School Leadership & Management m^ Carfax Publishing

•'^ ™IW Taylor&FrancisGroup

Vol. 24, No. 4, November 2004

The passion of successful leadership

Christopher Day*
School of Education, University of Nottingham, UK

This paper reports multiperspective research on 10 successful, experienced headteachers working

in a range of urban and suburban schools of different sizes (with different school populations and
free school meals indices of between 20% and 62%). All had raised the levels of measurable pupil
attainments in their schools and all were highly regarded by their peers. A key characteristic among
the heads was that, regardless of styles and strategies, all revealed a passion for education, for pupils
and for the communities in which they worked. The research revealed that the 10 headteachers
sustained their success by the application of the a combination of 10 essential leadership qualities,
skills and principles and that these enabled them to manage a number of tensions and dilemmas
associated with the management of change. Fundamental to the achievement of success, however,
was their passion for students, school and community. This paper explores the nature of this
passion in relation in particular to six factors which are fundamental to success; achievement, care,
collaboration, commitment, trust and inclusivity.'

Introduction
The headteachers were selected on the bases that the Departmetit for Education and
Science improvement data for their schools for the last 4 years (1999-2002) showed a
general upward trend and that in the most recent OfSTED reports on the schools
their leadership was described as being 'excellent' or 'outstanding'. Further filters
were applied relating to length of experience, gender, phase and socio-economic
status (SES) of schools, pupil mix and geographical location. The schools in which the
headteachers worked consists of one nursery/infant school, five primary schools and
four comprehensive secondary schools, all of which are in what might be described as
challenging urban circumstances. All of the schools are publicly owned and
maintained by local education authorities in England. Three of the schools serve
communities which are predominantly Muslim. None of the others have a significant
proportion of ethnic minority pupils. Ofthe headteachers, six are men (three primary,
three secondary) and four are women (one nursery/infant, two primary and one
secondary) and all but four of them are over 50 years of age. All but two of them have

*School of Education, University of Nottingham, Jubilee Campus, Wollaton Road, Nottingham,

NG8 IBB, UK. Email: christopher.day@nottingham.ac.uk.
ISSN 1363-2434(print)/ISSN 1364-2626 (online)/04/010425-13
© 2004 Taylor & Francis Ltd
DOI: 10.1080/13632430410001316525
426 C. Day

been in post for at least 5 years and two have been in post for over 20 years. Only one
headteacher had held a previous headteacher post.
Successful headteachers as identified by researchers (see, for example, MacBeath,
1998; Leithwood et al., 1999; Southworth, 2002; Day et al., 2002), inspection
reports and government recognition (e.g. the award of 'Beacon School' or
'Technology College' status) for those schools which excel in areas beyond the
testing/target setting/results obsession are those who attend to the broad moral, social
and ethical issues in educating pupils as well as to the technicist-oriented government
agenda. They are also those who recognize that successful schools need many
leaders. Headteachers in schools in challenging circumstances especially seem to be
aware of the need to nurture staff, pupils, parents and others in order to build
successful learning communities (McLaughlin & Talbert, 2001). Indeed, National
College of School Leadership (NCSL) has placed the transformational and ethical
dimensions of leadership firmly in its developing programmes for leaders at all levels
in schools. In order to counter the possibility of fragmentation of effort and energy as
the 'managers' focus upon fulfilling their accountabilities and responsibilities, it
seems that successful headteachers are those who encourage the development of
communities of learning, supporting a strong mutually supportive, collective service
ethic (McLaughlin & Talbert, 2001). Five elements essential to building and
sustaining schools as learning communities are: shared norms and values, focus on
student learning, refiective dialogue, sharing of practice, collaboration and inclusivity
(Louis et al., 1996; Sebring & Bryk, 2000).
There is a tension between focusing effort upon building capacity in such
communities which distribute power and decision-making and the bureaucratic
model of leadership suggested by the pressures of achieving success in the current
results-oriented environment. Successful heads, it seems, ensure that one supports
the other, despite the tensions evident between their purposes. Multiple rather than
single forms of leadership seem to be what are required, then, in today's English policy
context. As Hayes et al. (2002) note in their empirical study of 'productive' leadership
in Australian schools:
... style is not as important as the willingness of ... principals to contribute to the
development of broad-based learning communities within their schools... . (Hayes et al.,
2001, p. 15)

