School leadership in South Africa: towards embedding presence for Principals for the creation of societal value.

Abstract

The study examined school leadership in terms of ‘presence,’ sensing, and societal values in schools in Ekurhuleni South District, in Gauteng, South Africa. The value contribution of society to build cohesion with school leadership was explored. Selective approach was used to select fourteen (14) secondary school principals and three (3) NGOs working with schools. The school leaders and NGOs were involved in structured interviews using Scharmer’s Theory U for the process through an inductive approach and interpretive research. Analyses of the responses helped to establish themes and their categories to explore school leadership and societal values that build school effectiveness. The thesis relied on three research pillars: 1) The Ontological view as the external world of learning and experience; 2) The Epistemological view as a relationship of the researcher and the school leadership as the researched; and 3) The Axiological view as the school context of work for the principal and educators. Challenges identified facing secondary schools are leadership failure, lack of discipline, socio-economic conditions, and instability. The following objectives guided the research: 1) To provide a South African based school leadership framework that expresses South African context; 2) To identify key pillars and drivers for visibility and influence on school leadership; and 3) To identify enablers that promote the alignment of societal value as an expression of presencing. This made the research process participative, conversational, and facilitative to solicit experiences of the participants. To collect data, questionnaires were developed as research instruments. To analyse data, ATLAS.ti tool provided qualitative available data to make information arranged, reassembled and managed systemically. That helped to inform and validate school leadership framework that influences school excellence, collective responsibility, and shared leadership. The research concluded and recommended that the context of society where schools are adds an indirect but important role towards school improvement plans. The study concluded that there is a need for further research on school leadership framework to address school related challenges. School leadership was found as an important factor for school functionality, to inspire teaching and learning and to encourage ‘presencing’ and societal value creation in a post democratic society.