E D I TO R I A L

Educational Management Administration & Leadership

ISSN 1741-1432 DOI: 10.1177/1741143209351668
SAGE Publications (London, Los Angeles, New Delhi, Singapore and Washington DC)
Copyright © 2010 BELMAS Vol 38(1) 5–7; 351668

Editorial
School Culture—Towards a New Model

Tony Bush

The concept of school culture has been a focus of debate for more than two
decades. It has proved to be a fertile way to comprehend school practice and to
connect it to wider issues of national or societal culture (Walker, in press). It has
also helped to counter the dominant bureaucratic assumptions underpinning
school leadership and management. By focusing on the values and beliefs of
leaders, teachers and students, it has provided a helpful means of understand-
ing the ways in which schools operate. More than 20 years ago, Beare et al.
(1989) celebrated the organizational distinctiveness implied by the use of the
term ‘culture’. The advent of self-managing schools in many education systems
has also served to reinforce the notion of schools and colleges as unique entities.
Despite this widespread interest in culture, Les Bell and Peter Kent, in the
opening article, argue that the concept is difficult to define and even harder to
operationalize. They review the literature on culture and note that fragmenta-
tion into sub-cultures often occurs. They comment that research has focused
primarily on teacher views and argue that student perspectives should be given
more prominence. They propose a five point ‘jigsaw’ model and test it through
a 100% sample survey of sixth-form students, supplemented by interviews.
They note that students are strongly influenced by external factors which, in
turn, impact on school culture and conclude that leaders will find it increas-
ingly difficult to transform school culture without engaging with the wider
community.
Michael Salmonovicz and Daniel Duke’s article examines the role of a ‘turn-
around’ principal in a low-performing urban elementary school in Virginia,
USA. The state governor introduced the Virginia School Turnaround Specialist
Program (VSTSP) to address low performance in ‘troubled public schools’. The
authors present the findings of an exploratory study focusing on a single prin-
cipal participating in VSTSP. They track the principal’s decisions, notably those
about creating a culture of teacher accountability and implementing an
effective reading programme. The principal also sought to address teacher
under-performance although she received little support from the district’s

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Educational Management Administration & Leadership 38(1)

central office. The authors conclude that ‘there are no short cuts to sound
decision making’ and that principals need guidance in ‘reading’ the local
context if they are to operate effectively.
Chi-Sum Wong, Ping-Man Wong and Kelly Z. Peng focus on the link between
emotional intelligence (EI) and job satisfaction. They note confusion over the
meaning of EI and comment that recent English research (James and Vince,
2001, Crawford, 2007) shows that emotion is a powerful factor in educational
leadership. They report on two inter-connected studies with Hong Kong
teachers about the impact of middle-level leadership on teachers’ job satisfac-
tion. Their results suggest that middle-level leaders’ EI has a significant influ-
ence on teacher satisfaction and conclude that EI should be an important factor
in selecting, training and developing teachers and school leaders.
The fourth article, by Bernard Moswela, examines how instructional super-
vision is undertaken in Botswana. Instructional leadership, variously also
described as leadership for learning, or management of teaching and learning,
has increased in prominence in the 21st century but this is a rare contribution
on this topic from sub-Saharan Africa. The author notes that instructional
supervision is seen as the responsibility of regional education officers rather
than heads of schools. He administered an open-ended questionnaire with 38
teachers and heads in 15 secondary schools, augmented by interviews with four
teachers and two heads. He notes that most respondents value instructional
supervision but most teachers feel that heads cannot perform this role success-
fully because they are managers and not classroom practitioners. Despite this
finding, he concludes that heads should become more involved in supervision,
culminating in annual reports on performance.
In the next article, Ken Reid analyses the management of school attendance.
He notes that, following devolution, there are now four different national
monitoring systems in the UK. He links pupil attendance to the standards
agenda and notes that several important studies of this topic were undertaken
in England following the election of the ‘New Labour’ government. He also
reviews the position in the other three countries, noting that it is less well devel-
oped in Northern Ireland because of the ‘stop start’ nature of devolution in the
province. After describing the management of school attendance in each
country, he comments on their ‘entirely different strategies’ and concludes that
their approaches will continue to diverge.
The next article, by Warren A. Whisenant, Paul M. Pedersen and Galen
Clavio, is unusual in focusing on ethical dilemmas in school sport in the USA.
They examine the role of schools’ athletic directors and note that sport is a
‘male dominated institution’. They identify three ethical dilemmas: participa-
tion; hiring practices; and ‘climate of fairness’. They comment that one million
fewer girls than boys participate in sport. This is almost certainly linked to the
figures which show that only 14 per cent of athletics directors are women. They
conclude that school administrators should ‘demonstrate their commitment to
a goal of equity in sports’.

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 Bush: Editorial

The final article, by Bill Egginton, examines performance appraisal of

academic staff in higher education. He comments that universities have been
subject to increasing levels of scrutiny in the UK, and notes the link between
performance and reward. The focus of the article is on the management chal-
lenges of formal appraisal systems rather than the relative merits of different
approaches to performance management. Drawing on a case study of military
education at Shrivenham, part of Cranfield University, he shows how internal
and external pressures have impacted on performance review at the university.
He notes the dangers of managerialism but concludes that performance
management is likely to become increasingly significant in UK universities.

References
Beare, H., Caldwell, B. and Millikan, R. (1989) Creating an Excellent School: Some New
Management Techniques. London: Routledge.
Crawford, M. (2007) ‘Rationality and Emotion in Primary School Leadership: An
Exploration of Key Themes’, Educational Review 59(1): 87–98.
James, C. and Vince, R. (2001) ‘Developing the Leadership Capability of Headteachers’,
Educational Management Administration & Leadership 29(3): 307–17.
Walker, A. (in press) ‘Leadership Cultures and the Learning Organisation’, in T. Bush,
L. Bell and D. Middlewood (eds) The Principles of Educational Leadership and
Management. London: Sage.

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