These headteachers findings ofthe research acknowledge and affirm the work of these
researchers. However, they reveal something more than capacity building, commu-
nity focus and collective service ethics.
They displayed, through who they were and how they acted, a deep and passionate
commitment to their work (Day, 2004). Under such circumstances and faced with
such challenges, they had sustained their passion for education and, within this, their
passionate desire for the success of all their students. This was communicated directly
through their sense of humour, interpersonal warmth, patience, empathy and support
of their staff, parents' and pupils' self-esteem and a capacity for continued refiection
of different kinds (Day, 2001).
 The passion of successful leadership 427

Passion
Passion is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as 'any kind of feeling by which the mind
is powerfully affected or moved'. It is a driver, a motivational force emanating from
strength of emotion. People are passionate about things, issues, causes and people.
Being passionate generates energy, determination, conviction, commitment and even
obsession in people. Passion is not a luxury, a frill or a quality possessed by just a few
headteachers. It essential to all successful leadership. Often what drives passionate
feelings is unconscious: behind the ordered control and professional calm of
headteachers bubble:
... deep, potentially explosive passions, emotions bringing despair, elation, anger and joy
of a kind not normally associated in the public mind with work. (Nias, 1996, p. 226)
Such passion was evident in the study of 10 successful headteachers working in
schools in disadvantaged communities. Their passion was expressed both through
their enthusiasm and also through principled, values-led leadership (Day et al., 2000).
Like effective teachers, these headteachers had a passion for their schools, a passion
for their pupils and a passionate belief that who they were and how they led could
make a difference to the lives of staff, pupils, parents and the community, both in the
moments of leadership and in the days, weeks, months and even years afterwards.
Passion was associated with enthusiasm for achievement, caring, collaboration,
commitment, trust, inclusivity and courage, which are themselves key characteristics
of effectiveness in teaching.
Passion was also associated with fairness and understanding, qualities also
constantly named by students in their assessments of good teachers, and with the
qualities that effective headteachers display in everyday social interactions; listening to
what staff and students say, being close rather than distant, having a good sense of
playfulness and humour, encouraging staff and students to leam in different ways,
relating learning to experience, encouraging all to take a collegial responsibility for
learning, maintaining organized school and classroom environments, being know-
ledgeable about their work, creating learning environments which engaged both staff
and students and stimulated in them an excitement to learn. Six areas of passion were
identified through the data gathered from those interviewed in the study: (i) a passion
for achievement; (ii) a passion for care; (iii) a passion for collaboration; (iv) a passion
for commitment; (v) a passion for trust; (vi) a passion for inclusivity.

A passion for achievement

I get this feeling of passion, almost like a passion for the school. I sense a feeling that she
feels something that when the school achieves that she has achieved in order for the
school to be achieving ... she has always had a strong desire to maintain or improve
standards and to better the school ... to see that people are able to achieve. (Parent)
This comment by a parent about the headteacher of a 1200 strong comprehensive
school near London where almost half the pupils receive free school meals is typical of
428 C. Day

