to the categories of managing instruction and developing individuals.
- 15.
The unit of observation is the school and the values described correspond to the average percentage of teachers in schools who state that they “very much agree” that the principal carries out the task listed in the indicators defined for each practice. This format was chosen in order to synthesize the information because when it comes to evaluating “the boss,” the population tends to be uncritical and to respond with important components of social desirability. The application of this stricter criterion increases the likelihood that the principal actually carries the practice in question in a systematic manner and not only sporadically.
- 16.
Note that a factorial analysis of the spreadsheet of correlations between the indicators of school leadership practices allows us to establish the following three large categories for the case of Chile: establishing leadership and redesigning the organization (explains 52.6% of the total variance); developing individuals (explains 4.6%); and managing teaching (explains 3.2%).
- 17.
The position of pedagogic head or academic coordinator exists in 72% of the schools in the sample.
- 18.
The survey showed that teachers consult pedagogic heads more frequently than principals when there are pedagogical problems and that the principal is consulted less frequently than fellow teachers.
- 19.
The Ministry of Education has administered teacher evaluation centrally since 2003 (see footnote 13). In order to evaluate each teacher, his or her own opinion is considered along with that of another classroom teacher and the school’s principal as well as a through a teaching portfolio and the film of one class. For more information on this interesting process, see www.docentemas.cl.
- 20.
In our ongoing study, we are testing various interpretations in order to search out plausible explanations for this acritical stance. They include the possibility that principals are particularly undemanding (hypothesis of complicity) or that they do not understand the conceptual categories that would allow them to evaluate teachers’ performance in the classroom (hypothesis of ignorance).
- 21.
The analysis considers the following variables: type of school, socio-economic level of the student body, enrollment, average level of the school in mathematics and language on the national learning test in fourth grade in 2007 and 2008, and the principal’s gender, experience, and training.
- 22.
Fifty-seven per cent of the primary school principals in the sample for which the leadership profile was built are women.
- 23.
The study applied a technical procedure in order to ensure correct standardization of the SIMCE results in accordance with the students’ socio-economic level.
- 24.
This result also is supported by other studies performed in Chile. Volante (2008) verifies that there is a statistically significant relationship in secondary schools between the exercise of instructional leadership, high expectations regarding the students’ potential for learning on the part of the teachers, and their results on the University Selection Test (Prueba de Selección Universitaria, PSU). Lagos (2009) finds that school leadership affects students’ academic achievement controlling for other factors, and that its effect is partly indirect, mediated by the work of the teachers. Majluf and Hurtado (2008) find that schools’ learning results depend on teacher motivation and “soft management” attributes of the principal. Similarly, Thieme (2005) and Garay (2008) underscore the importance of transformational leadership that is expressed in technical competencies combined with charisma, intellectual stimulation, and principals’ levels of inspiration.
- 25.
This is when the principals are not the school’s owner. In our study, 18% of the principals in the sample also own the school at which they work.
- 26.
This generous supply of training opportunities for principals and their high level of participation is mainly due to two legislative changes that have affected the Chilean school system over the past 30 years. The first is the result of the growth of private higher education, due to legislation approved in the 1980s, which has increased the offer of post-graduate courses at private higher education institutions. A second critical development was the Teaching Statute (article 65), which states that those aspiring to principal positions must have completed additional studies related to “administration, supervision, evaluation or vocational guidance.”
- 27.
The “administrative” emphasis of leadership training does not contribute to building leadership practices that schools need in order to improve their effectiveness. International research suggests the importance of in situ training that is focused on the pedagogical function (OECD 2008; McKinsey and Company 2007; Darling-Hammond et al. 2007).
- 28.
- 29.
“Training for school leadership” is not an important area in teacher training. A study by the Ministry of Education (2007) states that “after reviewing 33 curricula for Teaching Primary School programs in private and public universities in Chile, we found that 20 programs included one course on educational management and 13 made no explicit mention of the topic (though it could have been included in optional courses not described in the program materials). Of the 20 programs that deal with the subject, only two offer more than one course in this area (including topics of leadership, legislation and preschool management)”.
- 30.
There was one exception: in 2008 and 2009, the Ministry of Education asked Fundación Chile’s Education Area to carry out a pilot project on induction into the school system for 180 incoming municipal school principals.
- 31.
In our study the time principals dedicated to training and the degree(s) earned (certificate, master’s degree or document) did not correlate to leadership practices and, more generally, to the schools’ educational performance.
- 32.
Due to space limitations, this article does not expand on the functions and practices of Chile’s municipal school owners, who have the final say regarding the operation and educational results of their schools. Marcel and Raczynski (2009) provide an exhaustive analysis of municipal school owners in education, showing how those that are successful allow principals to play a key role and create adequate institutional conditions for them to perform well.
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Weinstein, J., Muñoz, G., Raczynski, D. (2011). School Leadership in Chile: Breaking the Inertia. In: Townsend, T., MacBeath, J. (eds) International Handbook of Leadership for Learning. Springer International Handbooks of Education, vol 25. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1350-5_18
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