The purpose of the study was to explore the daily leadership practices adopted by principals in the rural context within the 21st Century. The daily leadership practices adopted could shed light into the extent to which they understand the requirements and expectations of the role of the principals in the 21st Century. Furthermore, the study also aimed to understand the challenges experienced by principals in this context as well as how they have addressed them.
The ways in which they address the issues could also shed light into the awareness of their roles within the 21st Century. The findings of the study revealed that principals have some awareness of what the requirements of their roles are supposed to be as leaders, while in other areas they lacked the full awareness.
89
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99 APPENDICES
APPENDIX A: LETTER TO SCHOOL PRINCIPALS
PO BOX 299 MMAKGODU 0779 10 July 2016
The principal
--- --- ---
Dear Sir/Madam
PERMISSION TO CONDUCT RESEARCH STUDY IN THE SCHOOL
I S.S Maifala, a Master of Education student at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, hereby request permission to conduct a research study in your school. I intend to interview the principal about his/her roles in a study titled “Leading 21st Century Schools: An exploratory case study of leadership practices adopted by principals in the rural context.” The purpose of the study is to explore the leadership practices you adopt on a daily basis as well as how these practices manifest awareness of what is required from you as school leaders of the 21st century.
Data collected will be treated as confidential and will not be disclosed for any other purpose except for the study. The name of the school will never be showed and mentioned in any manner, instead pseudonyms will be used to protect the identity of participants.
For further inquiries in this regard, kindly contact my supervisor, Dr P. Myende at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (031- 260 2054).
Thanking you in advance.
...
Selaelo Maifala
100 APPENDIX B: LETTER TO PARTICIPANTS
PO BOX 299 MMAKGODU 0779 10 July 2016
Dear Sir/Madam
REQUEST TO PARTICIPATE IN RESEARCH STUDY
I S.S Maifala, a Master of Education student at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, hereby request you as a principal of the school to be a participant in a research study to be conducted in the school. The study is titled “Leading 21st Century Schools: An exploratory case study of leadership practices adopted by principals in the rural context.” The purpose of the study is to explore the leadership practices you adopt on a daily basis as well as how these practices manifest awareness of what is required from you as school leaders of the 21st century.
I have requested permission from the Department of Basic Education to carry out the research in the province and use principals as participants should they wish. If you agree to take part in the study you will be interviewed once and observed for a period of one week. Data collected will be treated as confidential and will not be disclosed for any other purpose except for the study. Your name will never be mentioned and showed in any manner, instead pseudonyms will be used to protect the identity of all participants.
For further enquiries in this regard, kindly contact my supervisor, Dr P. Myende at the University of Kwazulu-Natal at (031- 260 2054).
Thank you in advance.
Sincerely,
--- Selaelo Maifala
101
APPENDIX C : INFORMED CONSENT FOR PARTICIPANTS
102
103
104
105
106 APPENDIX D: INTERVIEW SCHEDULE
1. Introduction by researcher to participant 2. Signing of consent form
3. Credentials of the participant (qualifications, teaching experience, principalship experience)
4. Interview questions
4.1.What are your daily leadership practices in the school?
4.2. How much time do you devote to each of these tasks?
4.3 Out of all these roles, which do you consider the most important?
4.4. How much do you think the performance of the school is linked to your leadership?
4.5 What challenges do you encounter that constrain your leadership role?
4.6. Which challenges do you think are related to the rural context?
4.7 What kind of support do you get from the department of education in your leadership roles?
4.1.8What kind of support do you require that they are failing/unable to provide?
5. The participant is free to share and discuss anything that may not have been covered in the questions and they feel is relevant.
End of interviews
107 APPENDIX E: OBSERVATION SCHEDULE
1. Observation times: from 07:00 hours to end of day (when principal leaves school).
2. Number of days observing: minimum of three per school, more will be arranged as needed to collect more data.
3. Questions guiding the observation:
3.1 How do principals spend their day in the school?
3.2 Do they have a routine? What is that routine?
3.3 How do they interact with teachers?
3.4 What type how do they interact with learners?
3.5 What kind of issues and possible challenges do they deal with in their position?
108
APPENDIX F: LETTER TO REQUEST PERMISSION FROM DEPARTMENT OF BASIC EDUCATION
PO BOX 299 MMAKGODU 0779 07 July 2016 Head of Department: Education
Application to conduct a research study in the Limpopo province.
My name is Selaelo Sylvia Maifala, a Master of Education student at the University of KwaZulu Natal. I hereby request your permission to conduct a research study in five schools in the department of education in the Limpopo province. The title of the research is “Leading schools in the 21st century: An exploratory case study of principals’ meanings and understandings of their leadership roles in the context of rurality.”
I further request your permission to conduct interviews with the principals of these five schools. The interviews will be conducted outside school contact time.
For further enquiries in this regard, kindly contact my supervisor, Dr P. Myende at the University of Kwazulu-Natal at (031- 260 2054).
Thank you for your attention.
Yours sincerely, Selaelo Maifala
109
APPENDIX G: DEPARTMENT OF BASIC EDUCATION LETTER
110
111
APPENDIX H: DECLARATION OF PROFESSIONAL EDIT
10 Kudu Heights 5 Gwai Place Faerie Glen Pretoria 0081
Email: [email protected] Cell: 084 602 8634
05 April 2017
D
ECLARATION OF PROFESSIONAL EDITI declare that I have edited and proofread the Master of Education Dissertation entitled:
LEADING 21st CENTURY SCHOOLS: AN EXPLORATORY CASE STUDY OF LEADERSHIP PRACTICES ADOPTED BY PRINCIPALS IN THE RURAL CONTEXT. by Ms S Maifala.
My involvement was restricted to language editing, proofreading, sentence structure, sentence completeness, sentence rewriting, consistency, referencing style, editing of headings and captions. I did not do structural re-writing of the content. Kindly note that the manuscript was formatted as per agreement with the client. No responsibility is taken for any occurrences of plagiarism, which may not be obvious to the editor. The client is responsible for the quality and accuracy of the final submission.
Sincerely,
Prof VT Zengele (B.A., B.Ed. (Hons), PGDE, M.Ed., D.Ed.) Associate Member, Professional Editors Group