the high personal and professional investment made in their schools by 10 English
headteachers in schools in challenging economic and social environments who, with
their colleagues, pupils, parents and governors, participated in an eight country
project on successful school leadership. The catchment area for the school was
classified as amongst the most deprived 10% in England, with high unemployment.
Students were described by the head as having 'low attainment on entry, with some
challenging behaviour'. The most recent OfSTED report had described the school as
'very good, with a number of outstanding areas, including a behaviour management
policy'. The school also had a good student attendance rate and high teacher
retention;- both key factors in successful schools.
Helen had been head for 13 years. How, then, did this headteacher's passion
express itself? What were the key indicators of success that might be attributed to this
elusive quality? First, it is necessary to define what passion is and why it is essential to
successful leadership.
The example we set as passionate adults allows us to connect to [pupils'] minds and
spirits in a way that we can have a lasting, positive impact on their lives ... by ... working
with the [pupils] at the frontier of their own individual and collective experiences, feelings
and opinions. (Fried, 1995, pp. 27-28)
It is this passion which is rarely acknowledged as being at the heart of the intellectual
endeavours and emotional commitment to service of teachers and headteachers as
they work towards the moral purposes of society through students and young people.
For her, success with the school, which has a 9 3 % ethnic minority population (with 58
languages spoken and 87% speaking a language other than English at home) was
multifaceted. Achievement took time. One part of it was defined as:
getting in the top 5% (of A-Cs at GCSE level). It was the culmination of everything that
we'd hoped for and worked for ... we had to work really hard to get the 'technology' status
... the staff didn't believe we could do it, but it worked for us. (Head)
However, Helen, like other successful heads in the study, had 'lifted' the school in a
number of different ways. When she arrived the school was the least popular in the
area, the examination results 'terrible'. These had improved from 12% to 6 5 % A-Cs
over the period. Students staying on at the school beyond the statutory school leaving
age had increased from 84 to 300. Her values were clear:
... the one thing which struck me when I came herefirstwas that the children were getting
a raw deal ... there wasn't any focus on achievement at all ....
Helen described herself as having 'a great personal interest in children' and her
particular style of leadership as being 'child-centred'. She found the children very
rewarding, 'even the rogues and vagabonds'. She spoke of her interest in her pupils
There's always something I involve myself in to do with children. I always eat in the
dining room ... I stand in the corridors ... I mostly take paperwork home ... I talk to
people face-to-face. (Head)
This was confirmed by others in the school.
She likes motivating others and keeping them on the right track. (Student)
 The passion of successful leadership 429

You always see her wandering around. She's always around and about. (Student)
She's achieved a lot for the school, and aims high. (Student)

A passion for care

These actions were examples of a passion for caring which went far beyond duty. One
of the teachers in the school provided an example of Helen's response to students'
emotional needs and her belief that their education should not suffer:
An eleven year old girl had a baby. The head arranged child care for the baby so the girl
could to her GCSEs and ... she was quite clear that this girl's educational chances were
not going to be ruined and the school was going to facilitate that girl at all costs and that's
what happened. (Teacher)
Successful heads in this study liked children and young people, felt comfortable
talking with them, were interested in learning about their backgrounds and present
realities, treated them as individuals and listened actively to what they said and how
they acted. In short, a core part of their passion was care. Nel Noddings describes this
as one-caring in which:
Apprehending the other's reality, feeling what he feels as nearly as possible, is the
essential part of caring. ... For ifl take on the other's reality as possibility and begin to feel
its reality, I feel, also, that I must act accordingly; that is, I am impelled to act as though
on my own behalf, but on behalf of the other. (Noddings, 1984, p. 228)
Caring, as part of a passion for teaching, is a key construct in the accounts given by
pupils of all ages of good teachers. They are 'helpful', 'fair', 'encouraging', 'interested
and enthusiastic', as against bad teachers, who are 'indifferent' to the individual
(Hargreaves, 1972; Nash, 1973; Woods, 1979). Caring relationships are fundamental
to successful leadership.
It is difficult to envisage a passionate leader without such professional integrity and
whose first priority is not 'connectedness' with pupils, colleagues and self. Without
this, motivation, trust and enthusiasm cannot be nurtured. In leadership in the school,
as leadership in the classroom, care and compassion are essential features of becoming
and remaining connected to students and colleagues. Teachers and students alike
work better when they are cared 'about': an expression of headteachers' personal
beliefs and emotional commitment which goes beyond the contractual obligation of
caring 'for' (Fletcher-Campbell, 1995).

A passion for collaboration

Much has been written about the relationship between effective teaching and school
culture. It is now the 'received wisdom', for example, that collaborative cultures
enhance teacher participation and that distributed leadership in this and across a
wider range of stakeholders, including students, is likely to lead to and sustain teacher
commitment. The heads in this study placed huge emotional investment, nurturing
the capacities and capabilities of students, teachers, ancillaries, governors and parents
430 C. Day

as equal partners in the enterprise of teaching, learning and achievement. In other

words, their aspirations were to build and sustain their schools as communities of
teaching and learning, to make their schools good at learning (OECD, 2001a, p. 3).
Such communities actively promote teamwork, networking, risk-taking, continuing
professional development and participation through cultures of trust and collabor-
ation which coexist with decentralization, accountability, marketization and audit
cultures encapsulated by the term 'new public management' (OECD, 2001b) and the
current narrow usage of input-output 'effectiveness' success criteria.
This role has, arguably, become even more important as the social capital generated by
families, neighbourhoods, communities and other networks tends to shrink in many
countries. (OECD, 2001a, pp. 47-48)
All those in the study focused upon teamwork as a means of drawing upon and
building a fund of social capital, in order to create a store of shared experiences and
foster individual and collective qualities and achievement; increase flexibility of
response to change and emphasize mutual responsiveness and collective responsibil-
ity. What is clear from the data, however, is that such team working was not
encouraged as a means of sharing superficiality or self-protection. It was not regarded
as a replacement for individual knowledge, experience and judgement, but rather a
complement to these. Teams in these schools had both power and authority in
conjunction with the head within an ethic of shared responsibility.
A well calibrated team ... is the strongest team of all. Its total performance is greater than
the sum ofthe individual performances of its members; for this team uses the strength of
each member but minimises the weaknesses of each. But this team requires enormous
self-discipline. The members have to work together for a long time before they actually
work as a team. (Drucker, 1993, p. 79)
Little is known about the ways heads share power and authority with others without
abandoning responsibility for progress. The data in this study reveal the structures of
team working as complex and principled processes in the exercise of successful
leadership.
We work really hard at supporting each other and watching each other leam, modelling
lessons and saying, 'What did you think of this?' One of the things that was brought out
was that we needed to aim higher at what we expected and we needed to take more risks
in lessons and how we organise the curriculum ... you might end up with egg on your face
but every teacher, including me, knows that not every lesson is perfect. ... But at least if
you're taking the risk, and you are organising and planning on that basis, you're going to
raise the calibre of what you're doing. ... But you can't do it unless you've got a team of
people who are willing to go along with you. .. .People who share the view that standards
really do matter. (Head, Primary 4)
There was a sense of a collective rather than individual will to succeed:
It's got the system, it's got the monitoring, its got data on kids, it's got systems in terms of
'pastoral care'; its got monitoring in terms of standards, it's got lesson observation, its got
good practice, it's got INSET for staff. It is a matter of professional pride that we are
technically a good school ... a common and powerful culture is absolutely essential. A
strong school culture makes it easier to value our diversity. (Head, Secondary 8)
 The passion of successful leadership 431

The most successful aspect ofthe school would be the way the staff work together. ... If
they were a football team they would be in the Premier League. They really move into
spaces that one's left, volunteer to help and support each other ... and that includes
everybody. (Head, Primary 4)
All heads focused much of their energy upon creating an ethos of mutual respect and
developing the expectation within the schools that progress and standards were the
responsibilities of all staff. The examples below are indicative of this focus:
This is not a one person act. I'm surrounded by able managers; 12 out of 14 heads of
department are outstanding managers in their own right. (Head, Secondary 1)
There's a huge ethos of one team here. He works very hard at that ethos. (Deputy Head,
Secondary 1)
I say to staff, 'You're all leaders because you lead your area ofthe curriculum. You are a
manager too. You manage your classroom'. (Head, Primary 2)
Before she does anything she always talks to the staff first, so everybody knows exactly
where they are. She is receptive to ideas from staff and she has her ideas. She's the leader.
She delegates. But you can't say it's down to her, 'cos it is down to every single member of
staff. If she had a wonderful idea, and the staff didn't fall for it and pull together, then it
wouldn't be successful. (Teacher, Primary 2)

A passion for cotnmittnent

It's involving as many people as want to be involved and my experience is that if you do
involve them and if you do take things on board, you get even more back. ... That's why it
has to be teamwork with a capital'T' from the very top to the bottom. (Head, Secondary
5)
All the heads in the study had made 'room to manoeuvre' as extemal reform initiatives
(which have the effect of reducing their range of discretionary judgements) were
imposed and as the bureaucracy associated with increased contractual accountability
began to bite. Such leaders survive and continue to flourish in the most challenging
circumstances principally because of the strength of the values they hold and their
willingness and ability to be creative, sometimes in the face of enormous constraints.
Part ofthe reason that successful heads in the study were able to continue to adapt
and to move on in changing circumstances was their awareness of, adherence to and
action on particular core values which focused upon 'making a positive difference' in
the level of commitment of those with whom they worked.
Mr ... is the best thing that's happened to this school. (Before he came) we were in
serious trouble and then we got a great report when the inspectors came round. He's so
happy about it. Every time we're in assembly he always brings it up one way or another.
He always says this is the best school he's ever been to. (Pupil, Secondary 6)
She has the ideas. She's the leader. She delegates. But you can't just say it's down to her
'cos it is down to every single member of staff, 'cos if she had a wonderful idea and the
staff didn't fall for it and pull together it wouldn't be successful. We all agree with her
vision and we all think, 'Yes, we can do it'. We've all got the ambition. (Teacher, Primary
2)
432 C. Day

He's a bom teacher. I don't know where he gets all his energy and ideas from. He always
makes sure he has a difiicult class. He nurtures them. He knows the names of all the kids.
He'll never have taught them all. He knows the family connections. (Teacher, Secondary
3)
I suppose he's the anchor. The whole team of teachers work for him and he obviously
holds it all together. He seems to have a lot of time for the staff and the parents and the
children. I just think he's very passionate about what he does. He wants the school to do
well. He wants the children to do well. I think that's what drives him. (Parent, Primary 4)
I think that in terms of headship you have to be hungry for making a difference and having
your own school, and I know it's the perennial trap of headship to talk about 'my school'.
Yes, I can talk about our school, but there's only one me and it's not the buildings or the
children, although they are variables you work with. You have to have that will to want to
do it because actually the hours are often horrendous. I actually think it's the most
creative job you can have, especially secondary 'cos it's like a big orchestra. But unless
you've got that will to win, unless you've got that desire, unless you're prepared to put
yourself on the line you will never ultimately get the real rewards of success.
(Headteacher, Secondary 3)
He is very challenging but he will not ask us to do anything that he will not involve himself
in, were it needed of him. He does sixteen million miles over and above what we do and
still gets himself involved with the day-to-day things. He is involved in the minutiae, he is
involved in the big picture and he manages it all. (Teacher, Secondary 5)
Perhaps his biggest success is having a productive staff who will rise to challenges, who
will support him, because I don't think that was always the case when he first came.
People had to come on board really, and he is very challenging but will not ask us to do
anything over and above .... So I think that for me is a huge success, because I don't see
many heads who do that. (Teacher, Secondary 6)
For these heads, 'commitment' was made up of a combination of factors, the most
important of which were:

i. a clear, enduring set of values and ideologies which inform practice regardless of
social context^
ii. the active rejection of a minimalist approach to leadership (to just doing the job);
iii. a continuing willingness to reflect upon experience and the context in which
practice occurs and to be adaptable;
iv. a sustained sense of identity and purpose and an ability to flnd room to manoeuvre
by managing tensions;
V. intellectual and emotional engagement with all stakeholders.

A passion for trust

Especially evident in the comments during interviews with all stakeholders were the
exercise of trust, focus upon teachers' motivation and self-efficacy and the emphasis
on the creation and sustained building of productive, participative community
relationships, all strong features of Leithwood and Jantzi's (2004) most recent
conception of transformational leadership. Teacher after teacher referred to a school
 The passion of successful leadership 433

climate in which the head 'trusts you implicitly and will let you deal with things ... you
don't feel as if you've been infringed in any way' (Teacher).
It's not just the pupils, it seems the staff are happy here too. He conveys strong leadership
in everything. He's out there even after school, keeping an eye on things. He leads by
example. He's got everybody's trust. He sort of relates that everything is under control
and he's got his team well enthused. All the staff appear to be very happy and very
committed. If it wasn't for his leadership, they wouldn't be. (Parent, Secondary 1)
... the ease and friendliness is based upon the understanding that we behave
professionally. We tum up on time, we mark our books, and we care about the school.
If all that is taken as read, then we can have a good time with each other. And it means I
don't give people a hard time if their results are down one year .... (Head, Secondary 3)
He is caring ... supportive ... honest... but if people are not pulling their weight her main
concern is that they're not 'ripping the kids ofP. We're here to educate the children and if
somebody isn't doing their job she'll tell them. (Deputy Head, Secondary 3)
She lets people manage. People with responsibility, she lets them do their job with a
minimum amount of interference. But, she's there if you get into trouble or you need
advice, etc. She's giving you a job and says: 'I expect you to do A, B, C, D and E because I
think you're capable of doing that'. So you think: 'Well I've got to live up to that', and you
do it. She takes responsibility obviously, but she basically manages by not managing.
(Support Staff, Primary 6)
This kind of activist professionalism is premised on three concepts: trust, active trust
and generative politics (Sachs, 2003, p. 138). Active trust is 'dependent on new kinds
of social and professional relationships where different parts of the educational
enterprise work together in strategic ways. ... (It) requires that a shared set of values,
principles and strategies is debated and negotiated' (Sachs, 2003, p. 140).
A fundamental feature of generative politics is that it allows and encourages individuals
and groups to make things happen rather than to let things happen to them in the context
of overall social concerns and goals. (Sachs, 2003, p. 144).
Hargreaves (1994, p. 424) adds that active trust means that teachers 'feel a stronger
obligation towards and responsibility for their colleagues'.

A passion for inclusivity

Heads positively encouraged all members ofthe school community to build a sense of
community, continuity and purpose through creating sustained narratives of
experience, and in doing so countered the temptations of seeking short-term
solutions to long-term problems.
Each school, each head, had their unique sense of communal identity - what
Thomson (2002) in her work on Schooling the Rustbelt kids has called the 'thisness' of
schools — within the discontinuities of the environment. Each head had constructed,
with others, a coherent collage out of the multitude of policy reforms, fragmentation
of work, changes in society and, seemingly, 'ceaseless rotation of elements' (Sennett,
1998, p. 134) present in and around their communities of practice which threaten to
corrode them:
434 C. Day

Under the leadership of these heads all the schools had increased the involvement of
the parents in school and classroom matters, so that 'team' had become defined as
encompassing the whole community:
There's a true community spirit here. (Governor, Secondary 1)
There's a real community feeling. The vision is that the school is as successful as possible
for the children and the community. (Deputy Head, Primary 2)
In this school there were one parent families, high unemployment and a lack of home
support for pupils. Yet there was a strong community spirit fostered by the school.
We have parents coming in to do community courses - science, literacy and numeracy -
so that they could help with the children. (Teacher, Primary 2)
The head had established a parents' room and employed a home-school liaison
worker. One head of a school in which 'the majority of children are under achieving
before they come to school' (Teacher, Primary 4) referred to his style as 'Bill Shankly'
management, after the manager of Liverpool's most successful football team:
If you keep telling people how good they are they start to believe it and once they start
believing it then you can actually change things because you can give them the realisation
that they've got a lot to offer. They are the first educators of the children after all, and we
only come in at a later date. (Head, Primary 4)
All made a heavy investment in regular contact with parents. In each school parents
spoke of the genuine welcome, the time given to them unreservedly and their
appreciation of the facilities and opportunities to contribute to the pupils' and their
own learning:
I can come to see the head or any ofthe other teachers and they will always take time out
and go through things with you! (Parent, Primary 4)
Parental involvement was particularly challenging in schools where a significant
proportion of children entered school with 'below average ability in English
vocabulary and experience'. A Deputy Head spoke of how parental attitudes had
changed under the early years of the Head:
There was a lot of work done ... to let them know what was required in the British system
... and they've seen the outcomes in terms of success for their children all the way through
primary and secondary ... and there's a lot more confidence that what the school is doing
is good, and opportunities for parents to be involved in the school are increasing all the
time ... and there have been more parent governors from the community ... the English
classes set up three years ago have been really successful in providing people with the idea
that there is an opportunity to leam as adults. (Deputy Head, Primary 5)
One head spoke of the need 'to be aware of the cultural and religious needs of the
families' (Head, Primary 1) for example, the difficulty of children who had to attend
the Mosque for 2 hours each night in working at home.
A parent at the school spoke of 'the feeling' being right and the support for her on a
death in the family. The challenge for this head and others was 'to get the parents into
the understanding that education is for them and that it's a life long issue' (Head,
Primary 4).
 The passion of successful leadership 435

Community education was a recurring theme and all the heads were actively and
directly involved:
He tries to bring all aspects of the community to the school, and he's involved in lots of
things in the community, and it never seems like too much trouble for him. (Parent,
Secondary 9)
The head of this school was 'passionate about schools preparing young people to
make a difference in the community that they work in' and saw parents as 'part of our
team', and he ensured regular feedback on the school through questionnaires and the
school's website. According to one governor, the head spent 'a colossal amount of
time with parents'.
It seemed self-evident to me that if we were going to radically change things we had to get
a relationship with the parents that was more than just a friendly one but where we
actually get them really involved in the process of their children's education and that they
had some comprehension of what we were trying to achieve together. It was about getting
a real partnership going rather than a superficial one. ... I was very open, right from the
start, that I was going to be very ambitious. ... I think that's taken eight years to get that
message through to greater numbers than we used to do. The vast majority now
understand where we're coming from and have jumped on board with us and have
suddenly seen their children's aspirations rise considerably. (Head, Primary 4)

Conclusion
These heads had successfully countered what Gleeson and Gunter identify as 'the
endurance of structures that continue to limit ... commitment to wider educational
and participation enhancing values' (Gleeson & Gunter, 2001, p. 150). In these
schools 'interpersonal relations had not 'been supplanted by depersonalised or
contrived forms of intimacy which produce new forms of self-regulation such as team
work' (Blackmore, 1999, pp. 137-138; cited in Gleeson & Gunter, 2001, p. 150).
Rather, it was clear that they each had and were seen to have a strong sense of agency
and moral purpose.
They had created in their schools their own reform agenda, what Smyth calls
'educative restoration that constitutes the most likely antidote to the management
ideological onslaught' (Smyth, 2001, p. 128). Emboldened by their passion, each of
the headteachers exercised commitment, care, collaboration, achievement, trust and
inclusivity, and in doing so displayed both courage and persistence;
Such courage enables strategic non-compliance to take place in which priorities and
decisions are made in accordance with ethical commitments to children and contextual
factors around what can and cannot be realistically done. (Gleeson & Gunter, 2001,
p. 152).
If someone says that he cares for some individual, community, or cause but is unwilling to
risk harm or danger on his, her or its own behalf, he puts into question the genuineness of
his care and concern. Courage, the capacity to risk, harm or damage oneself, has its role
in human life because of this connection with care and concern. (Macintyre, 1981,
p. 192)
436 C. Day

For much of the time, the heads in this study worked in situations which may
reasonably be described as difficult, personally, emotionally and cognitively challen-
ging, sometimes turbulent and, occasionally, violently disruptive. It requires passion
to maintain a commitment over time, courage to persist in caring for every student in
the class, those who are able, those who are not, those who are interested and those
who are alienated. It takes passion to continue to believe in and be actively engaged in
one's moral purposes and not to default under pressures of effort and energy. It takes
passion not to be discouraged when school practices must be changed, new curricula
absorbed, new rules of conduct met which seem to emphasize managerialism and
bureaucracy at the expense of teaching. Leading well over time is a struggle and it
takes passion to continue to encourage self and others to continue to lead and leam in
changing and challenging times.

Note on contributor
Christopher Day is Professor of Education and Co-Director of The Centre for
Research on Teacher and School Development in the School of Education at
The University of Nottingham. He is currently coordinating a 5 year, 8 country
project on successful school leaders.

Notes
1. This research is part of a longitudinal, international, eight country study (ISSLP) which is
seeking to establish cross-country, cross-cultural comparisons of successful headship in
Australia, Canada, China, Denmark, England, Norway, Sweden and the USA. For details of
this project see: www.oise.utoronto.ca/~schoolleadership/ssl.html. The English study on
which this research is based wasfinanciallysupported by N.C.S.L., NAHT and S.H.A.

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